What's with the extra charge?

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I'm not sure about Magical Express, exactly. I read that they pick up your bags and take them directly to your room at the resort. BUT they can't possibly run a bus for each resort to the airport round the clock, can they? There must be a few busses that run to multiple resorts. That means there are LOTS of bags to find from LOTS of airlines and deliver to LOTS of resorts. That's a little scary. For whatever reason I didn't think the bags were on the same bus as the guests.

Now, on the pricing...
I am pretty sure the difference is the tax on the dining plan. I didn't know (until today) that there IS tax on the dining plan, and it is taxed at the resort rate of 11.5%, not the state tax rate of 6.5%. So Chuck S. was on to something with the tax, it was just the wrong component. It isn't the tickets, it's the dining plan!

 

[QueenOfCelts]

I am not a bit surprised at the price difference.

They always charge more for packages - the free stuff is NOT free.

One more thing I would like to point out and they do this EVERY single time and I always call the front desk and make them fix it.

On our upcoming trip we got a rate of $49 per night plus tax which equals $54.64. However, my package total (room only) is $55. They charged my card $55 for the deposit. They do this at every single resort I have ever stayed at in WDW. $.36 extra per room per night at Pop alone is ALOT of money and thats if every one has my discounted rate. Think about how much money that is and there is no reason for it. When I call, they normally don't give me a hard time and say" oh I will credit that right away" which they do......something to watch out for.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

That's odd. When I made our reservation for Pop our rate was $55, $61.33 with tax. My deposit was $61.33 exactly - no rounding. But with several thousand rooms I can see how that $.36 would eventually add up to a tidy sum, even if they aren't doing it to everyone!

FWIW, I got my quote from The Magic for Less today and it is exactly the same price as Disney's!

 

[QueenOfCelts]

That's odd. When I made our reservation for Pop our rate was $55, $61.33 with tax. My deposit was $61.33 exactly - no rounding. But with several thousand rooms I can see how that $.36 would eventually add up to a tidy sum, even if they aren't doing it to everyone!

FWIW, I got my quote from The Magic for Less today and it is exactly the same price as Disney's!

The last time we stayed at the Pop, my deposit was the correct amount but when I checked my Express Check-out bill, they had added the .36 to make sure I payed my package total. Like I said, they stick me everytime and I always call and have them fix it.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

It's not the dining tax that is making the prices different. Read my posts again... I was comparing room only/tickets only to package with room and same type of tickets. I was not adding dining for dining tax to be the difference.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I'll have to get back on the Disney site and try it again. I know when I was trying to do it without a package the tickets that WERE $767 "magically" became $819, so I stopped right there.

FWIW, on my package I am pretty sure the difference is the dining tax. Have you called CRO and asked them about it?

 

[LovePug]

Hmm, now you have me wondering how they do the bags thing. I mean I assumed on leaving that you'd have to get your bags to them sooner- but since they are using Mears- I figured it would be Mears that also transported our bags JUST like Mears does in the past if you used Mears as your transportation? Are you saying they are going to be transporting our luggage to/from the airport in some other way and not using Mears? Strange...

The bags won't be on the same bus that takes you to your resort. I'm not sure what kind of transportation they have for the luggage, but I know it's separate from the transportation that you take. The Mears bus driver that I got this info from said that it'll make the transportation to the resorts much quicker than the old way. She will just be dropping the guests off at their resorts and won't have to wait to unload all the luggage. She also said the most stops each bus will have is 3-4 on each run so it should be relatively quick.

 

[OhMari]

I wish they would start this sooner, but I can see people trying to load luggage with them on the bus.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I was wondering how long it would take to go from the airport to your resort and vice versa. Do they make you sit there until the entire bus is full? If your flight comes in at say, 11:05, and you go right to the Magical Express then I wonder how long you sit? Until the bus is full or until an empty bus comes along, or will they run them every half hour or hour or something? If they run on the hour then you would sit there until noon. That would be annoying. That is my biggest concern. That and making sure they get all 4 or 5 of our checked bags! It sounds VERY tedious to have to match up number of pieces of luggage with each family. Do they assign you a number or something and then say Family 123, Bag 1 of 5? How do they know for sure they have all of the bags you checked? That has the potential to take a very long time! But I did see that this is the way they do all the cruise luggage so they must have a system.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Check again on the pkgs versus seperate prices now. They seem to match up better now (only $1.36 off -and I don't mind paying that for the 'free' certificate worth $5. LOL That's way better than the amount of difference that was showing up previously!) -so maybe it was a glitch that Disney finally fixed???

