dining plan |

How to Use Your Disney Dining Plan

March 12, 2020 By Callie Leave a Comment

Disney dining plan is one of the most popular add on features for guests staying at Walt Disney World Resot in Florida (WDW). Disney dining can be added to any resort package for the length of stay and comes in four different packages to fit the different needs of families and travelers. Need information on the differences in each package? You can find a more detailed post here.

Once you have purchased your plan now what? What do I need to do? The first thing is make dining reservations or if you have a trusty travel agent they will happily make them for you. WDW opens dining reservations 180 days before travel and it’s important that you book before you go. I recommend that clients make decisions about 2 weeks before that 180 day window opens. It’s important that you have lots of options and are flexible with where you will be dining and at what times you will be dining while making these reservations.

Fried Chicken and Doughnuts from Homecoming

Once you have all your reservations in place they will be listed for you in your My Disney Experience account which you can view online or on your Disney World smartphone app.

If you are staying on property and receive a Magic Band or have your reservations linked to a purchased Magic Band then all of your dining reservations will automatically be saved to your Magic Band.

Your dining plan is issued to you in the form of credits. Depending upon what dining plan you have purchase you will receive a certain number of credits per person, per nights stayed (nights not days). For example, if you purchased the Disney Dining Plan (the most popular plan) you would receive 1 quick serve, 1 table serve, and 2 snack credits per night stayed. The credits come to you all at one time when you check in and remain active until midnight the day you check out. Credits can be checked for availability on you Disney World app, at the bottom of your receipt after purchasing snacks or meals or by going to the guest relations or check in at any park or resort.

Once you are at a restaurant, quick serve, or snack location simply tell the cast member you would like to use your dining plan-they will often ask if you’re on the dining plan-, scan you Magic Band, enter you pin and that’s it! Easy peasy!

What if you have credits left over? Leave no credits behind! Table and quick serve credits can be traded in for 3 snack credits. You can also trade in a table for a quick-so in other words you can trade down but not up. The last day of travel stop into your resort gift shop or the bakery in Magic Kingdom and use up your credits on snacks you can take home including, nuts, rice krispy treats, candy, cookies, etc…

Grab treats with snack credits to take home.

Need help planning your Magical trip? You can message me at Callie@Fairygodmothertravel.com or find me on Facebook at Callie at Fairy Godmother Travel. As always my services are complimentary!

Disney Dining Plan

March 5, 2020 By Callie Leave a Comment

One of the main questions I get asked about traveling at Disney World is should I get the dining plan? Walt Disney World (WDW) offers several different meal plans to meet a variety of different travelers. WDW has some amazing restaurants not to mention fun character dining so it’s easy to see how dining is such an important part of the WDW experience. Meal plans are offered as part of a WDW package add on to guests staying on property. Meal plans are also for the length of stay so if you’re staying for 5 nights it covers 5 nights-it’s all or nothing. You cannot pick how many days you’d like to do the meal plan, it is simply added to your stay. Let’s take a look at each meal plan, what they offer and the pros and cons of each.

Getting ready to have some fun at Chef Mickey’s

Disney Quick Service Dining Plan offers 2 quick serve (grab and go)meals, 2 snacks and a refillable resort mug per person per night stayed. Pros-Pay ahead so you can easily budget and plan for spending on your trip. Great for travelers who enjoy spending the bulk of their time at WDW in the parks. Cons-does not cover all meals and NO sit downs.

Disney Dining Plan offers 1 quick serve meal, 1 table serve meal (seated),2 snacks, and a refillable resort mug per person per night stayed. Pros- -Pay ahead so you can easily budget and plan for spending on your trip. Includes sit downs and character dining. Cons-does not cover all meals.

Disney Dining Plan Plus offers 2 meals-any combination of quick and table serve, 2 snacks and a refillable resort mug per person per night stayed. Pros- -Pay ahead so you can easily budget and plan for spending on your trip. Has flexibility so you an change plans and grab quick meals or plan mostly table service dining and save money. Cons-does not cover all meals.

Disney Deluxe Dining Plan offers 3 meals any combination of quick serve and table serve, 2 snacks and a refillable resort mug per person per night stayed. Pros- -Pay ahead so you can easily budget and plan for spending on your trip. All meals are planned. Great for foodies who want to focus on dining while on their trip. Cons-Often can be too much food or take too much time away from park time.

