Welcome to Day 11 of Disney Training. Be sure to read all my Disney World Training posts here.
On Day 7 of Disney Training I told you about the Dining plan. If you haven’t read that yet, please make sure you do. You will need to have a basic understanding of the Dining plan for this post.
As you know, there are 3 different dining plans to chose from. I am going to use the regular dining plan for this discussion.
Before arriving at Disney in 2009, we decided to get the regular dining plan. We paid for 7 days worth of credits for 2 adults, 1 child and our son was under 3 so he ate free. Upon arrival at the hotel, we were issued our Keys to the World card and our dining credits were loaded onto the card. We had 14 adult table service credits (1 per day per person), 7 child table service credits, 14 adult quick service credits, 7 child quick service credits and 21 snack credits. They gave us a print out at the hotel for our records.
We had made reservations ahead of time for 7 table service meals. All were character meals and we had one each day of our trip.
On the first day of our trip, we dined at Chef Mickey’s (a table service meal). It is a buffet. Each person (even my son who was under 3) got a plate from the buffet as well as a beverage. When we were finished with the meal, she presented us with the bill. We gave her one of our Key to the World cards and she took it to the register. She swiped the card and entered that we had used 2 adult table service credits and 1 child table service credit. She returned the receipt to the table with a pen for us to sign. We now had the option of filling in the tip line on the receipt with her tip amount (it would charge to our Key to the World card since we had set up charging). We brought cash with us instead and left her a tip. Our receipt reflected that we now had 12 adult table service credits and 6 child table service credits remaining. (it is really as easy as that!)
Later that day we ate at a quick service (also called a counter service) restaurant. We got 2 adult meals and 1 child meal. Again I just handed my Key to the World card and they scanned it and it removed 2 adult and 1 child quick service credit from our account. (Getting a snack works the same way. They just scan your card and it removes the correct number of snack credits from your account.) Every time you dine anywhere at Disney it will indicate on your receipt how many credits are left.
There are a few things you need to remember about the dining plan:
- Not every restaurant at Disney participates in the dining plan (most do). You can see the list of participating restaurants here.
- You receive all your credits on your first day at Disney. You do not have to use them evenly on each day. One day you could choose to just do 2 table service meals and another day you could choose to just do 2 counter service meals, etc. You choose how you want to spend them.
- You do not have to use 1 credit per person on your reservation at each meal. If just 2 people in your party wanted to eat at a quick service meal and the rest aren’t ready to eat, that’s fine.
- Not everything that looks like a snack is a snack. Read the confirmed snack thread here on the Disboards.
- Keep track of your credits while you are at Disney. Sometimes mistakes happen and you can get overcharged or undercharged. They can print out a dining report in the lobby of your hotel.
- There are 12 different restaurants and shows that require 2 table service credits per person. You can see the list here.
- If you don’t use the credits, you lose them. They expire at midnight on the last day of your reservation. You paid for these…. make sure you use them all!
- You can not partially use a credit. If you choose to forgo the dessert, you do not get a cash refund. Choose a dessert that you can take back to the resort with you if you don’t feel like eating it.
- You can not be a generous person and use your credits to pay for someone else’s meal (that isn’t in your party). They do not allow this.
If you have any questions or personal reflections on this, please leave a comment below. I love hearing the opinions my readers!
{ 14 comments… read them below or add one }
wow, that is informative. when we finally go, i will definitely feel more armed with information because these posts!
We had the dining plan, when we went in 2008 for 2 adults and 2 kids. When ordering quick service meals we ordered 3 adult meals and the kids shared one ,because there was more than enough food and your quick service credits were for an allotted number of meals during your trip, so we were not required to order so many child quick service and so many adult. Hope that makes sense. By ordering the 1 adult quick service instead of 2 childs, were able to get and extra quick service at night, when the kids were always hungry again before bed.
I was just going to say the same thing as my3angels. When we were there in May we found out on Day 1 that they did not keep track quick service between adult or child servings so we always did an adult quick service lunch for the kids to split and the “banked” one for later in the evening and used it as a “before bedtime” meal for them. It was a great way for us to stretch our dining plan. We also did this with our meals too. Split a meal at lunch and then “banked” a meal for later. We found the servings to be large and with the activity of the day we just spread our food out more…we could supplement with a snack and then bank our meals :-)
Does anyone know if this is still true – do they still not keep track of adult vs. child quick-service meal credits?
We were there May 29-June 5, 2009. I have not heard it to have changed on the boards.
Now that a couple of years have gone by since this comment – does anyone know whether or not they keep track of adult vs. kids quick service meals?
One thing we noticed was that “snacks” could be very different pricewise – we paid for a banana ($.99) and used our credits for the themed snacks that ran more in the $4 range.
Any new updates on the snack options available? This one is older now, just wondered if there is on for 10/11?
My daughters and I just returned yesterday (March 13, 2011) from staying at the Pop Century and having the dining plan. It worked wonderfully well for us.
In response to a post-question, the counting of meals is still done so that adult meals/childrens meals are not distinguished. So there were several times I ordered an adult meal for my daughters (ages 5 and 7) to split. It was a way to “save” meals, and sometimes the girls preferred the adult entree offerings over the children’s meal offerings.
Another tidbit of information to add: I learned that three snacks equals one meal (you can get three snacks in place of a meal). We found using snacks often worked well for us because we are often “grazers”, especially at breakfast time (so instead of a breakfast entree like pancakes, french toast, or omelets, we would choose fruit like grapes, melon, orange, banana, and we would choose a muffin or banana bread or croissant, and we would choose juice or milk, or we would choose pre-packages bowls of cereal like Disney-brand cheerios, or Kelloggs Fruit Loops or Frosted Flakes, etc).
Thank you so much for the reply! We are going in a couple months and this will definitely work out better for us…we have a 2 and 5 yr old…so…i’m sure mac n cheese and chicken nuggets aren’t gonna be appetizing every day of the week lol.
Another thought related specifically to using “snack” credits for breakfast–breakfast time (approx. 7:30-8:3045am) was by far the busiest time in the food court at the Pop Century Hotel; it was chaotic in the food court area and there were lines of people, so the last few days I actually picked up our breakfast items the evening before and took them to our room (I put the melon and milk I bought in the hotel room ice bucket), it was SO much easier to have breakfast in our room–also much quicker than going through the food court lines and eating there in the morning. And this saving of time is significant in the morning because the tips on this website about arriving at the park early in the day is right on—it is those first 2-3 hours of the day where there’s a HUGE difference in the crowds being much less, everything being fresh and clean at the parks, and our family being able to get onto rides very quickly.
WE were there in Sept 2010 and did the same. For counter service meals I ordered adult entrees for the kids and were never told that we couldn’t. I am going back in November and was wondering if this was still acceptable?
November 2011
We just got back and they did not keep track of adult and child quick service meals. I even asked at the counter of our resort and they confirmed.