Trifter

No. You don’t have to sit through hours of timeshare presentations to get this fantastic deal. Disney itself has actually offered this unheard of deal every year for the past 3 years. Although it is not widely advertised, it is listed on the Disney World website. You just have to search through to find it. So, how did I come across this jewel of information?

My youngest daughter, Rachel (3), decided after being bombarded with commercial after commercial of Disney World joy, that she needed to go to Disney World this year. So, began her quest.

“Daddy, can we go to Disney World?”

“No.”

“But, Daddy, they have princesses there.”

“No.”

“But, Daddy, they have a Winnie the Pooh ride.”

“No.”

“But, Daddy, I would LOVE it!”

“You really want to go?”

“Yes. Daddy, PLEASE?”

Then finally:

“Okay, we’ll go.”

So, we start planning our trip. I looked on several different travel websites…. Scouted out what I thought were good deals. I looked on the Disney World official website to check out what they could offer. I couldn’t find any discounts at all on their official website. In fact, it seemed extremely expensive to even stay at the Disney World resort at all, even if you got a deal through a travel consolidator. I’m resigned to stay offsite, until…

I am in my husband’s office one day talking to his boss, who happens to be my sister in law. We get to talking about the trips we’ll be taking as summer nears.

“We’re taking the plunge and going to Disney World this year.”

“Wow. Did you hear Paul and Wendy are going about the same time as you?”

“No. I didn’t hear that.”

“Did you get on the free dining plan?”

“Free Dining??”

“Yes. They said they got on some deal that gives them free food for the whole family for the week.”

“REALLY?”

Really. Free food. No kidding. They found out about this deal because they have a Disney Rewards Visa and got a notification about it with one of their bills. Now, that I have been planning the trip for some time, I know that there are websites specifically built for the purpose of informing those clueless individuals trying to plan a Disney World vacation for less than the cost of two arms and a leg. Mousesavers.com offers pretty up to date information on current deals that may be offered during your stay and codes to enter when reserving your room to receive the discount. At the time I was planning our trip, I had never heard of such things.

Why Do They Offer Free Dining?

Disney started offering this deal in 2005 for one reason: to bring more people to Disney World during a time when the parks were practically empty; the beginning of school. No one wanted to take their vacation right when the kiddies were getting ready to start school, or had started already. So, in order to encourage people to come to parks designed for kids and families during a hard time for kids and families to come, they started to offer this deal. If you come to Disney World anytime between the last week in August until the 2nd-3rd week in September, you get the Disney Dining plan for free.

How Does It Work?

There are rules and stipulations that go with this deal, of course. In order to get the free dining:

1. You have to stay at a Disney-owned resort hotel
2. You have to buy your park tickets through Disney
3. You must arrive/depart within the specified time period for that year (it varies somewhat from year to year)
4. You must make your reservation early, but within their specific time limit!
5. You either need to call Disney reservations and specifically ask to be put on the “Free Dining” deal, or get a the special code to enter into the computer if making your reservation online. Codes can be found at mousesavers.com. Disney reservationists are not allowed to even tell you this exists until you ask for it!
6. Once you have made your hotel reservations that include the free dining, call and make Disney dining reservations quickly thereafter. There are a lot of people using Disney free dining during this time period and reservations for the better restaurants go quickly.

The announcement for the free dining deal usually comes out in April at some point. That means you cannot make a reservation with the free dining deal until then. They close reservations for free dining in June. There are only so many “free dining” experience reservations allowed per resort. Once they have reserved their allotment of free dining for that hotel, it is no longer offered to guests wishing to stay there. For example, if you wanted to stay at the Pop Century Resort (a “value” resort), they may only allow 50 rooms reservations to have free dining out of the 300 actual rooms available. If you call to reserve a room at this resort after all the free dining reservations have gone, they will tell you that free dining is not available at this hotel, and you will have to keep trying until you find one that still has reservations open.

What Does Free Dining Include?

As of 2008, free dining includes the following: one quick service meal, one full service meal, and one snack per day per person for each night of your stay. So, if you are staying for seven nights, you will get seven quick service meals, seven full service meals, and seven snacks for each person (over three yrs of age) in your party.

A quick service meal includes: entrée (or combo meal), dessert, and non-alcoholic beverage. Dessert is not available at breakfast. Juice is offered instead. Quick service meals are those counter service operations in Disney that we would consider “fast food”.

Full service meals offer: entrée or full buffet, dessert, and non-alcoholic beverage. Sit down restaurants, character buffets, and regular buffets are all considered full service meals. Some “special” dining experiences count as two meals. So, be careful when using your dining options.

Your Disney dining credits are not available for use at ALL Disney dining establishments. But, the majority of them are. You will find an abundance of restaurants at each of the parks and the counter service and some full dining restaurants at each resort hotel that accept the Disney dining plan. For a list of restaurants that accept the Disney dining plan, you can visit allears.net in their dining section. There are also reviews of many of Disney World’s restaurants which is invaluable when trying to make first time reservations!

Missed the free dining plan this year? Start looking around April 2009. I can’t guarantee that they will offer it again. But, it is worth checking out. I could save thousands of dollars on your next Disney World vacation!