I know there is so many opinions about this, just hoping to get some of yours. My family - me, dh, twins - 11, 6 yo, 5 yo and my parents have a trip planned in June. Should we get the DP for just our room - 4 adults (counting my 11 year olds) and 2 kids and split up the TS and QS with my parents? So using a 6 person plan for 8 people. We were originally planning just to pay out of pocket, but we are doing CRT for lunch and Akerhaus for breakfast - just those 2 meals would be $1,100 including tax and tip. A DDP for our room for the week would be $2,450. We were also planning to do tRex and maybe Rainforest cafe, so probably $500 for those two meals…so that would bring our OOP cost to $1600 for just 4 meals. If we did the plan, we would still have 7 QS, all our snacks and would most likely have paid for a TS meal or two. We would use 12 adult TS for CRT, 6 for Akerhaus, 6 for trex and have 2 left for another TS. The two kids would be all set. Does this make any sense? To me, with the character meals, DDP seems like it might work for our family.
Have you run the numbers? Is it to late to move some of the kids to your parents room (just for adding dining purposes?). I think the cheapest version may have been two adults and the child in your room with the deluxe plan (9 credits a day) and everyone else added to the other room?
Thank you!! We already booked our rooms at AoA, so I am trying to decide if I should (or even can) add on dining. We can’t switch the kids out of our suite…we already have our magic bands and everything set. We got the Perfect Gift package - so they are beautifully boxed special bands that will be the big present on Christmas morning!
I tried the calculators - thanks for the tip!- but it shows CRT as only $487 including tip, but for 8 of us for lunch in June, I figured $720. I also couldn’t put in for 8 people with 6 dining plans (which makes sense) so it is saying I have extra TS meals to use, which I wouldn’t. Maybe it’s easier to just look at menus and figure it out manually. My ADR is the 28th, so I’m trying to settle on everything this week to start practicing. Everything is so new!
I just tried the second one and it is close to what TP says the price is for lunch/dinner. I would set it for the 8 and then run the numbers. Then reduce the cast estimate by the $150 a day.
I’ve made the plan work for us by sharing meals, but there’s only two of us. We paid $1200 for our plan for our trip in July and would have paid $1600 OOP. From what you’ve said, it sounds like to me it makes sense. As long as you’re smart about where you use your credits and you have people who are willing to share, you can make it pay for itself and more. Buffets, character meals, and Via Napoli were the only places we couldn’t share, but that was fine because I’m not paying OOP for those places if I’m not on a dining plan. I can’t enough to get my money’s worth OOP if I can’t share. I had gastric sleeve, so I eat a child’s size meal. Good luck with your planning!
