I love this forum. Thank you for asking.
I am on my way home from Dollywood right now and I really hope it’s in my mailbox. Realistically it’s more likely tomorrow.
DH is going to open his work computer tonight and look at his calendar so he can tell me which of the three options is best.
I am so close!!!
6 Likes
No, we just buy a ton of gift cards to pay off the cruise and with the $1k limit it means giving her a handful of numbers manually with lots of room for errors. And for the money timing of our budget we wanted to wait until a certain day but then she was gone that week for a surgery and then her team was having trouble bc the gift card numbers on the form I’d filled out weren’t all right AND Disney was having a tech issue so payments weren’t able to be done online at all and it took a three-way call with Disney who couldn’t even figure out what payment history was left for our two rooms and the TA didn’t have an accounting of what payments had been made for which rooms so they were both hunting and pecking for how much to apply from each gift card to each reservation until I pulled my spreadsheet where I’d documented the cost and initial deposit and then asked the DCL agent for a history of payments and manually tabulated in my spreadsheet what should be leftover (which the gift cards should’ve covered but the random guessing at which reservation to apply each amount to was not working out). And then I think one other time I had to make a payment for the first cruise she was out so wasn’t responding and our pay in full date was in 2 days (she had been sending me regular emails to remind me of the payment due date up and I had let her know when we were planning to pay it and instead of saying “oh I’ll be out x-x days but will get to it when I am back the day before your pay in full date) so I was stressing there for a minute too.
2 Likes
Oh wow. That’s definitely not a good experience.
2 Likes
And I just re-read what you quoted for me and realized I worded it wrong. Should say I hated having to pay Disney through her only. No way for me to do it directly with Disney.
2 Likes
this is a running joke with TAs. with the starcruiser 7 hour holds especially. thankfully the hold times are generally much better than they were in say 2022 when even the smallest thing took 2 hours.
2 Likes
I was pleased that the price of my stateroom when booking with my placeholder was about 10% less than what was shown when I was booking without my placeholder, before applying the placeholder credit. So not only was my deposit lower, but the grand total was lower. I had read that there was a discount for “select sailings” when using a placeholder, but I assumed it would just happen to be every other cruise but mine. 
(Disney has made us so cynical. 
)
5 Likes
FYI, more and more agents are charging a planning fee and its not at all prohibited by disney as you’ll see thrown about. I sure as heck am not booking anyone’s FP+ 2.0 without charging a fee. Many folks won’t book anything at all without charging a fee. I don’t yet charge fees but that’s just because I’m lazy about the legal paperwork required to charge them. But you’d be shocked at the number of people I have pimp me for information, have me search for hours for the perfect resort for them, then ghost me and book it on their own the second I do.
Without a fee, literally the only way we get paid is after you travel. So if I plan your entire trip and you cancel at the 30d mark, I get nothing for all those hours. I’ve spent thousands of hours and dollars acquiring Liner-level knowledge of WDW (just as one example of what I sell), and I’m happy to help you and share if I’m getting a small percentage (after splitting with agencies, anywhere between 6 and 9%) of your pretax hotel and tickets, but I’m not a volunteer.
OK I promise no more hijacking @Jeff_AZ
I am definitely doing this for our March cruise. 5% with my redcard will add up! And ugh, I’m sorry about your GC experience! That’s a hot mess.
Did any of yall see the news about the Aristocrats lounge and the Groot show on the treasure?!?!
3 Likes
Yes! It has me seriously thinking about switching my Wish cruise to the Treasure!
5 Likes
Good to know for the future - thanks!
Absolutely - that would be so much better! However, seeing the discount on the 7-day sailing and the reduced deposit helped with the inconvenience of having to call.
3 Likes
Glad you fared better than I did!
3 Likes
do ittttttt. i would say come on our March 1 one but it is somehow sold out
3 Likes
No - I hadn’t caught that yet! Even more excited now - I don’t know even know whether I’ll like The Cat Drink, but I want to drink out of that glass 
I see another GTY in my future.
4 Likes
I always look at what’s beside, above and below the room. Then when I saw laundry was on deck 8, I decided on deck 8 as it makes my life easier (we have also been on 8 on a previous cruise and didn’t mind the motion midship). Then when I had it narrowed down to a few rooms I looked up their likely muster stations and chose one of what I felt was a better option (yes, I know I have a major “pursuit of perfect” problem as @QwertySC calls it).
3 Likes
If the Wish ever does longer than 3-4 nights, I’m booking decks 7-9 only on it because I already do laundry on the 3-4 day cruises and if I had to do it more than 1x/sailing I would not mentally want to lug the laundry that far an extra time.
2 Likes
I just haven’t really had the luxury of choosing as I need connecting and I can’t book that far out since 2014…
And I’ve never had a trip be made or broke by location. I always see pros and cons. The pro of forward Lido was close to food and movies; the con was I felt it more. The pro to deck 2 is easy on/off, but long way to sun deck. Etc.
3 Likes
Of course they did. They really, really, really need to find a way to make the system digitally recognize the placeholders and apply them to the unblocked dates.
It is oh so nice to see that new total! I think typically blockouts have only applied to Easter/Christmas and then anytime it’s a first-ever of their kind sailings (like the first not preview cruise to go to Lighthouse Point, and any maiden voyage).
1 Like
No, go on the Wish, enjoy its art & beauty & Marvel (and Frozen if you like Frozen) & Hyperspace Lounge, and get Silver status. While onboard the Wish be sure to get a placeholder before the end of your last full night.
Then come home and book the Treasure with that placeholder, to then appreciate its art & beauty & allll the Marvel and use some Silver status for the longer sailing. Our sailing is June 7, 2025. But they’ll be running 7 nights alternating Eastern & Western Caribbean pretty much all the weeks from this Christmas with itineraries out until spring 2026 so you’ll have options a plenty!
5 Likes
we will see if we even like cruising 
3 Likes
Spoiler alert: you will.
5 Likes