When I book Free Dining, I have the 2 day tickets included. When I get to the park the first day I go to Guest Relations: Have them make my AP the Priority Ticket that is used when I go in the gate. Each day I check
MDE to make sure the 2 days was not touched and if it is go to GR to fix it. Then when I need to renew my AP I tell them I want them to use the 2 day ticket sitting in my account towards the cost of the AP.
I have heard some ask that the 2 Day Ticket be removed from their account and placed on a hard ticket. When renewing use that hard ticket to renew. One thing you should always do is look at your time between trips and the savings for the renewal. A few years it may have saved me XXX to renew but it cost me XXXX all the months I didn't use it until my next trip. On those years I let my AP expire and then just purchased a new full price at the time of my next trip.