My DDE pickle

[Mary Anne]

This is kind of involved so please bear with me.

We're DVC (Disney Vacation Club) owners and have invited family to come with us to Disney for a "family" vacation I have reserved a two bedroom OKW villa and an extra studio. So we've got sleeping spots for 12. For 5 nights. So we'll have a full kitchen, two mini kitchens and a full washer & Dryer.

At this point we have the following group coming:

Me, DH and two sons (18 year old and 16 year old)
My MIL 90
My Dh's uncle - 91 (his wife of 65 years just passed away)

yup you read that right two 90 year olds

I'm crazy but I'm not psyco we need help with the 90 year olds, so we've invited my nephew (29) and neice (32) (who MIL raised due to death of their mother right after birth of nephew) and their father.

So at this point we've got 9 people staying with us in our DVC home.

However, my nephew's girl friend and her family will also be there, so that's another 5 (this group has taken care of their own rooms)

So, my question is DDE only lets you have 10 for dinner right to get the discount? We won't be able to use it for any number of meals over 10 at one sitting? My nephew has a DDE card so he told us not to worry, but what if some meals we ALL eat together, what hapens then.

On one hand, I think, just order the DDE pass as we know we'll be back ourselves in December for 13 days but then I think, why start it now and it'll expire end of June next year. Why don't I wait till my next trip and start it then, so it'll be good for a full year from that point.

Has anyone hear traveled with a group? How did you handle it?

 

[carol1231]

Ok, I may be wrong here because I haven't traveled with a large group. But, I think the card will handle 10 people in your party, so that savings on the 10 people would be significant enought to pay for the price of the card and then some. So wouldn't you still be saving?

 

[Luv2Roam]

I have not traveled with a group. But I have used my DDE discount card for up to 6 people (including myself).
My understanding is you will have a DDE card. And your nephew has his too.
The DDE allows up to 9 or 10 people. I forget which. You each can have that many, since you have different cards. I assume you are not both linked to the same card.
Be aware the dining checks will be combined onto whichever card is used. As example, if you have 6 guests on your card for the discount, all 6 guest checks will be one total bill. You won't be able to have separate checks.
It use to not be a big deal. Now it is a rarity a server will allow separate checks.
Just be prepared for whatever check splitting you will need to handle on your own.

 

[Mary Anne]

No at this point only Nephew has an active DDE card. Sorry I wasn't clear about that. I can't decide if I should order one for my family so that would give us two? I'm not concerned about splitting the bills as we'll all just chip in cash to pay and I'm sure one meal will be paid for my Uncle and one by MIL (that is their style). What I'm trying to find out is if there are more then 10 of you eating if they will allow the discount with only one card.

 

[Amyrlin]

I would say it is worth ordering one, as then you can use it whenever your nephew is not with you, as long as you are going to spend more than $300 on food it total, as that is the break even point.

 

[Luv2Roam]

I agree with Amyrlin.

 

[Mary Anne]

See that's it, I doubt we're going to eat out more then one meal a day for the 5 days we are there. 90 year olds just don't eat like teen agers. And we'll have the full kitchen for breakfast, lunch and snacks in the room.

I guess the deciding factor is if the other group does eat with us, and if so how many meals. Maybe, I'll just wait till I get there and make up my mind after day one.

First two days we've got a suit at the Movies for just my family and my MIL, then we move to OKWest with the rest of them for the next 5 nights.

 

[Cheshire Figment]

If you have more than ten people and two have DDE cards you can have the bill split into two groups, and each will be able to have a separate DDE card discount applied.

Two things to consider -- (1) it must be a separate card with its own account number and not a spouse card. (2) even if one (or both) of the groups are smaller than the number for mandatory gratuity, if the toal is equal or greater the gratuity will be automatically added to both bills.

Minor technical point -- the break-even is at $281.69 (not $300.00), because the discount will affect the sales tax.

 

[Jasminetigger]

We were there last June and on several occasions we had 12 in our group. I asked our server how they would handle the bill. She said 10 meals would be discounted and the other two would be normal price. Then she winked at me and said or maybe magic would happen and the whole bill would be discounted. And that's exactly what happened. Not at just this one meal but all of the meals with our group of 12.