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Dining Plan Question

gracie1

Member
Original Poster
We have 3 children and our oldest will be 12 when we go on our next WDW trip. If we are on the dining plan and she does not care for anything on the adult menu, is she able to order off the children's menu? Thanks!
 

sbkline

Well-Known Member
I think the age cutoff for a child dining plan vs adult dining plan is 9, same as for tickets, if I am not mistaken. So, unless you lie about her age when booking the dining plan, you will be paying for her as an adult on the dining plan. Now I could be wrong, but if you already prepay her as an adult, I suppose Disney would not have any problem with her ordering off the children's menu, since she would then be getting alot less than her money's worth.

*Edit*

On second thought, even though Disney would surely not object to you buying a child's entree at an adult price, it could be that this would be impossible for technical reasons. Or perhaps not impossible, but very problematic for you. Your dining plan info is encoded on your key to the world card, which would include how many adult dining plan credits and how many child dining credits you have. If, for example, you have three adults and two children eating, but one adult eats off the kids menu, the computer may count all the childrens' menu food as a child's dining plan credit, rather than deduct the adult credits which belong to your daughter. So what could end up happening is that it would throw your dining credit balance out of whack. Instead of using up one of your daughter's adult credits, it might end up using an extra child's credit, which would result in "stealing" a child's credit away from one of your other children. Let me illustrate it this way just for simplicity's sake. Let's say you have you, your spouse, a 12 year old (who counts as an adult if you're honest) and an 8 year old, for 3 nights. So you have 3 adult credits X 3 nights, for a total of 9 adult credits. You have 3 child's credits for your 8 year old. If your 12 year old doesn't like what's on the adult menu and orders off the child's menu, the computer system might automatically deduct 2 children's credits off of your account (one for your 8 year old and one for the food which your 12 year old ordered off of the kids menu), leaving your 8 year old short one meal credit and leaving you with an extra adult credit. And depending on how many nights you stay, and how many times you do this, you could end up using up all of the kids credits out from under the children, and leaving extra adult credits. Does that make sense?

Of course, I use the word "might" because I don't know this for sure. But it seems logical that if the wait staff keys in a child's menu meal, then the system would deduct off a child's credit.
 

mickeysshoes

Well-Known Member
My DD are 20 & 17 and they still seem to not always enjoy the adult menu. So we find that if you just talk to your server they will always come up with a suggestion to the problem. My youngest always end up with a great plate of food at Yachtsman..they get her 2 kids cheeseburgers and what ever sides she likes. We always make sure to take care of our serveres when they go above and beyond for our great buy pickey DD!! No need to worry your kids will not leave the table hungry on any of the DDP!!!
 

gracie1

Member
Original Poster
I think the age cutoff for a child dining plan vs adult dining plan is 9, same as for tickets, if I am not mistaken. So, unless you lie about her age when booking the dining plan, you will be paying for her as an adult on the dining plan. Now I could be wrong, but if you already prepay her as an adult, I suppose Disney would not have any problem with her ordering off the children's menu, since she would then be getting alot less than her money's worth.

*Edit*

On second thought, even though Disney would surely not object to you buying a child's entree at an adult price, it could be that this would be impossible for technical reasons. Or perhaps not impossible, but very problematic for you. Your dining plan info is encoded on your key to the world card, which would include how many adult dining plan credits and how many child dining credits you have. If, for example, you have three adults and two children eating, but one adult eats off the kids menu, the computer may count all the childrens' menu food as a child's dining plan credit, rather than deduct the adult credits which belong to your daughter. So what could end up happening is that it would throw your dining credit balance out of whack. Instead of using up one of your daughter's adult credits, it might end up using an extra child's credit, which would result in "stealing" a child's credit away from one of your other children. Let me illustrate it this way just for simplicity's sake. Let's say you have you, your spouse, a 12 year old (who counts as an adult if you're honest) and an 8 year old, for 3 nights. So you have 3 adult credits X 3 nights, for a total of 9 adult credits. You have 3 child's credits for your 8 year old. If your 12 year old doesn't like what's on the adult menu and orders off the child's menu, the computer system might automatically deduct 2 children's credits off of your account (one for your 8 year old and one for the food which your 12 year old ordered off of the kids menu), leaving your 8 year old short one meal credit and leaving you with an extra adult credit. And depending on how many nights you stay, and how many times you do this, you could end up using up all of the kids credits out from under the children, and leaving extra adult credits. Does that make sense?

Of course, I use the word "might" because I don't know this for sure. But it seems logical that if the wait staff keys in a child's menu meal, then the system would deduct off a child's credit.

I didn't think about it messing up the credit system. We won't lie about her age - big difference between 9 & 12 :) Maybe this will get her to venture out a little more!
 

Master Yoda

Pro Star Wars geek.
Premium Member
Ultimately, it is up to the discretion of the restaurant but it has been my experience that most, if not all, will allow an adult DDP credit to be used for a kids meal. Quite often they will do an adult portion of whatever kids meal they order.
 

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