Sharing Credits...What is Disney's reasoning?

[jelliott04]

Not sure if I worded the title correctly and I'm sure to get flamed.

THIS POST IS ABOUT WHY DISNEY DOES IT THE WAY IT DOES and not about cheating the system. I'd never cheat the mouse!

I'm a little confused about why Disney doesn't allow the sharing of credits. Or some system to buy the exact number of credits that you'll need. In our case, the DDP isn't enough credits and the DxDP has too many. In my mind, the DxDP is $99.97 for 3 TS meals which works out to be $33.32 per adult meal. Why not just ask you how many TS credits you'll need and let you do it that way?

I know you can't share credits but my question is, what would Disney really be loosing if they allowed it? The credits are paid for, so why not use them however you want? What if you want to buy your mom a snack or your uncle his birthday dinner? Sure, they would be loosing Uncle Jim's cash but they'd be gaining it back by the unused credit at the end. It seems like a wash to me. Or are they banking on Uncle Jim's cash AND people not using all their credits?

We've done it with AP discounts, TIW card and the DDPs. I have the spreadsheet to prove that it really is a wash money wise. (if you look at the spreadsheet, note that it is a couple years old)

We like the DDP for the convenience and for the prepaid factor but unfortunately it doesn't fit in with every trip.

Just some thoughts on this Thursday morning.

Jen

 

[TDC Nala]

Because Disney thinks in its own best interest. If your guests buy their own meals instead of you treating them off your DDP, that's more $$ for Disney. If you don't use all your DDP credits, Mickey gets to keep that money without actually giving you any food for it. That's why. Not everybody uses all their credits, and they know this.

are they banking on Uncle Jim's cash AND people not using all their credits?

Basically, yes.

Just to remind repliers that it's a policy on the Restaurant board to not discuss actually getting around Disney's rules on the dining plan, so posts that discuss doing that are going to be deleted. Yes I know that is not what the OP is asking about.

 

[jelliott04]

Yes I know that is not what the OP is asking about.

Thank you for acknowledging my intent in the post. It is a fine line to walk, but truly, I don't understand why Disney does some of the things it does. Sorry if you have to babysit this thread all day, that wasn't my intention either.

I know they have to make money, they ARE a business after all. Just seems like there must be more to it than some extra credits left over.

On the plus side, I got my signature fixed from vertical to horizontal!

Jen

 

[aaarcher86]

Thank you for acknowledging my intent in the post. It is a fine line to walk, but truly, I don't understand why Disney does some of the things it does. Sorry if you have to babysit this thread all day, that wasn't my intention either.

I know they have to make money, they ARE a business after all. Just seems like there must be more to it than some extra credits left over.

On the plus side, I got my signature fixed from vertical to horizontal!

Jen

Small victories

 

[cmwade77]

Basically, I think the dining plan is Disney's equivalent of Sea World's an Universal's all day wristbands. They don't allow sharing either, so I think Disney is trying to copy the same rules. The difference though is Sea World and Universal are all you can eat, so the rules don't make sense for Disney, but they are what they are.

 

[aaarcher86]

Basically, I think the dining plan is Disney's equivalent of Sea World's an Universal's all day wristbands. They don't allow sharing either, so I think Disney is trying to copy the same rules. The difference though is Sea World and Universal are all you can eat, so the rules don't make sense for Disney, but they are what they are.

It makes sense for Disney financially not to allow the sharing of credits.

 

[smiths02]

Or are they banking on Uncle Jim's cash AND people not using all their credits?

Yes.

I get the logic. Think about it...other discounted things like park admission is not transferable. If you have a 7 day parkhopper pass but you are only going to the parks for six days, you can't let Uncle Jim in the parks with your extra day.

 

[asmit4]

I'm sure I will get deleted, warned or flamed but this is what happened last time we ate at Narcoosee's and the time before that.....1/2 of us had DDP, the other 1/2 did not. (we were 2 families booking separately for rooms)....we told our server as is customary who was on DDP and who was not. That is all we said.
BOTH times when we received our bill the DDP items were the most expensive of the entire table- not the meals the DDP people ordered. We said nothing at all, paid the bill and left her a nice tip as we always do at Disney.

I do NOT know if this is policy or not- all I am saying is what was done with our bill both times. (and no, we did not request this)

 

[bumbershoot]

If you want to look at a system that works more like what you're describing in the first post, check out Disneyland's awful dining plan. You basically get exactly the number of dining credits you want. And you're getting almost EXACTLY what you pay for it. Worse, if you spend *more* than your voucher, you have to pay extra in cash. Or you could get a lower dollar-amount voucher out, but if you give them more voucher than it costs, you don't get change back.

There are people who can save a tiny bit of money with Disneyland's dining plan, but I would be that MOST people lose money with it, and at the very least it requires a lot of thought and planning, and almost certainly some OOP money.

At least with WDW's plan, IF the plan makes sense for your group for a given trip (and I have TRIED to make it work for our group/family for each WDW we've planned/taken), you stand a chance at coming out ahead.