2010 Free Dining Discussion-Free Dining released for everyone (see 1st post)

[MellieluvsDisney]

I made our reservations for Pop this morning with a CAA (AAA) travel agent.

This will be our 3rd year to the world with free dining. We are 4, me, my husband, my mother and my aunt.

I'm doing this right now and this

We are extremely happy to go again this year.

 

[DW2010]

I've always wanted to take advantage of free dining, but I don't think the math works out for us. As Florida residents we get discounted tickets and often discounted onsite hotels. Even though "FREE" dining sounds very enticing, I think the rules require booking at full price for hotel and tickets.

It seems to be less expensive to pay for the dining program and get the discounted FL resident tickets/hotels.

Has anyone else noticed the same thing? Am I mistaken? Is there a way that I could be saving more by taking advantage of free dining?

Yep. I waited 4 months for free dining only to be crushed when I found out that you can't combine free dining and FL resident tickets. We're only going for 3 nights and getting a 3 day ticket so it's cheaper for us to get the FL tickets. Heck, we'd even save about $35-40 to BUY free dining...lol. Now if we were going for 7-14 nights, free dining might work out better depending on how many days worth of tickets we bought.

 

[OrangeCat04]

It runs until Oct 2nd right?? What if you book your trip for Oct 2nd-8th. Does your free dining extend for your whole trip? Or do you need to have your trip end by the 2nd??

 

[2princes'mom]

just grabbed our free dining & only was on hold for 3 min!!

 

[momto2inKC]

Just so your check in is by Oct 2nd, you can get it for up to 14 nights.

 

[Cllong75]

I called around 1:30 and added FD to our reservation, and upgraded to the DDP instead of the QSDP and it was less than 10 minutes from when I dialed to when I hung up. Can't wait until September.

 

[pinkle]

finally! it's all done.....decided to upgrade from Pop to POFQ (waterview)! ADR finalized, now I just have to wait it out! What a load off!

 

[gregpso]

I am so sorry to hear this. I've always been a little scared to use a TA and have made our plans on my own. Yikes, so does this mean that you can't call yourself and change your ressie? Ugh, I'd be so mad.

In this day and age there is no need for a TA do it yourself over the net save money and the hassles

 

[Melissa<3Disney]

I'm so glad to see that most everyone got the free dining and the resort that they wanted! Now the fun of the countdown to Disney really begins!!

 

[Joyful Disney]

Hello Everyone.

My first post here....just joined minutes ago.

I had to say Thanks ... I been looking all over for at least a month for Free Dining....had almost given up. 3 weeks ago or so I found Dis boards. I been following... That's How I knew to get up at (OREGON) 3:20 am this morning.

Start hitting redial at 3:56 AM ~ after about 4 redials straight in ...NO Wait.
It was so quick I thought now what.....took me a hour an half to get back to sleep. so I made reservations.....

Taking 2 grands (their 1st trip to WDW) 11 boy & 4 yr old princess. 8 nights @ POP (they will LOVE POP)

So I booked Mickey BBQ - Cinderella Royal Table, Donald Safari Breakfast, Hollywood Vine Character Breakfast, Crystal Palace Winne Pooh & Friends & 1900 Park Fare. Amazing we can do all this...with the upgrade. Still checking O Hana (full)

THANKS AGAIN
JOY

 

[EclecticWAHM]

That's just an example they give. The Disney Visa offer clarifies somewhat:

Minimum three-night stay required.

I don't see that they have the full rules posted anywhere publicly, but the first post in this thread has a good summary of what has been deduced so far.

It's kind of irritating that they don't clearly state the rules on the site. I imagine it confuses not only customers, but CMs too.

 

[MCFADDEN5]

We are planning to go in December and really hoping they will extend the free dining again like they did last year. Does anyone remember when they did that? We are trying to decide if we should just book the trip now to make sure we get our resort of choice and they apply the fd code later?

 

[TheRatPack]

We are planning to go in December and really hoping they will extend the free dining again like they did last year. Does anyone remember when they did that? We are trying to decide if we should just book the trip now to make sure we get our resort of choice and they apply the fd code later?

You can check Mousesavers for dates of past years promotions....they have all that listed and cut off dates...etc. I just checked and it says that it came out July 24th for Visa Card holders and July 27th for the general public. It said you had to book by September 26th and that it was good for check in dates 9/27 through 12/17. HTH

 

[TheRatPack]

In the past have they everextending the fd offern to nov or dec??? Were are going in July in the saving is better for us with the visa kids deal but it would be nice to go later in the year as well also do they offer bb for the visa deal?

Yes, see post above They extended it last year and bookings started in July for check ins September through December.

Called this morning at 0700 was on hold for 48 minutes. CM was excellent she played out the FD and the kids stay and play on both of my reservations. (split the orig res up into 2 in order to optimize my discount for the little one's) saved $650 on one resafter kids stay and play and $550 on the other after FD and upgrade to Regular dining @ a value resort.

The CM I got on Thursday did this too....we saved a lot since we have 2 rooms and she ran numbers using the Kids and the QSDP FD. One room is the FD deal and the other room is the kids deal....love when you get a nice CM that does that without asking

It runs until Oct 2nd right?? What if you book your trip for Oct 2nd-8th. Does your free dining extend for your whole trip? Or do you need to have your trip end by the 2nd??

