Annual Pass?

[mousefan1972]

I am considering purchasing annual passes for my family and hoped those of you on here who have them could give me some feedback. I don't live in Florida, and going to WDW involves a plane ride. However, we're planning on 2 trips annually, one at Christmas and another in the spring. Each will likely be a week long and we'll be using 8 days of tickets per trip. An annual pass seems like a no brainer, except I have been lucky and have found great package discount codes in the past which have significantly reduced our cost. For our trip this Christmas, we're staying at POR on a MYW plus dine package with a discount code applied, saving us about $500. However, on subsequent Christmas trips we're planning to stay at Shades of Green, which means no MYW package. For the spring trip we plan to stay at the Poly. So my questions are: would we be lucky enough to score an AP holder room only discount for the Poly in late April/May? And will I be kicking myself if Disney releases a great package discount code, but I won't need a package b/c we have AP's?? Lastly, we usually get the DDP (although we're still on the fence for '08 due to the changes), is the DDE for AP holders worth getting? Sorry for all the questions; it's just that AP's are so expensive, and I don't want to spend that much money and end up regretting it. Thanks in advance for your input.

 

[Cinderelly07]

Do It!

It is way more than worth it. Not only can you get the AP discounts on rooms but you can get a Disney Dining Experience card which saves you 20% at many of the seated dinning options in and out side the park. It gets you buy one get one free passes at Pleasure Island and with the AP you get 10% off at World Disney purchases and Ghirardelli's at the Market Place. You also get free parking,,, there are sooooo many perks.. We go two or three times a year and wouldn't think of not getting our passes renewed every January.

 

[PineapplePrincess]

You only need one AP to get the Dining Experience card. So you could just get one AP and get the deals on the rest.

 

[Vernonpush]

You only need one AP to get the Dining Experience card. So you could just get one AP and get the deals on the rest.

You only need one AP to get a discount on a room also.
By the way, if you drink adult beverages, the DDE (20% off) is also applied to that.

 

[ScottNBecky]

we are AP holders and believers in them. We live in Illinois so we can only go during the peak seasons and it has been well worth it for us.

 

[Rob562]

I've done the calculations for the food budget for how my group of friends and I eat, and the DDE discount always comes out ahead of the DDP *except* for when Disney is offering the DDP for free.

I have an AP and live in Massachusetts. I went in June this year, and will be returning in December. I was *hoping* to get one more trip in next May before the pass expires, but unfortunately my friend's work schedule won't allow him to take off until after it expires. So, I'll just be renewing and going in June again, then once more in either September or October.

While it doesn't say specifically how much the discounts were, you can check the past trends for discounts on Mousesavers. It looks like there have been discounts from mid-April through late May each year.
http://www.mousesavers.com/historicalwdwdiscounts.html#codetrends

-Rob

 

[mousefan1972]

Do you have to renew the pass before it expires, or is there any grace period? For example, if I buy pass in May '08, it would expire in May'09. But say I'm not there to renew it until December '09. Does it still count as a renewal, or do I have to buy a new pass since the one I have is expired?? Or can renewals be done online or over the phone?

 

[WTBAD]

There is no grace period for renewal that I know of, especially not 4 months. If you renew the year on the renewed pass starts the day the old passes expires. I have had AP's for four years now. I don't always renew at the expiration. I just wait for our next trip & buy new ones. You can time your trips to make your second just before your passes expire, then buy new ones before your next trip. Also you can't always count on the AP room discounts. It's been three trips since we've been able to use the discounts. Ofcourse, if your staying at a Mod or Delx your more likely to get the discounts. The DDE is the best benefit for AP's. A 20% discount on table service & some counter service can pay for the DDE card in three or four days. But how fast you recoup the cost depends on your eating habits. If you eat primarily counter service, you will find it harder to recover the cost of the DDE. The only counter service that takes the DDE is Flametree at AK & the food courts at the hotels. But for us, AP is thje only way to go.

 

[yankeevttch]

it expires a year after you get it. so yes if you get in May it will expire a after that. We have ours and live in GA. We go for 3 long weekends and a week durning the time we use ours.

 

[Rob562]

Generally, you have a 30-day period after your AP expires that you can renew it in-person. You should also get a renewal notice in the mail and can renew over the phone. But in any of those instances, the renewed AP will have its expiration date set for one year after the original AP expired.

Usually I buy one in mid-December, and then go again the first week of the following December right before it expires. Then I don't buy one until the December after that. So I only buy one AP every other year. But this year, my travel plans ended up that I'll have to renew my AP.

-Rob

 

[davinakb]

Our AP is well worth it, esp. considering that DDE card. :slurp: We also don't renew, just get a new pass we go again. It saves more money that way, if you plan your next trip just before the pass expires. We do F&W every year so one year we went mid-October and the next year went at the beginning of the month. That way we go two F&W, plus another week in February all on one year's pass. FWIW.

 

[Craig & Lisa]

This will be our second year with the AP's and they have saved us a TON!! Until we got them we only went once a year, and since we go at least 3 times a year, even though it was a big up front payment in the long run you save so much more. The Ap discounts help also. Just remember that if you want to get the DDP you can't use the AP discounts, but look at it this way you get the DDP and the room, you don't have to worry about tickets, money saved again.

 

[OhioDisneyLover]

We are going on our third year with APs. We live in Ohio and usually take 2-3 trips a year. One for 9 days and 2 trips for 3-4 days. We have the DDE card and it seems to be the way to go. We have always been able to get great AP discounts on our room without a problem. The DDE card is great too. It seems that you can use it at a lot of different places and some places that don't take it (like Fulton's crabhouse) will give AP holders a discount. We are shoppers and use the AP discount at DTD at the World of Disney store among other places. Not to mention the car rental discount from Alamo since we rent a car each trip. It seems that there are just tons of things to save money on.

We renewed over the phone within the 30 day grace period.