My Disney Disaster

[Butterflies31]

I have a trip planned for March 1st booked and paid for to go to Disney World. Its our families 1st Disney Vacation. I have 3 Children who are so excited to see Mickey and Minnie. Me and my husband have been married 14 years and never been on a honey moon. I guess you can say that this trip will be our all in one vacation. A first of things in our lives. SO we are so excited bursting with Joy, Only 1 thing the whole trip is depending on Income tax returns. SO we did our taxes and got it out of the way early thank goodness. now we where told that our taxes got rejected and it will be another month until we get them. My husband and I just went threw an hour of me crying and him sobbing and calling the travel agent back asking about trying to reschedule our trip. They told us by moving our trip around it will cost us an extra $700.00 So now I must figure out how much cash I need to get threw my 1st 2 days in Disney. Does any one have a ball park figure how much money a family of 5 averagely spends on a day in Disney World.. We booked all our dinning so I assume I need to account for tips and all. I have a hopper pass and a Disney dinning plan. DO any of you have a suggestion? Can we still make this a Fantastic vacation?

 

[johnsonmatt3]

make a budget of maybe 20 dollars a day per person and try to bring some food from home. also there is a store called mickeys market or mart. everything there is under 10 dollars.

 

[Chelley00]

We booked all our dinning so I assume I need to account for tips and all. I have a hopper pass and a Disney dinning plan. DO any of you have a suggestion? Can we still make this a Fantastic vacation?

You could drop the park hoppers. You could downgrade to Quick Service dining plan which would save you tips, or drop the dining plan all together, then share meals, eat in your room from groceries etc. Tell the kids that all their souveniers have to wait until the last day.

You can do Disney cheaply and still have a great time! Good luck!

 

[nmmom95]

I second dropping the park hoppers. That is an extra $52 per ticket. You can look at the prices for the restaurants you have booked and figure out your tips. Prices and menus can be found here:
http://allears.net/menu/menus.htm
Relax! You can still have a great time!

 

[DisneyBamaFan]

Your post is confusing. You need to calculate the amount of money that you would spend in the first two days because you will not have the income tax return for those 2 days? If so, minimize the TS meals on those days (to avoid tipping until you have the money) and wait on all souvie purchases for a few days. I don't see why you couldn't avoid all spending for two days if your tickets and dining plan are paid for already...

 

[Leajess99]

It sounds to me like you are still depending on that tax return and I would just like to warn you that if you are indeed that you may want to wait and go when you have money in hand or stay offsite at a cheaper place. I know how devastating that is but what if you get down there and the money still is not deposited in your account??

 

[a1tinkfans]

Oh My, OP, that IS a shame..And you are so close to your trip....But I too am confused.....if it is paid for, what do you mean, save for the first 2 days??


Are you totally depending on a check clearing for this vacation.
While I wish you the very best of luck, it sounds like your family cannot really afford the trip right now ....If you have your heart set, what about downgrading a resort, removing the hoppers, trying Quick serve instead of Sit down Dining???
Is that a possibility for you or should you re-schedule when you are financially more stable?
Good Luck OP, its a tough situation, Heres hoping you have some luck and sending Pixie Dust your way!

 

[Butterflies31]

Ok my trip is all payed...
We are just worried about spending money because we are on a tighter budget now that we are not getting that extra money... It was like our big plan to have the kids have at least 100 dollars to spend.. So now we have the 1st 2 days of the trip broke, because my husband gets paid while we are on the trip I can be one to tell you all do not depend on Tax returns to go on vacation... Thank you all for the advice.. My angsiety is just getting the best of me..

 

[monkey30]

Ok my trip is all payed...
We are just worried about spending money because we are on a tighter budget now that we are not getting that extra money... It was like our big plan to have the kids have at least 100 dollars to spend.. So now we have the 1st 2 days of the trip broke, because my husband gets paid while we are on the trip I can be one to tell you all do not depend on Tax returns to go on vacation... Thank you all for the advice.. My angsiety is just getting the best of me..

Well hopefully this will help, we just came back from WDW last week, and with the quick service dining, we did not spend much at all. I would say about $400.00 total, we spent $80 at walmart getting breakfast food and snacks, water that kinda thing, to cut down on park spending, and the only other money we spent in the park was for a popcorn bucket (we always get one!) and some special things to bring home. We did do a character breakfast and put it on our credit card. But that was all. We found the quick service plan was alot of food, and we actually were frantically trying to spend credits the last few days.

 

[melancholywings]

Buy and hide souvies from the Disneystore before you go. Then leave them on the kids pillows the next day.
If it's a small stuffed animal let the kids carry it around in their backpack while at the park. It lessens the temptation of wanting to buy a $20 one when you walk by all the souvie stands.

