Most efficient way to pay with gc

[Kt75]

We are planning to buy gcs in total and the some for resort charges for our April trip. Let's say I buy $5500K in $100 gcs (55 cards)

What's the best thing to do? I saw you can combine the cards on disneygiftcard.com up to one card $1K.

Should I just combine all the cards and call in the codes to CM before our stay? Or can I just call them to enter the codes per 55 card? Is there a limit I can do this per day?

Also is it good idea to have an gc with a large balance for daily resort charges? Should I go smaller amounts?

The reservation currently has MiL cc since it's a grandparents trip for DD; but payment is out of a shared Balance for charges. Don't want her to get an bill for $5k amount

 

[ncc1701]

My understanding is that you can't put them on your resort account like you do the credit card. Many people charge the room then go down to the front desk and pay the balance off before they reach the charge limit for their resort. We use GC and just use them as a form of payment when we are at restaurants etc. If you are getting that many combining them would be a good idea. Maybe leave a few at the smaller amount but I would not take 55 cards.

 

[tseitel]

That what we did. Every few days I would stop at the front desk and pay off my charges using gift cards.
I would definitely combine some, and not take so many cards.
Also, just in case, keep the cards you used- if there are any problems and you need a refund on something, they put the funds back on the gift card used.

 

[imagineer52]

If I'm reading the original post correctly, you mean to pay off the room/package balance, before your trip, right? I would combine them so you don't have quite as many, you don't have to though. It can get a mess to keep track which are combined, since the website only allows you to have 5 cards at once. When you call Disney to pay, they actually take payments through their automated system (which I think works pretty well!), so you aren't bothering a person with that many gift cards. This way you can do all of them, or a couple a day, once a week, etc. For gift cards for charges on your trip (food, souvenirs) I wouldn't put more than 100 or so on a gift card. Just in case it's lost, it's lost. I certainly wouldn't want all my eggs in one basket. Hope this helps!

 

[buzznina]

I combine our GCs a couple of ways. I will combine to get enough $1000 GCs to call in and payoff the reservation before check-in, so much easier doing a couple of cards vs 20-30. Then for our trip, I like to combine them into $500 GC and keep them in the room safe and we will charge everything back to our room. I then will stop at the desk every 3rd day and pay the balance off with our GCs and I also get a detailed printout of our charges that I can go over to make sure there were nothing unusual.