Disney really does have a plan to fit all travelers. Disney distributes their dining plan in credits per night stayed. For example, if you were staying for 4 nights and got the dining plan each member of your party would get 1 quick serve credit and one table serve credit and 2 snack credits for each night. You decide how you use your credits. Some restaurants such as Cinderella’s Royal Table count as 2 credits while the bulk of restaurants in and around the parks-including at resorts-usually are 1 credits. If you don’t use all your credits on your trip you can actually trade them for snacks to take home at your resort or in the parks. The best part of the dining plan is the ability to pre pay and be stress free while traveling. You’re able to order whatever you like at table service dining so if you pick the least expensive or most expensive item it’s covered. You will also receive dessert and adults over 21 can choose an alcoholic beverage as their drink. Character dining also allows you to skip those lines in the park to meet characters. Characters come right to your table, sign autographs and take pictures as part of the dining experience.

Need help planning your magical vacation? Feel free to message me at Callie@Fairygodmothertravel.com or you can find me on Facebook at Callie@FairyGodmother. As always my services are complimentary!

Booking Disney-Dining Plans

September 22, 2016 By Callie Leave a Comment

Walt Disney World Resorts have so much to offer guests that sometimes it can be just plain overwhelming. You’ve picked your hotel and you know when you’re going so let’s talk about food.

WDW offers three separate dining plans which can be added to your stay.To add dining plan or not…..

Quick Service Dining Plan-this offers guests a refillable resort mug, 2 quick service-similar to fast food- meals a day and 1 snack daily.

Deluxe Dining Plan-this offers guests a refillable resort mug, 1 quick service meal a day,1 table service meal a day and 1 snack a day.

Premium Dining Plan-this offers guests a refillable mug, 1 table service meal for breakfast lunch and dinner and 2 snacks a day.

Important things to know about meals plans.

1.They are ONLY offered to guests who stay at WDW Resorts.

2.1 Quick serve meal can be redeemed for three snacks instead-at the same location. For example-if you were in the French Bakery in Epcot and wanted three snacks you could use one quick serve meal to pay for them.

3. 1 Table serve meal can be used as 1 quick serve meal. (You probably don’t want to do this but you can.)

4.ALL members of your party-aside from those 3 and under-must get the meal plan. It’s all or nothing if you choose to add this option to your reservation.

5.Your meal plan credits are only for the nights stayed-so 6 nights 7 days visit equals 6 days worth of meals. BUT you can use meal credits and snack credits as you wish-6 snacks in one day-done-no meals one day-fine.

6. Your meal credits are stored on your magic bands-the server only needs to have you enter in your pin to use. Make sure you tell your server at sit down restaurants you specifically want to use your meal plan or they will charge it to your room. You can check to see that you have been charged accordingly on the bottom of your receipt at the restaurants. Your receipt will tell you how many credits you have remaining.

7. Tips are not included.

8.Alcohol is not included.

I’m a pretty avid meal plan user. Vacationing to me is not having to worry about the cost of what I’m eating and having the meal plan allows me to order a full meal, what ever I want on the menu and not feel like I have to eat every last bite. I also really enjoy that at table service meals I can pick a dessert. I probably wouldn’t do this if I wasn’t on the plan. I have been to WDW without the meal plan but having the meal plan allows be to eat at a wider variety of restaurants since I’m not worried about cost. Also if you love character meals but hate the character meal prices then having a meal plan that includes table service allows you to book a ton of character meals and save money. It’s so much easier to take pictures with Mickey and get his autograph while sitting at your table then waiting in hot lines and wasting park time.

You need to price out the meal plans to see if they are a good fit for your family. If you’re doing Disney on a tight budget the dining plans may not be for you-or they may be. Plan prices change every year but you can simply tell the difference by using the Disney site to plan and see how much it adds to the total of your specific package. I priced out a quick weekend trip for 2 days and was shocked that by adding up the average of what two people would eat during the day at the park I honestly only saved ten dollars per person in not getting a meal plan. That’s the cost of 2 snacks.

The food at WDW is definitely part of the fun. Have fun eating! I am always happy to help-shoot me a message in the comments or on my facebook page if you need help.