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Post by jemmls4 on Jul 13, 2019 0:06:14 GMT
we have a 9 day trip to WDW planned for the fall. We are going with my daughter and her wife and my son will join us for a few days at the end. We’re really excited for the Star Wars part (DH and I). Of course I heard news of the Rise of the Resistance ride opening 12/5; our trip is a bit before then.
It got me to thinking about going again soon since we are almost empty nesters. son lives with us, but almost finished with college. We really just need to worry about doggie. A light bulb moment happened thinking about going more often so maybe look into an annual pass. We are not DVC members or FL residents so pass is $1100. Several sites said you can upgrade your ticket to an annual pass while you are there. What we are spending for our trip this fall is about half the cost of the pass, so it’s an attractive idea.
There is a Disney Yammer site at work and some were saying upgrade before, another said you have to wait until after, and yet another (and my Disney travel agent) said you use your ticket for a day and then upgrade. Travel agent is offline now so I was wondering if any of the peas could tell me a few things...
- why do you have to wait until after you use your ticket the first day to upgrade to pass?
- if we decide to upgrade, is the pass then effective immediately, meaning we get all benefits off pass? I have a spa day built in, and annual pass would get me a 15% discount AND if I felt like hopiping to a park I could because I can now go unlimited days.
- we bought the photopass for the trip. The annual pass includes the photos. Wondering if we get a refund or eat the cost. Just curious; of course it would be nice to get the money back, but it’s not a lot in the big picture.
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Post by freecharlie on Jul 13, 2019 0:11:16 GMT
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Post by freecharlie on Jul 13, 2019 0:12:16 GMT
we bought the photopass for the trip. The annual pass includes the photos. Wondering if we get a refund or eat the cost. Just curious; of course it would be nice to get the money back, but it’s not a lot in the big picture. I think you will eat this cost |
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Post by Eddie-n-Harley on Jul 13, 2019 3:00:13 GMT
- why do you have to wait until after you use your ticket the first day to upgrade to pass? With the disclaimer that I have never been to Disney nor read the terms of their passes, my guess is that your annual pass is good for 365 days from the date of purchase. If you upgrade now, your pass will expire in July 2020. If you wait and upgrade after the first day of your trip, your pass will be good until September/October/whatever 2020. it may also relate to whether you will be able to offset the annual pass cost with a discount for the ticket you're already visiting on. |
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Post by cade387 on Jul 13, 2019 3:30:38 GMT
You should still have time to cancel photopass if you do it now. Then upgrade on your first day down there. You have to upgrade before you take any photos to get them (I went through this last year and lost a few photos).
You should be able to get the spa discount as long as you upgrade immediately.
The only benefit to upgrading now is if they are offering some sort of access due to crowd control for SW:GE. Florida will be doing things different than California so no one knows for sure yet. However if you upgrade now it would really be buying now, not an upgrade. This means:
- if you booked a package now that includes tickets you would have to cancel and rebook or double pay for tickets and your pass.
- your date of activation would be now so you essentially lose the days between now and your trip.
I don’t see how buying now helps with the information available today.
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Post by dualmaestra on Jul 13, 2019 3:53:45 GMT
I went last summer to DW and booked my entire trip through a travel agent, including park tickets and photo pass. I live about 35 min from Disneyland so my sister and I decided to get th ePremier pass (good at both DW and DL). Ours was a little more complicated because we had a DL annual pass and while in Florida, we wanted to upgrade to the pass good for both.
My travel agent investigated what we had to do. She was told to upgrade before going into the gates the first day. Before going to the parks we tried upgrading at Disney Springs (they have an office there) and they were out of passes. They told us it wouldn't be a problem to upgrade once we were at the parks, they said the tickets do not loose value.
My sister and I tried upgrading for 3 days until we were finally successful at Hollywood Studios. I ended up getting a small refund because of the ticket price and Photo Pass I had already purchased.
I don't think you should have a problem upgrading at any time, you just have to go to a ticket box.
Good luck!
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Post by mrgiedrnkr on Jul 13, 2019 12:01:08 GMT
We bought annual passes in March but they didn't activate until we walked in the parks. One thing to check is if you upgrade now, will your hotel be cheaper? Annual pass holders get a discount on rooms depending on availability. Our passes were less than $1000 but we didn't get the Waterpark option.
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Post by pennyscraps on Jul 21, 2019 1:15:50 GMT
Hi. Sorry for the delayed response. I was in Quebec.
Your annual pass activates upon the first day of use, and is not tied to the purchase date.
Your Memory Maker should be refundable, if your package is not yet paid in full. If your package IS paid in full, your travel agent should be able to get it refunded. If it was purchased outside of a package, it is not refundable.
"Memory Maker is non-refundable (except if purchased as part of a Magic Your Way vacation package) and non-transferable. When purchased as part of a Magic Your Way vacation package, Memory Maker is subject to the cancellation and refund policies of the Magic Your Way vacation package."
Your discount is available immediately upon pass activation.
A discount for a room would have to be based upon availability - and there IS a great pass holder discount out there right now for fall. Today I booked a trip for us 12/6-8, and we are also going Labor Day weekend - all for Star Wars Galaxy's Edge. I know the passholder rooms are out there right now based on what I saw this AM. Or shall I say - they were out there this AM. Inventory has been flying off the shelves this week with the release of the fall dining offer and the fall room discount.
If your package is not yet paid in full, anything is changeable. If you are working with a TA, they can run this down for you. Just a note - the Disney TA's do not cost you extra. You don't pay any more for anything through us than you do by going direct. The advantage is that we are here to help you in situations like this. WDW/DLR are more complex today than ever, and it helps to have someone guide you. We don't control your trip - you retain all of the control you want. We are advocates for you - aides.
Finally, annual passes went up on June 18 when the 2020 packages dropped. And also, everyone on the same room reservation HAS to have the same tickets. SO, you cannot be ON the reservation with an annual pass and have everyone else on your room have base/park hopper tickets. At least not in advance. You could upgrade yourself once you arrive. There is not a situation ever at WDW where they would run out of passes and any ticket kiosk can upgrade you - at Disney Springs or at any of the 4 parks. In this case, your annual pass start date would be the date you first used your current ticket.
You would not all get the benefits of the pass unless you all had a pass.
So in this case, you will pay more now for the annual pass than if you had made the change on July 12. The annual prices went up substantially. That may help you deliberate. Sorry I didn't see this the day it posted.
Feel free to ask me any questions.
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Post by beaglemom on Jul 21, 2019 4:42:46 GMT
We booked a package with regular park hopper tickets and I upgraded mine to a season pass the first day. That way we got discounts on everything. We ended up upgrading everyone else on our last day. No real reason other than we didn't feel like dealing with it till the last day. We did 10-day hoppers over Spring Break in April. We knew we were going back in February for the Princess Run Series. So between the two trips, there was about a $50 difference between having the tickets vs season passes. So we added on another trip. Originally we were going to go in August before school starts but decided it was going to be too hot. So we are going to go again for Spring Break since it is a week earlier this year. So we will leave to head home the day our passes expire.
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