The price of the tickets you're talking about- are you SURE you matched the tickets only prices AFTER it got to the next page showing taxes added to them- comparing that to the total of room w/tickets? Because in both instances, the first price they show you (either tickets alone or adding it to a room) is without taxes, it magically adds it on the next page if you're doing a room/tickets pkg... if you're doing tickets only it only shows it on the next page if you "add it to your cart". That might be the huge difference your seeing? But the difference I was seeing in matching prices with taxes already included..has stopped now. Weird. But I guess they fixed it. LOL

Oohh, now I'm really worried about the "magical express" transportation. It's not sounding very magical to me. LOL Magically "free" if you stay at a resort but is the magic also when you finally get to see your luggage? Or is it magic that it's not actually lost in transit at times? LOL Since they were using Mears- I figured the luggage would be loaded on just like when you PAID for Mears- but apparently not. Not sure how it makes it easier to load/deliver/unload luggage on their own bus instead of with the bus that has the passengers on it. This worries me... it worries me because we'd have to fly out later in the evening (so DH could take us to the airport after he gets off work) and thus we'd arrive pretty late- I wonder how long we'd have to wait for our luggage? And no, I can't carry enough in our carry ons (to also carry on the Mears transportation with us) for all 4 of us (me plus 3 kids) for the NIGHT and potentially the next morning if we get up early and it's not arrived or gotten to us at our room yet before we want to head out early to the parks?
ack
That doesn't sound good.
I am not worried about leaving though... we'd also be leaving late in the evening and it wouldn't bother me that they needed our luggage way earlier than our actual transportation. I'd be planning on leaving the luggage with them up front after checking out ANYWAY, even if I was doing my own transportation back to the airport. But if it doesn't go with you then either... hmmm. does it go to the airport way earlier than you? If so, where IS it waiting at until you use your transportation to get to the airport and board your plan? Do they check it on FOR you? And you never see it so you don't know that it's checked or not? Hmmm... major worries. LOL I'm not sure all that worrying, waiting to get your luggage when you arrive, etc. is WORTH the free transportation instead of paying for it yourself.

When cruising and they transport your luggage, how is the luggage handled? I can see it would be quite different though- since everyone for that cruise must board and deboard when they return all at essentially the same time. so they'd just unload luggage at the port at the same time, load it up at the same time and take it to the airport at the same time. I'm not sure how that will compare to people arriving to go to resorts at all hours of all days.

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Strange- now that the prices are 'matching' a lot more closely- if you add the dining pkg to your room/tickets pkg- it no longer shows the "free certificate" included... only if you do room/tickets without dining.
LOL

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

Very interesting....

Try adding flight ON the pkg with Disney... I tried it just now just to see how much THEY would charge for the flight- and it ended up coming up $20 cheaper than the cheapest I've found for us (expedia, travelocity, etc.) I was sure it would cost MORE, not less.... interesting. LOL

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

I was just on the Disney site TRYING to compare the AAA prices with the Disney prices. Keeping in mind that the things in the package that I have the AAA price for are NOT the things I need in my package. The stay is too short and the tickets are the basic ones, but I wanted to compare apples to apples. The Disney site is INFURIATING me!!

I tried to put in 6 night, 7 day with dining like in the AAA brochure. Even though I SPECIFICALLY clicked "7 day ticket" it decides FOR ME that I can only have a 6 day ticket! Then when I add dining it cuts my ticket back to THREE days!! WHY ON EARTH would I buy a 6 night dining plan and only buy a 3 day park pass? GRRRR! That system is worthless and it makes me ANGRY!

So now I guess I will get on the PHONE with AAA and just book the darn thing. I've had it!

 

[BibbidyBobbidyBoo]

It was doing the same thing to me last night (I was clicking one day- it would show 6 day tickets, then change it to 3 day tickets when I added dining). I think there was a glitch in the system though- because when it was doing that- the "rows" of information for the tickets where you click which one you want- were all messed up.. not saying amounts, saying how many days tickets in each ROW!
but it finally worked later on.... so I think that was some kind of mixup. Then when I tried to save the info- it said they were having website difficulties and couldn't save itineraries at this time. LOL Maybe the website is overwhelmed with people constantly trying different scenarios like both of us are. LOL

 

[eeyore0062]

I went there the other day just to see how the Disney site was working and I also found it a bit confusing. I was getting some really wierd things like a 10 day package with waterfront room coming out cheaper than the same with a 7 day package. I kept going back to make sure that everything matched. It was really strange. Later, it worked right, though... so maybe there was some kind of glitch they needed to work out.?

 

[gothmommie]

This happened to me last year when I booked my parents at the Poly Concierge. They only needed lodging - I had bought tickets and vouchers for them elsewhere. I selected 'basic plan' (or something like that) and got one price. Then I selected room only and got another price. The basic plan was $18 more. Somehow in the confusion of making last minute plans - the more expensive plan was the one I booked. When I called Disney to inquire the price differential they hadn't a clue and they ended up refunding me my $18. BUT in order to do that they had to cancel the ressie I made and book a room only reservation.

They never did explain the whole thing to me. I was left feeling like it was a system glitch.

 

[jackskellingtonsgirl]

the ticket price screen was still all messed up this afternoon. But I did call AAA and book my trip! It was $135 cheaper than Disney, and we get $25 Disney Dollars for booking with AAA in January. I will keep my eyes open for codes or other things, but for now I think that is the best deal available. When I am POSITIVE about our dates I can move things around if I need to - we don't have to make final arrangements until mid-August! I think the Disney site is probably overloaded more often than not, so I have decided not to fool with it anymore!