Prepaying with gift card…..

[CoolDisneyCat]

I’m buying gift cards at Target to use for our Jan. 2023 trip. I‘d like to give them to the front desk when we arrive and then charge against them with magic bands. I’d also leave a credit card number in case we went over.
But.. what if we didn’t spend (stop laughing!!) the whole amount. How would Disney refund the money?

 

[starry_solo]

I’m buying gift cards at Target to use for our Jan. 2023 trip. I‘d like to give them to the front desk when we arrive and then charge against them with magic bands. I’d also leave a credit card number in case we went over.
But.. what if we didn’t spend (stop laughing!!) the whole amount. How would Disney refund the money?

It's a hit and a miss as to whether you can pre-pay an account with gift cards. There are reports that you can and some that you can't.
You still have to put a credit card on file in order to charge to the magic band.

Most people put a card on file and then every day or two go to pay it down with the gift card.

If they let you put the money from a gift card down, then any excess would be refunded to the same gift card(s).

 

[Rm4OneMore]

Refunds are usually made to your original payment source. Make sure to hang onto your gift card. If you use digital gift cards, buy a physical card, and transfer the balance of the digital cards to the physical card(s).

 

[gottalovepluto]

One time a CM processed my entire gift card for me but it was only like $20 over what I owed for the room. All of my other stays (more than I care to own up to lol) it’s a hard no on prepaying any more than your room and parking until you have incurred the charges. The problem they tell me is refunding when you pay with a gift card is apparently a humongous hassle.

Imho 95% chance you will need to put your credit card or debit card on file to enable room charging (and be ready for it to be Pre-authorized and aware that could lock up your credit limit funds for up to a week) and then periodically, or on the last night of your stay, go to the front desk and pay down your account with your gift cards.

 

[CoolDisneyCat]

My room’s already paid for.. DVC.. so sounds like the best idea is just put down a credit card and go down the last night and give ‘em my gift cards.
thanks for your responses!

 

[starry_solo]

My room’s already paid for.. DVC.. so sounds like the best idea is just put down a credit card and go down the last night and give ‘em my gift cards.
thanks for your responses!

Depends on how much you spend. There are spending limits and then the credit card gets charged. That's why people go every day or two days to pay down the balance. Although, if your room is paid for, why don't you just use the gift card to pay at the point of purchase?

 

[Twilghtsprkle]

My room’s already paid for.. DVC.. so sounds like the best idea is just put down a credit card and go down the last night and give ‘em my gift cards.
thanks for your responses!

No! They charge every couple of days. More often if you charged a bunch that day. So to be safest of nothing going against your credit card you need to go down about every night. Not morning since they process the charges overnight.

 

[scard192]

Use the gift cards for mobile ordering; you can't use your Magic Bands to pay for that.

 

[Swimgirly]

I went down on the last night to pay my balance with a gift card and they had already charged my credit card. I did insist that they refund my credit card and take the funds from my gift card. It took them a minute (they weren’t happy about figuring it out), but it can be done! Based on my experience, I would go every couple days.

 

[CoolDisneyCat]

Use the gift cards for mobile ordering; you can't use your Magic Bands to pay for that.

This is good to know! But you pay when you order so I suppose you can’t.

 

[Zortrium]

Confirming some reports and speculation above, last month I checked out with a negative room balance from prepaying the room account with GCs (only happened because someone in my party came down with covid and we left early...)

Disney refunded the credit balance to the gift cards charged to pay the room, which I no longer had since the hotel disposed of them. Billing department is working on issuing me a fresh gift card with the total balance owed.

So, it's certainly a hassle, but they can deal with this situation.

 

[SL6827]

I will need around $1100 on a couple gift cards for our disney dining with our next trip. I do not like to carry that much on me at any time, I won't. So i will either pre-pay my room or go and pay down every few nights. I rather just pre-pay the room.

 

[eticketplease]

Depends on how much you spend. There are spending limits and then the credit card gets charged. That's why people go every day or two days to pay down the balance. Although, if your room is paid for, why don't you just use the gift card to pay at the point of purchase?

I’m a DVC member as well and never pay with physical gift cards at the time of purchase. We use the magic bands for the pure convenience. We are not always together so the members of are family can make purchases and it is ultimately paid with gift cards without the possibility of losing them in the park. I do save one card on my phone so that I can copy/paste when doing mobile ordering. After about two days I will go down and pay off the balance. Even if I do not have enough gift cards I continue to use the magic bands as my card on file is a Chase Reserve that gets 3x on Travel and I do not know what some of the merchandise shops code as but we know the room is coded as travel.

 

[beldred]

It's EXTREMELY rare for them to allow you to pre-pay on your account with a gift card. And even if they did, you have to link a CC to enable magic band charging.
I pay for my full trips with gift cards and we go every year. I can tell you in all the years since the magic bands started, I've had *one* CM who loaded a gift card to my room account on day 1 as a pre-pay. It's really not a hassle though to use them -- We charge throughout the day with our bands (with mobile ordering now, we pay directly with gift card - save the card number in a notes file on your phone and just copy/paste!) using them for food, shopping, whatever. Then every evening when we come in from the parks, as we pass through the lobby I stop off at the front desk and pay whatever the current balance is (the concierge can also do this for you if the front desk is busy with check-ins). I've only ever had an issue where they had already charged my credit card one time (and that was because we had a very large spending day at Epcot Food & Wine) but they offered to reverse that charge and let me pay with a gift card. It took a few extra minutes but that's been literally once out of dozens of times.
You do want to have a physical gift card with you. They can usually run a digital one, but it's a lot more work for them and not every CM knows how to do it. I carry one physical card with me and transfer to it from my others as needed using the disney gift card site. That way I'm not carrying around thousands in gift cards. I have at least 2 other physical cards on the trip, usually locked in the room safe. That way if something happens to my "main" card, I can immediately move the funds off it to one of my back ups.

 

[CoolDisneyCat]

Thanks for the replies, everyone! Your advice is welcomed.
I don’t want to use my gift cards in the park or restaurants cause I don’t want to keep track of balances or carry them around. It’s fine with me if they charge against the credit card I have on file. Using magic bands is so easy.
I’ll just stop by the desk every few days and give them a gift card to pay down my balance. Seems like the easiest.

 

[Gator Kate]

On my recent stay at BWI I applied a gift card to the balance due on my room at check-in. What made it easy is that the amount on the card only covered about half of what I owed for the room portion of my stay . It was deducted immediately and the rest of what I owed went on the credit card on file with the hotel. It was very simple and CM had no problem with it. I hope this helps someone.