Yes

Hello Everyone.

My first post here....just joined minutes ago.

I had to say Thanks ... I been looking all over for at least a month for Free Dining....had almost given up. 3 weeks ago or so I found Dis boards. I been following... That's How I knew to get up at (OREGON) 3:20 am this morning.

THANKS AGAIN
JOY

Wow, congrats.....sounds like you guys are going to have a blast! Glad you got in so quickly too....and got all the ADRs you wanted (minus Ohana....but keep checking) My kids were so excited, as they knew FD hadn't been announced in early April and we were looking at other vacations due to that, when I told them FD was finally released, they were soooooo excited that we could do Disney again.

 

[TheRatPack]

Say that there are 100 CMs working at the call center and 1000 people called at 7:00 to get free dining (and yes, I know these numbers are way low ). 100 of those callers would've gotten through immediately, while the other 900 would've been put in the queue. You were just unlucky and were lower in the queue than other people.

Well, on Thursday there were people that called after me and they were on hold less time....I called on my cell and then 10 minutes in to that hold queue I called on my house phone....my house phone got through quicker. So I don't necessarily think that it's first called first served, maybe each goes through a different switch board to direct you to the shortest queue line when you dial and so if a lot of people hang up on that line it bumps you forward? Who knows, it's one of those Disney mysteries...like PIN's....LOL

If you haven't gotten your Reservation Confirmation e-mail, check your spam folder! That's where mine was this morning!

I didn't get mine till after 9am 24 hours after booking. I think they send them out in batches and so it just depends on when your changes were made and what batch they get lined up in.

I waited on hold for 47 mins this morning (had to modify an existing res.- had to add my new baby). Anyway- got CBR for 11 nights! Can't wait!

Still haven't received my conf. e-mail. Checked spam and not there, either.

Wait till after 9am....I couldn't even get to mine online, it kept saying that it wasn't available? After 9am it was in my email though.

This may be a question for the moderators -

Is there any reason why I would want to "link up" the dining ressies I made a month ago with my updated FD plan/hotel ressie? I was thinking it might not matter because when I go to the restaurant, I give them my confirmation number, sit down, eat, and then give them my key to the world to pay for it. Do I need to call a CM and attach the two or doesn't it matter? Thanks.

I ask because I tried to do it this morning and he said he would have to get me new dining reservations, if available, around the same time that I already have them.

I didn't link mine, I guess I would if I had CRT or something that way I wouldn't have to pay to make the ressie, but all of ours are no deposit required and I didn't want them tied to the reservation where they get pulled up everytime my reservation does. More room for error there....hitting the wrong key...etc. It's never been an issue at the restaurant, I don't think they've ever even asked for room numbers or anything...just our name and they check their computer for our ADRs, don't think I've even had to show them our ADR confirmation booking number, although I do always carry it.

 

[DisneyMomFanatic]

We use Deanna through Small world vacations and she is awesome. Never have to worry about anything. Tell her what I want and it's done. I don't have to get on the phone at all. Send some emails and she is good to go and gets it done. LOVE it!!!

 

[DisneyMomFanatic]

our free dining was more expensive than the room % discount....who knew??? I'll pay for dining if I get cheaper over all bottom line...

 

[TACK]

Nothing beats waking up to snow in May

I called yesterday a few times in the morning and was told of a 30 min minimum wait so decided to call later in the evening. Got through in about 12 minutes and cancelled my old reservations, upgraded my dining plan and make my room requests.

Done -- if they offer the Bounceback - I'm taking it.

 

[milmore104]

Ok so I had been hoping for the FD like the rest of you and am using a TA who is awesome. She knows what I was and was getting it for us. We are scheduled to stay at the Contemporary and when I just happened to go to the Disney website to look, low and behold there was the 40% off room. I ran the numbers and come to find out that if I do 8 nights/6day myw base tix and DDP it is almost $350 cheaper to use the 40% off than to do the free dining. GO FIGURE??!!! If it's cheaper to pay for food and less to use the discounted room, I don't care how you slice it, give me the cheaper price. Emailed TA and boom, DONE, got it! Saved almost $350 for the same package that we wanted all along. And I am still surprising the whole family with the Resort we are going to, they still think we are staying at Coronado.

Us too. We have been planning on a Dec trip this year but when FD came out I had to look at it. My DH announced the other day he would like to go back at our "usual" time (Oct). But when I compaired FD to the 40% off code we got we save $900. So we are sticking w/ our 40% off code.
I'm also surprising my family w/ our resort. They think we're staying at Pop and we're staying at AKL!!!

 

[pinkle]

Nothing beats waking up to snow in May

I called yesterday a few times in the morning and was told of a 30 min minimum wait so decided to call later in the evening. Got through in about 12 minutes and cancelled my old reservations, upgraded my dining plan and make my room requests.

Done -- if they offer the Bounceback - I'm taking it.

snow! how terrible! I am definelty going to consider bounceback....releive all the stress. We've done FD 3 times and have never been offered bounceback, i wonder why?