One Villa, Two Families....and Disney Dining.

[DisneyKidds]

Who's had to deal with that scenario, and how did you handle it?

We're planning a trip next year with friends and we'd like to get a 2BR villa. We are big fans of the dining plan. Not sure where our friends will come out on that, and we'll have to address it before we make the reservations. If we are in one villa and using the dining plan, all members of the party have to be on the same plan. So what to do it we want the deluxe plan and they want the regular plan, or if we want a plan and they don't? If we aren't on the same page I suppose we'd have to make two seperate reservations (a 1BR and a studio). Of course, that is more points than a 2BR, and I'm going to guess the chances of us having adjoining rooms with seperate reservations are nil. So you can see my quandry.

Hopefully they are interested in the same dining plan we are and we can handle it with one reservation, all on the same plan. Of course that brings up the use of credits and how you manage those. All the adult credits are pooled, and all the kids credits are pooled, as are the snacks. If they are new to the plan, how do you make sure everyone uses just what they are entitled to? I suppose it will be easy to explain to them what is theirs and how to use it, but it could get a bit tricky managing who has what credits left, and resolving issues if there happens to be any discrepencies. If I don't know what they've used, and it turns out we only have x number of credits left, I may never know if it's accurate or if a mistake has been made. Mistakes are probably few and far between at this point, but I'm sure they still happen. I really don't want to have to sit down each night and go over who used what to make sure the remaining credits are correct.

Any thoughts, advice or experiences with this kind of situation would be appreciated.

 

[tjkraz]

First bit of advice: With that many people going--and it sounds like you want to eat some expensive meals--check out the TIW/DDE card instead. Unless there are 5-6 kids on your plan (to go with 4 adults), I doubt the savings would be much different between the two discount programs.

Aside from that, everything you said is correct. They have to be on the same plan as you for the entire length of stay. All of the credits are pooled.

If you do decide to book a 1B + Studio, I bet the resort will try very hard to put you side-by-side. But as you said there are no guarantees.

Do some calculations and see how they respond. That deluxe plan is something like $80 per adult, per day. That could cost them over $1000 for food alone. Depending upon their expectations that may not be an issue, or it could be the difference between going on the trip and not going.

Make sure you give some consideration to how much time they plan to spend with you during the trip. If they don't want a dining plan, it's one thing to figure out a way for you to buy the Deluxe and them to pay-as-they-go. However, if they anticipate spending most of trip side-by-side with your family, and you are stopping to eat three sit-down meals per day, things may not work out quite so well.

 

[DisneyKidds]

Thanks for the advice.

Yes, we have some logistical issues to work out, and we need to get a handle on them before we make the reservations. No, I have no idea what their view will be on a vacation food budget. They won't be paying for lodging, but they still might not want to spend a lot of dough on food, like we typically do. I do know we would try and plan some meals with them, character meals with the kids, but how much time we spend touring together is an unknown. We are WDW vets who like to take it easy and know we'll be back again soon, while this will be a first trip for them and their kids and who knows when they will go again.....so they may feel the need to see and do more than us.

We'll have 5 adults (that includes a ten year old) and 4 kids in the party. We do have a Tables in Wonderland membership that we use in conjunction with the dining plan. It's just too easy to recoup the $60 membership fee on just a few meals not covered by the plan, along with a couple of drinks or other non covered items here and there. So if we can't agree on a plan for the group we always have that discount available to us without complicating things. Of course on this last trip we saved closer to 30% with the DDP, so the TIW route wouldn't be quite as beneficial for us. However, for a trip with someone else, giving up $100 or so in savings might be worth it to keep things simple.

Definitely looking forward to bringing our friends, but when you really start planning you realize there are many more issues to work out besides "do you want to go with us". Last time we brought another family with us there was no dining plan to complicate the situation..........

 

[Deb & Bill]

If you already have the TIW card, just skip the dining plan. We did it once and thought it was way too much dining. I can't even imagine getting the deluxe dining plan - three sit down meals a day is a waste of my time - plus waaaaayyyyy too much food for this family. Let me add that we enjoy eating but couldn't use all our credits the one time we did the plan.

On our last trip we didn't do the plan and just used our DDE card. We didn't spend all that much on food (maybe one TS every other day) and one CS every day or so.

If this is their first trip to WDW, you really, really need to show them around and play the tour guide. I'd bet that is what they are thinking will happen unless you make it clear that they are on their own other than a day or two or a few meals together.

 

[DisneyKidds]

Thanks for the input. It may turn out that skipping the plan and just using the TIW discount is the best option, assuming they aren't interested in a dining plan. If they want the dining plan we'll do it. If they don't, or don't want the same plan, splitting the reservation into two rooms would cost us more in the extra points we'd use than the dining discount we'd give up. It helps to think it through though.

Hopefully they are interested in a dining plan. For us it has always bee a no-brainer. Our TS meals more than cover the cost of the plan, and the CS and snacks are essentially free. We always save more than 20%. We did the deluxe plan last week and our savings was over 30%. It was only a two day reservation, but our credits covered three signature meals and a character breakfast. Three meals a day is too much, but if you plan on doing any signature dining the deluxe plan is a good value.