We used a travel agent (recommended by the Unofficial Guide) to book our January OKW stay with 8 day park-hopper tickets for our family of 6 excursion. Last week, I wanted to get all my finances in order, so I started looking at MDE to see what they showed as being paid for, etc. Instead, all I could pull up was a page that gave me the total cost (which seemed to be off slightly from what the TA paid via my credit card), but no indication of received payments.
So I called Disney and was told that, for sure, my resort and park tickets were paid in full.
I thought I had added Memory Maker and travel insurance via the WDW website, but it became clear that I had somehow put these in a shopping cart but never really purchased them. The Disney phone guy said I’d have to go back to my travel agent to get Memory Maker, but that I couldn’t buy the travel insurance because my trip was now paid in full.
Okay, that made SOME sense… I set things up with the travel agent, so any changes or additions would have to be through the travel agent. But the travel insurance thing seems funny to me… my trip is in January, for goodness sake… why would I not be able to purchase it well in advance of my trip just because I’m paid in full?
So I contacted the TA, and he was able to add on Memory Maker AND the travel insurance… though he also mentioned that he had to finagle the insurance because normally you’re not able to get it once the trip is paid for. So bottom line… we got what we wanted and all’s well that ends well. But I’m curious… what drives the no-travel-insurance-once-you’ve-paid-in-full thing? Are there some sort of regulations that makes this a thing? Or is it just a policy decision?
I thought it would be nice to have a statement (preferably from Disney) showing everything I purchased, and every payment received, so I could see clearly what I have and haven’t purchased, total balance due (if any) etc. But so far that doesn’t seem like an option. I asked the TA if he could give me something, but all he provided was a statement showing the total charges he put on my card. As of right now, I still can’t see anything on MDE that shows my travel insurance purchase, and I’m not sure if that’s something that shows up there. The only thing I have right now is a confirmation of the travel insurance purchase via an email from my TA.
This is probably the only trip we’ll ever get to make as a family, so maybe I’m being too OCD (hence this post, which I now realize is as long as some trip reports). Or else I’m just clueless about how to navigate MDE… which is a distinct possibility. Can anyone tell me I should just shut up and start preparing for Fast Pass day? 
no not about to tell you to shut up. Disney trips are hugely expensive and you need travel insurance. I would ask the TA to send you the policy.
The insurance vendor may, perhaps, be trying to cut down on fraud. One declines insurance, then gets an inkling of something that may mean cancellation, and buys insurance to protect the purchase knowing they’ll use it. It’s just a guess.
Your TA may have purchased you a third-party policy. Many do, because the commission is better.
I think you’ll be OK with an itemized statement from your TA. The agent should be able to provide you with a statement of what you agreed to pay, and what they would secure for that payment. It might be different from the dollar for dollar price on Disney’s screen, because agencies sometimes (yes, even good ones sometimes) add their own fees or surcharges. Make sure your TA provides you with a list of everything you have been promised.
Don’t know if that’s at all helpful. Good luck!
I’ve always been told that travel insurance must be bought before a trip is paid in full. Not sure why, but I have heard it before.
I don’t know the specific reasoning for the travel insurance policy. We paid at 30 days out and added travel insurance at that time. In reality, we’d be more likely to have an inkling that we might need to cancel at 30 days out than you would for trip that’s months away. (Not that we have one, thankfully!) So even though I know the “paid in full” thing is a standard policy, it doesn’t make as much sense as a time limit would.
We researched third party “cancel for any reason” coverage months before our trip, since the #1 thing we were concerned about wouldn’t have been considered a covered reason for traditional insurance. But since we had already put a deposit down (which we did nearly a year in advance) and it wasn’t within 2 weeks of paying that deposit, we didn’t qualify to add the cancel for any reason coverage. Again, makes perfect sense to let us add that at 6 months out but we couldn’t even though someone booking 6 weeks in advance would have been able to.
Yes, it’s common here in the U.K. too. Although insurance through the travel company is nearly always poor value anyway.
We always buy insurance once we’ve booked our flights. It usually prevents you claiming for anything you know about before taking out cover.
Going back to the OP, the TA should be able to provide you with the policy and a policy number.
We usually buy our vacation in pieces. The company we use to buy our travel insurance requires us to buy the policy within 7 days of paying for the first piece of our vacation. As we pay for the various pieces of our vacation, we have 7 days to add them to our policy and pay the price difference.
I think we all deserve an itemized statement to see what is being charged and how much. When we stay at a hotel, we get a itemized statement for each day: room cost, parking fee, resort fee, dining charges, tourism tax, sales, tax, etc. For a long stay, it is challenging to stand at the front desk to go over the statement. That’s when you check your daily costs.
One year, DD was part of a skating team. They traveled for competition. We paid a certain amount for travel each month and then at the end of the season, they just sent us an amount of money we still owed. I asked for an itemized statement: airfare, hotel, bus, competition fees, etc. They said it would take some time to come up with the itemized statement. Then, how in the world did you come up with a lump sum of how much money we still owed?