To dining club or not.

[Luna81]

Yes. I'm 11 months out. But I tend to overthink. We are a family of three. We are definitely not normally a sit down and eat in a restaurant family. When we do we are much more chicken/pasta/burger people. When I set the plan up I did the regular dining. But I am thinking of either going down to quick service. Or tossing the plan completely (I think I can do that still? Until closer to the date?).

I had set it up because I was thinking of the character dinners. But I'm leaning on just doing one as a breakfast. And then just eating from quick service after that. It just, for me, seems like it would be so much less stressful to be able to eat when you want. Not be tied to a reservation, and trying to work fast passes and everything around that.

Advice ? I'd still need to save up gift cards for food. But that's okay. I don't think I can pay from my vacation club account to food. So I'd have to remember to not load some and then figure out how to apply that to our account when we get there?

 

[sharonabe]

With the change to the QS meals on the dining plan next year, it's going to be very difficult to break even with the QSDP. It sounds like you'll do better paying OOP for your dining.

Saving up gift cards is a great way to still have the prepaid value of the dining plan. Just remember to tell yourself that no matter what you eat (expensive vs. cheap), you're probably still paying less than the dining plan would've cost you.

 

[Luna81]

With the change to the QS meals on the dining plan next year, it's going to be very difficult to break even with the QSDP. It sounds like you'll do better paying OOP for your dining.

Saving up gift cards is a great way to still have the prepaid value of the dining plan. Just remember to tell yourself that no matter what you eat (expensive vs. cheap), you're probably still paying less than the dining plan would've cost you.

Thank you! I'm going to think on it a few days before trying to change it.

 

[Lisa F]

agree that you are definitely not a good candidate for the dining plan... we'll maybe from a disney profit point of view but not from a value to you point of view.

instead of using the vacation savings, put some of your money into gift cards. I started planning at 11 months out and pretty much hit my savings goal with around 6 months to go. I saved a bit by buying my Disney gift cards through the Target site with my red card and then combined then onto one card through Disney's gift card manager site. I have used it to pay for the dining plan for myself for part of my trip (I'm doing 2ts a day so it's worth ir for me) but will also use it for tips and incidentals and the oop portion of my trip. I expect it to be as easy to use as the ddp honestly.

 

[Nancyg56]

I would not use any dining plan with the way you want to dine. The regular DDP would probably frustrate you, and QS pan would not make good sense unless you just want it to be paid up front.