Srsly Complicated Dining Plan Question.

[karensokool]

Hi Dining Plan Experts! Please help me with this!

I have a reservation at the POP Century for Sept. with Free dining. We have the regular dining plan with one quick, one table, and one snack. It's for me and my two adult children. our reservation is for five nights and 6 days. We have park tickets for all six days for all of us. Now, Because of his college schedule, my son will be joining us a day late and there's a chance he may be leaving a day early. I know that the meals are pooled. If I keep him on the reservation for all 5 nights, will his additional meals remain in our pool? If I take him off those two days for both the park tix and room reservation, will he still qualify for the free dining promotion for the days he is there? Does It make financial sense to keep him on and use his extra meals or will decreasing his park hopper days to his actual amount of days (4) and taking him off the room reservation for those few days save more money? Finally, I will need to arrange a separate magical express for him both ways. Will that trigger a change in the reservation that will automatically remove him from the hotel reservation for those two days, thus removing his extra meals? Thanks in advance for this help! I'm lost on how to proceed.

 

[Pumbaa_]

Everyone in the room must have the same dining plan. You are free to use the rooms credits as you wish since the credits are not assigned to a person

 

[Pumbaa_]

In regards to tickets, you can buy 4 day tickets and once there add additional days to the people staying longer. Do this before the last day used on the tickets

 

[sharonabe]

Sounds like you might need to do some math and also see what other discounts are out there for your dates.

With three adults in the room, I believe there is an extra $10 per night for that 3rd adult. Your son also currently has more ticket days than he needs, so you could save some money there too. Since you've upgraded to the regular plan, there's that cost for him as well.

You could drop him completely from the reservation and add him once he gets there, but then he wouldn't have any dining plan and you would need to pay OOP for his meals. However, this would keep the dining plan for the other two and you can still have your 6-day tickets. You could buy him a 4-day from a discount seller like Undercover Tourist. This way you could still have the 60 days for FP+ for all days you are in the parks for all of you.

I would also price out a room discount and discount tickets for all of you, and then pay OOP for all meals.

 

[borgthe]

The problem with getting less days than you intend to stay means you can't make fast passes. I wish Disney would do something about this. I room with other people a lot and have an annual pass. We get the 2 day tickets for everyone but then the people without the annual pass can't make fast passes for their whole trip. I loathe the new fast pass system and this is a major reason. Also, last minute trips are a problem. Fix this Disney!!!!!

 

[6disneykids]

The short answer that I can think of, is keep him on both the room and DDP as if he was staying the entire time. Unless you have to purchase ticktets for the entire stay, Id get his separate. I know many people feel the dining plan doesn't make financial sence, for some other famillies, (mine included) members of the family can order what they want. I have 2 members of my family, that would be like a deer in the headlights paying for each meal, and making the trip miserable.
The Fast pass question is also valid, which it may be in your best interest to leave him on the room.

 

[brockash]

Hi Dining Plan Experts! Please help me with this!

I have a reservation at the POP Century for Sept. with Free dining. We have the regular dining plan with one quick, one table, and one snack. It's for me and my two adult children. our reservation is for five nights and 6 days. We have park tickets for all six days for all of us. Now, Because of his college schedule, my son will be joining us a day late and there's a chance he may be leaving a day early. I know that the meals are pooled. If I keep him on the reservation for all 5 nights, will his additional meals remain in our pool? If I take him off those two days for both the park tix and room reservation, will he still qualify for the free dining promotion for the days he is there? Does It make financial sense to keep him on and use his extra meals or will decreasing his park hopper days to his actual amount of days (4) and taking him off the room reservation for those few days save more money? Finally, I will need to arrange a separate magical express for him both ways. Will that trigger a change in the reservation that will automatically remove him from the hotel reservation for those two days, thus removing his extra meals? Thanks in advance for this help! I'm lost on how to proceed.

Just to clarify; you're dining plan gets each person 2 snacks/day. It does not matter how many park days you have (as long as you purchase the min. needed for the package to qualify for free dining.)
If you leave your son on the package (for the package, you really aren't going to be able to take days/nights off his), you guys will still be able to use his extra credits. This will be your simplest way to handle it (you can still make different magical express reservations for him if it applies), and most likely due to the free dining will probably be the best way to handle it, unless you can get some large discounted tix for him etc.

 

[chocolateMinnie]

Similar happened to us last trip.
In the U.K. we book about 16 months in advance and we booked for our family of 4 on free dining with tickets but no flights.
When it came to booking flights my DH decided he didn’t want to fly anymore but was happy for the rest of us to visit.
We couldn’t cancel his part of the package (this may be different with a USA booking).
So we went 3 people two weeks on four dining plan credits.
No problem.
Brought lots of snacks back for the kids at the school where I work, treated some people we met in the parks with cupcakes etc and had a daily Frappuccino.

 

[LisaRay]

We did this when my daughter was in college. But with free dining (even paying the upgrade to TS from QS) it was just much easier and not that expensive to leave her on the whole time. We got to use her credits for extra meals and extra snack credits were great at Food and Wine (back when free dining fell during that time frame). This would also prevent an issue with getting the FP too.

 

[karensokool]

Thanks all!