Disney Vacation Saving Account

Walt Disney World
1

Hello,
Has anyone recently used the Disney Vacation Saving Account? My friend asked me about it and I had not heard of it so I could not answer her question. Any advantage to it? Thank you

2

I used it and found it to be awesome! There is a tool to help you estimate how much your trip will cost, whether it is a Cruise, WDW, or Aulani. You can set-up when and how much you want deposited into your vacation savings account. Made saving for our trip super easy.

3

My question would be - is the advantage over a traditional online savings account only that it locks the funds into you Disney Trip?

I would think having an interest bearing account such as Cap1 360 would be slightly better (which is what I’m doing for my trip this year). I guess I can see the benefit of Disney’s plan for kids or for when you need to hide money from an account you can easily access ;p. I’m not totally sold though unless there’s some other goodies or incentives.

4

A normal savings or “Christmas/Vacation Club” account at my bank pays next to nothing in interest. So Disney’s $20 gift card for every $1000 deposited isn’t a bad return. We had a thread a short while back where a Liner had to cash in her Disney Savings and the money was credited back to her account very quickly.

I’m a bad saver, so having Disney just quietly remove my money (instead of doing it with a parade and fireworks, I guess) from my account works for me. I just set mine up the other day.

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5

Thanks for the info and opinoins I think she would find it helpful (I think she should just join Lines lol)

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6

I checked into it a little while back. They give you a $20 gift card for every $1,000 used to pay for a Disney trip, not for every $1,000 that is deposited (since you can cancel and withdraw your funds at any time).

If you happen to have a Disney Visa Premier card, it wouldn’t necessarily be worth it, as this is the exact same benefit that you would receive anyway; you earn Disney Dollars at the rate of 2 percent for anything that you purchase directly from Disney (so $20 for every $1,000). (Plus 2 percent at gas stations, restaurants, and grocery stores and 1 percent everywhere else.) If you put your money in the Disney Vacation Savings account, you would not be using your Disney Visa to pay for your trip, so you really don’t earn anything extra. I decided just to use my regular savings account for this purpose instead.

So if you don’t have a Disney Visa Premier card, if you don’t want to have to think about depositing or transferring funds to your own savings account yourself, and you want the funds to be a little more difficult for you to get to on a whim, these would be the benefits I can see it using the Disney Vacation Savings Account.

7

I have heard the strategy of using your disney visa to make a payment into the Disney Savings account, thereby getting the bonus twice.

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8

That would be great! From what I read, it seemed like the money was automatically deducted directly from your bank account and that a credit card couldn’t be used. I’ll have to check into this further. If you happen to find out how to do this, be sure to post it. :smiley:

9

You mean for every $1000 spent from the account, not deposited - also, the $20 gift cards for every $1000 spent only applies after the account has been opened for a minimum of 120 days.

But even with all of that, we’re still using it. :slight_smile:

10

But wouldn’t putting money into the account using your Disney Visa card count, as your using it to pay into your Disney vacation account? Then you’d end up with both rewards; the only thing you’d lose out on is the no interest should you pay for your trip with the card and then pay it off over time.

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11

I use a credit card to pay into it; you can also use Disney Gift Cards as well. So I’ve also heard of people buying target gift cards at a discount, using those to pay for Disney Gift Cards at target and getting those for 5% off by having a Red card, and then turning around and using the gift cards to open a Disney Vacation Account.

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12

So the $20 per $1000 is only good for purchasing items directly from Disney prior to the trip?

I am renting DVC points, and getting tix from Undercover Tourist so sounds like this wouldn’t benefit me if my main purpose in opening this account would be for food and souvenirs during the trip. Sigh

13

Thanks for the note. If I can use my Disney Visa, and am definitely on board. :smiley:

Addendum: I am now officially on board. Thanks again for the clarification on how the deposits can work.

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14

No - it’s a gift card, so you can use them during your trip, or even at a Disney Store or the Disney Store website.

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15

Then this definitely wouldn’t work for you, since you’d need to make the reservations & buy tickets directly from Disney for it to count.

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16

I signed up for the Disney Vacation Account today. I am hoping that I still earn Disney Dollars when I add money to it using my Disney Visa. I don’t see why I wouldn’t, but the Vacation Account is run by Chase too so maybe they don’t allow it. I’ll have to keep an eye on my account.

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17

So I got my statement from Chase today, and from what I can tell it looks like if you have the Disney Visa Premier card you do earn the 2% Disney Dollars when you make payments into the DVA. :smile:

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18

I was told at Target that the 5% discount using the Target card does not apply to gift card purchases.

19

That may be what they said but many people have received the discount both in store and online.

20

@DANIELANDVERA, I’ve been using the Target cards for months to pay off our Christmas trip. I get the 5% every time, online or in the store.