I am a Disney newbie as you can probably already tell from previous posts. I have a series dumb/simple questions I was hoping you guys could help me with. Here they go:
My sister and brother are staying offsite. They dont have magic bands, how do they check in for FPP?
Once we are through our first 3 FPP, where do we get other ones? on the app? only at kiosk? both?
For rides with Child Swap, is there a specific area that you have to wait by or can you wander off to keep the little one entertained and come back when you party is through the ride?
How far in advance do I need to drop an ADR that I am not going to use without get a penalty?
At one point, is it a good deal to get the DDP? Right now we are doing a character breakfast almost every day (Tusker House, CRT, and Akershus). The one day we are not doing a character breakfast we are going to BOG. Should I consider it?
We are traveling with a military member, my sister. They can get the Memory Maker for cheaper. How many people can be linked to the Memory Maker account? We are traveling together but I imagine she may wonder off at times to do other rides. Could it be linked to my account too?
Thanks in advance for your insights. Feel free to answer the ones you want!
These are not dumb questions. Disney can be confusing.
1–They will use their park ticket (unless they decide to buy a magic band)
2–Both although the app is better since you can open it as soon as you tap into your third FPP ride.
3–No, you don’t have to wait in a specific area (at Universal you do but not Disney).
4–You can drop an ADR the day before and not be penalized.
5–I personally don’t think the DDP is a good deal, but you may need to crunch the numbers based on where you are eating. Character breakfasts are cheaper than lunch and dinner so it may not be ideal for you have planned.
6–I am not aware there is a limit. I have about 25 people linked in MDE who can use my AP memory maker.
Not dumb questions at all! Looks like the most of the questions were answered, but I thought I’d throw my 2 cents into the DDP question. For us - Fam of (4) with (2) little ones it made sense to do the DDP. I crunched the numbers after we went and we saved about $300 in food. We did do a bunch of character dinners - BOG/CRT as well as the Spirit of Aloha, but I felt like having the DDP allowed us to do that stuff. I like to know what I’m spending ahead of time, and other than tips and souvenirs, we didn’t spend money on any food. I could also eat anything off the menu I wanted without thinking of the costs. We just booked with the free dining plan and upgraded so we could do it all again.
Yeah with the kids being young we needed to eat every meal. Oh and we also liked the idea of being able to chose a table service meal over a quick serve. Sometimes it’s nice to just sit and not have to wrangle kids and food trays.
Make sure you add in snacks. We always ended up having some left over and we go to the gift shop and buy rice crispy treats for the kids’ friends.
Oh! And the rider swap. They will give you a paper FP that can be used for up to a month so you can use it when it’s convenient, not just immediately after.
I don’t know if you already have your tickets or not, but your sister that is a military member is able to get military discounted tickets that are significantly cheaper through Shades of Green for up to 6 people. They are called Salute tickets and include park hopper.
It might be worth it to investigate the DDP. Especially if you’re doing the more expensive character meals…Akershus is close to $50 or $60, I think, for an adult, and the DDP is $75 per night. You’d get a QS meal and some snacks for that extra $20 or so. Run the numbers and see. distripplanner.com is good for seeing prices. When you look at the out-of-pocket price at the bottom it includes gratuity. DDP does not, so you’d need to factor that in, as well, when looking at if the DDP would save you money.
One other point to consider about DDP … The DDP allows you 3 Table Service meal credits per day, however some restaurants consume 2 Table Service meal credits for a single meal (known as Signature Dining). Therefore you will not necessarily need to eat three meals a day to use up all of your credits.
I don’t think the Deluxe DDP would be necessary, just the regular. For 2 adults and one kid, for example, the regular is like $180 and the Deluxe would be $280. Out of pocket would surely be cheaper. The regular plan, though, might save money if you’re actually doing a character meal a day at $45-50 a pop (especially if you have character meals at lunch or dinner). If it’s $180 for the plan for 2a1c and Akershus will cost $130-140 then an additional $40 that day for a QS meal, and 2 snacks is a good price. If you’ll actually eat that much food. You could also combine two of the credits for your CRT meal and eat QS or snacks that day. I think the regular DDP might save you money. Run the numbers and see!
AND the other thing about the DDP would be that if you were doing character breakfasts to save money, you could switch to lunch or dinner instead and not pay more. And get the ROL dining package, for example, and not pay more. It is worth considering.
Rider swap - you know you all have to show up first to get the rider swap?
ADR cancellations - there are a few, mainly the pre-paid ones like CRT and the dinner shows, but also any special dining packages for Fantasmic, ROL, Candlelight Processional etc where you have to cancel a couple of days before.
The confirmation email for each ADR will have the cancellation policy in it.
We didn’t all have to be there for Rider Swap at any ride in November. Not even FOP. My husband and I would take my daughter to do something else and then the other one would ride with our other daughter.
Piggybacking - the salute tickets should also be available through her local base ticket office, but would require activation upon arrival (SoG Tickets are pre-activated). They are generally available in 4 and 5 day park hopper increments, with the Water Parks and more option available (or whatever it’s called nowadays).
They tend to run in the neighborhood of 55%(ish) of the regular price of a MYW Disney ticket.
@DreamLaughImagine gave you good info on being able to tap in with the park ticket.
Personally, I’d recommend purchasing MagicBands. They’re so much more convenient than digging in pockets and purses for park tickets, plus, they will auto-load onride videos from the few attractions that have them into MemoryMaker. Other rides with the onride photo can be claimed using either the park ticket or the MB; again, it’s the convenience factor.
For me, it would be worth the $13/per basic MB for the convenience factor alone. YMMV.
In general, you can get away with the tickets, but I agree with you on this.
Our last trip, we didn’t have MB (there were six of us, and I didn’t feel like paying for them). For the most part it worked out. I personally kept all the tickets with me so that I didn’t have to worry about any of the kids dropping them.
BUT, this kind of backfired when we went to do Test Track. As it turns out, they tie the designs you make to your ticket/MB. Later, as you wait to board your car, you are supposed to scan them again so that your specific vehicle configuration is tested. But since everyone had handed me back the tickets after making the cars, the tickets were all shuffled up and we couldnt’ sort them in time to scan them. As a result, we didn’t get a chance to see the ratings for our specific designs. With MBs this would not have been an issue at all.
You need to all be there (or at least one person with the non-rider) at the entry to the line to retrieve the RS pass/lanyard. Otherwise anyone would try and get RS! But after this, you can do whatever you want.