You can pay for Disney parks tickets with giftcards. Not sure about AP's. I called the regular Disney line they had a hard time doing it so sent me to ticketing by connecting me on the phone they can do it no problem. Not sure about main ticket kiosk.
I used Disney GC for my AP.
I called the AP number from the Disney site and took care of all the demographic info over the phone.
When I arrived at DLR I went to the Ticket Booth and picked up the card.
It was easy. They said it would save time when I went to pick it up.
I had one $500 gift card and another $250 gift card that I used. If you had several gift cards in smaller amounts it might make it more difficult if there was a limit of GC's they can input to the system.
When we were there last December we purchased multiple $50 gift cards from the Holiday Pin Series (the ones that came with the Frozen pins). When we upgraded our 3 Park Hoppers to AP's they let us use the cards, so there were quite a few! And we had the pins to give away as gifts (and of course keep our own set). It did take some time but the CM was very nice.
I paid for my premium AP with $50 gift cards from target...so 15 or so of them (renewal before price increase). It wasn't an issue at the ticket booth but they are limited over the phone...I think they can only take 4 over the phone
Sounds like those were Disney *store* giftcards, not normal Disney GCs. After all, if they can only be used in Canada, but there aren't any Disney parks up there, it wouldn't make sense if they were normal GCs.
OP if you have multiple cards, go to disneygiftcard.com to consolidate them! It's a relatively new feature they have.