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News Round Up 2017

danikoski said:
Not according to the offer details on Disney's website. The Special Offer page has the quick service for moderates, but when clicking on offer details before booking a package it comes up with what I posted above, which clearly indicates the moderate resorts get regular dining plan. Disney might want to get their story straight...

Not that I'm booking, but I thought it was odd...
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They probably didn't update that part from last year.
 
rteetz said:
News

There are other package and room only offers beside free dining as well.

http://www.wdwmagic.com/resorts/wal...offers-at-walt-disney-world-resort-hotels.htm
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Yup. Took advantage of the Room Only 20% off of Values. We had booked Standard Room at All-Star Sports (which is actually what I wanted--meaning a Standard Room) however no Standard Rooms were available at any of the All-Stars for my dates....so switched to Preferred Room which really wasn't what I truly wanted but it was hard to pass up the total savings of $83.53 (if it was only like $5 or $10 total I probably wouldn't have done it). The per night difference with the discount was only like $8-$9 because we had previously booked Standard and now we're booked Preferred but still.

We were fine paying Rack Rate (probably one of the only few people on the Boards who would be as my husband didn't want to have to pay in full like UT required, etc) so the discount was just icing on the cake.
 


Honestly if you have a party of 4 or 5 at a moderate, the QS option and then upgrade to the regular DDP is still a pretty good deal. You still save $48 per person per night off the plan. And would get food for your party of 4 for $84 a day (plus tip of course). An honestly at a value that's an excellent deal. I wonder how limited the rooms are for these deals?

I notice it is now essentially completely unavailable for the height for F&W season, with all of October and the first half of November missing.

What's funny if you think about it is it wasn't long ago that the DDP was less than $48 per person, they've been hiking the prices so fast on the DDP that it's now too good a deal to give it out for free.

We used to live on the DDP but I really got sick of "playing the game" to try and plan your trip around it. I am glad I don't have to think about it anymore.
 


TheMaxRebo said:
That's very cool - nice touch to include their home is on Earth. I assume something similar for Star Wars Land? maybe even more themed though?
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I'm assuming SW Land will continue what they do in Launch Bay, and have the CM badges say there home "planet" such as "Alderaan" and "Tatootine". Since humans are from multiple planets in the SW universe, this works out fine, as opposed to Avatar where there are no humans anywhere but from Earth.
 
skier_pete said:
I'm assuming SW Land will continue what they do in Launch Bay, and have the CM badges say there home "planet" such as "Alderaan" and "Tatootine". Since humans are from multiple planets in the SW universe, this works out fine, as opposed to Avatar where there are no humans anywhere but from Earth.
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Agreed. Didn't know if they could go even more subtle as if this is really a planet on the edge of the galaxy, home to smugglers, etc. - the people working there likely wouldn't have name tags giving away their names, and stuff to the First Order
 
skier_pete said:
Honestly if you have a party of 4 or 5 at a moderate, the QS option and then upgrade to the regular DDP is still a pretty good deal. You still save $48 per person per night off the plan. And would get food for your party of 4 for $84 a day (plus tip of course). An honestly at a value that's an excellent deal. I wonder how limited the rooms are for these deals?

I notice it is now essentially completely unavailable for the height for F&W season, with all of October and the first half of November missing.

What's funny if you think about it is it wasn't long ago that the DDP was less than $48 per person, they've been hiking the prices so fast on the DDP that it's now too good a deal to give it out for free.

We used to live on the DDP but I really got sick of "playing the game" to try and plan your trip around it. I am glad I don't have to think about it anymore.
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Definitely depends on how many people are in your party. In reading on the main thread about this it seems like people are doing pretty well finding availability - but at some places it might only be preferred rooms (for example, at PORS I think it is only the princess rooms they are finding, at least for certain dates).

To me with the dining plan it is more about how you like to eat than the actual value. Especially when there are other discounts out there, you can wind up better financially with other discounts and eating differently. (for emxaple, we don't always get dessert, or might just get aps, etc. ... and unless getting and adult beverage we usually just drink water).

I am the same as you as we had it in the past when it was a better value but even then I found myself "playing the game" and ordering the most expensive option rather than what I really wanted on the menu, etc.
 
rteetz said:
News

CMs have newly themed name tags for Pandora.

https://twitter.com/allearsdeb/status/856495041359040513
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Those are pretty cool - though I hope those CMs will also be issued a standard name tag as well. I know it really doesn't matter, and the Pandora tags are probably more valuable, but I would be a little disappointed if I was working there and didn't get the classic version too. I rarely got a chance to wear my name tag when I worked there, but you better believe it has a place of honor on my desk now.
 