 

[wdwmom0f3]

If your trip is already paid for, you don't have much to worry about. Just tell the kids that they can buy something towards the end of the trip & give them the money later. When we go to Disney and we are on the DP, we don't spend that much money at all. Just take some items from home to eat in the mornings, have a CS for lunch, a snack later & dinner out. Everything but your breakfast is covered. If they need an extra snack, let them get one and pay for the others later in the trip. You will only need to have money for the tip at dinner for yout TS meal. Believe me, it's doable so don't stress about it.

 

[Allisdad]

We took our daghter for the first time last September and she was so overwelmed with the parks she didn't even ask for anything until we went to downtown disney. If you want you can also charge things to the room and pay for them at check out.

 

[MerriH807]

Can't you charge the tips to your room and then pay for it at the end of your trip??

 

[Donaldswife]

Can't you charge the tips to your room and then pay for it at the end of your trip??

That is exactly what I was thinking. If you are staying onsite just charge everything to the room and pay for it when you check out. Then you only have to worry about the total for the week and not day to day....You can charge the gratuity to your room even if you are on the dining plan, that is how we handle it every year!

 

[Ericandjenng]

Since your plans are made and it's hard to rearrange ADRs at this late date, check the dining section here on the DISBoards or on Allears.net. Both have the menus for the restaurants and their pricing. Sorry if I missed how many are in your group but on our previous trips (2 A, 1 C) with the DPP, our TS meals with tax were $80-100...so about $15-20 was the tip portion.

Drinks and snacks oop are usually in the $2-2.50 range. Also with the DP, you can use your snack credits early in your trip and pay oop for the remainder when you run out.

Also one of our tricks is more for sanity sakes than anything else...we bring a box of cereal so that my son can have breakfast without waiting on us to get out and to a park each day. Otherwise he gets cranky...we just buy milk each night on our way back to our room.

Do make a plan with your children to look in the early part of the week and buy toward the end of your stay. Tell them, there is so much to see and choose from that they don't want to spend it before they know what all there is. Almost everything that is available in the parks is also available in DTD somewhere. Also, since you have the park hoppers, you can always take an afternoon later in the week and go back to get that one special thing.

If you plan on using your KTTW card for charging purposes, you can put a credit card down and still pay in cash at the front desk before leaving.

Hope this helps

 

[charming]

Im so sorry for you. Im using my refund to help pay for our trip and so is other members of my family, i dont know what i would do. I hope everything works out for you but there is alot to do thats very little to no cost it has alot to do with how old your DC are. Good luck

 

[kim929]

And don't forget you can use your debit card for room charges, Disney doesn't actually charge the account until your reach 500.00. So if your husband is getting paid during your vacation, you should be fine. last time I went, I packed a suitcase of all snacks and breakfast stuff for the kids. ARe you planning on getting the resort mugs? I believe they are 13.00 ( they were last year when I went) ea with free refills at the resort, that cuts down on drinks at least while at the hotel.

 

[DisneyTravelers2008]

best of luck to you...we jsut did it on a budget for a family of 4...me, hubby, 12 yr old son and 6 yr old daughter. We packed lunches and snacks and took them in with us. This saved so much $! But, after reading closer it sounds like your food is paid for already.

For tips, you wont have to tip for counter service. For table service, the average tip is probably about $12 to $18...depending on where you go.

You can put a credit or debit card on file at your room if you stay on property and charge tips and expenses to the room and pay for it all at check out...you just have to keep track of how much you charged It is helpful...but be careful.


As for buying things fo rhte kids, we stayed busy with parks, rides, shows and meals so it was easier to avoid the stores. On one trip, I did get some budget friendly things Disney for them b4 we left and wrapped them up and took them with me. In teh mornings b4 we left for the day at the park, I left them open something special so they would not ask for expensive stuff at the park. this helped too.

Good luck! Have a blast!

 

[DisneyTravelers2008]

We were going to use our refund to renew our anual passes but my husband's car needed seroius work so thatplan went out the window................waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaah!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[sparklynails23]

Can't you just use a credit card and pay that off when you get home? If that isn't in the cards, just eat snacks from home and use the microwave at the food court to warm up some breakfast and dinner food. I've done it on a cheap trip, and to be honest, my kids usually didn't get souvenirs. Well, they might have gotten one cheapie each trip, but I bought spinners and those light up necklaces at home, and they didn't really ask for anything else. Those "must have" overpriced Disney trinkets just sink to the bottom of the toy box when you get home, anyway.