Right now I am booked for 6 in a AoA suite with free dining for December. I wish they would post room only offers for that time so I can see which is the best deal.

We upgraded to the regular dining play and were just going to go crazy on the dinner shows and O'hana (what is that one now, about $75 for dinner?) and the character meals. We haven't had free dining for years. I know it isn't always the best deal but for 6 adults in an AoA room it isn't bad. Though I am looking into DVC points rental. The points rental services I always go through never really have availability for anything though, so maybe I'm doing it wrong.
 
PxyShan said:
Those are pretty cool - though I hope those CMs will also be issued a standard name tag as well. I know it really doesn't matter, and the Pandora tags are probably more valuable, but I would be a little disappointed if I was working there and didn't get the classic version too. I rarely got a chance to wear my name tag when I worked there, but you better believe it has a place of honor on my desk now.
Click to expand...

From what I've seen, the CM's who will be working in Pandora are (most, if not all) current employees of the parks who were specially hired for this area, simply due to the additional training that they're undergoing. They'd already have one of the classic Disney nametags.
 
jlundeen said:
Or it might have been different way back when, until they relalized that people were only booking banking on the discounts...I don't know...any TAs on here? Has this way discounts work changed over the years?
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I used to work at the Disney Reservations Center in Orlando. I can confirm that things work differently now. It never was as simple as just tacking on a discount. But in the past, if the guest had the room during the new discount date range, it could be added.

Today, the system processes any date/room changes by checking availability based on current rate and stay restrictions. Therefore, changes are only approved if they meet the current restrictions as if you were making a new reservation.

Although the process is similar to canceling and rebooking, this is all done by the system behind the scenes. Any approved change to a reservation will retain the original reservation number.

(Caveat: Changing between "room-only" and "package" reservations is not possible due to Florida laws regarding travel agencies. These types of changes will require canceling and rebooking.)

If anyone wonders, requiring guests to meet current rate and stay restrictions for changing hotel reservations is an industry standard. Pretty much every major hotel chain on the planet uses this method. Disney was one of the last major companies to switch to this method of inventory control.

Note: I edited this post for clarity.
 
Last edited:
writerguyfl said:
I used to work at the Disney Reservations Center in Orlando. I can confirm that things work differently now. It never was as simple as just tacking on a discount. But in the past, if the guest had the room during the new discount date range, it could be added.

Today, the system processes any date/room changes by canceling and rebooking. That can only happen if what you want is available as if you were making a new reservation.

If anyone wonders, the cancel/rebook method of changing hotel reservations is an industry standard. Pretty much every major hotel chain on the planet uses this method. Disney was one of the last major companies to switch to this method of inventory control.
Click to expand...
That's something I have realized is quite a confusing thing when people talk about applying offers to their existing reservation. Time and time again I've seen people say "no no no you HAVE to book a new reservation then cancel your old one that's what Disney will do anyways".

Sounds like from what you are saying (and this is what I mentioned earlier today in another thread that I thought was going on in the background) that internally the system is cancelling the reservation. When you go in to "Change Reservation" if that option is available your reservation number should stay the same (mine def. did) at least that's what I gathered. I had issues though with Chrome as Chrome did not (and still doesn't) have the "Change Reservation" button--it's just a spinning wheel. Other browsers don't have that issue and multiple people reported issues like that.

What I've seen in the multiple threads is people in semi or full panic mode (at least it seems that way) because they went through the process of making a whole new reservation and then plan to go and cancel their original one (some because of the spinning wheel issue and another browser wasn't attempted/didn't know what the issue was). Some didn't immediately get a "Cancel Reservation" button for their original reservation, some didn't see their new reservations for hours, many questions asked about when refunds would be issued, how long does it take for the new reservation to show up in MDE (many saying I've got the confirmation e-mail though) etc.

I guess I should be glad that I was able to do it easily as far as the actual steps/computer working- I've never stayed on site before so I've never had to do this before. I kept my same reservation number, it showed up in just a few minutes (maybe even sooner as I was off printing the new confirmation page) on my MDE account and it applied my previously paid down payment so no balance was owed. For reference if it makes a difference I was doing the Room Only discount and unfortunately no Standard rooms were available for my dates in any of the All-Stars so I upgraded basically (even though I didn't truly want to) to Preferred from Standard.
 
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