Best way to purchase park tickets for timeshare people??

[Dragonlady]

We have booked a trip through RCI at Old Key West for June 1-8. Since this is a timeshare reservation using points, what is the best way to buy park tickets? We called the 1-800 number to ask about tix and dining (I think it's the same number DVC people use) and the price they quoted was the same as buying tix and dining from the Disney website, no discount. I thought you usually get a discount on tix and/or dining if you book a whole package together but maybe I'm mistaken, or maybe this isn't true for timeshares. In the past we've booked through AAA so maybe that's where the discount comes from. Anyway, we usually do the regular dining plan, which I believe has to be booked through the DVC/RCI folks, but is there a better (cheaper!) way to purchase park tix? I think I read somewhere on one of the SR Disney forums that it's better to purchase tix through the local Disney Store?? (But I would think the price would be the same). And beyond that, is there a way to "link" our park tix to the rest of our reservations so everything is linked on our Key to the World cards? And even further beyond that, we'll probably add a couple of extra days prior to June 1 at a value resort so I wonder if all that can be linked as well?? (whew!)

This is our first trip using our RCI timeshare. We're veterans at Disney planning but newbies on the timeshare end of things!

Thanks much for any input!

[wendyburger]

Hi! Unfortunately there is no discount on regular tickets or dining plan through DVC. Since you want to add a few more days on at the beginning of the reservation, I would book a package and add 10-day tickets on at the beginning. That way, you can take advantage of the special going on during that time, that will include a discount on room and tickets. Then, when it's time to move over to OKW, take your old room key with the tickets and ask them to add your tickets to your new room key. (Concierge should be able to do this if the front desk can't). Since dining is "attached" to the number of nights you are staying in the room, you'll need to add those on separately to each reservation.

If you would like assistance with the first part of your reservation at the value resort, please contact me. Along with being a travel agent, I am also a DVC member

[Dragonlady]

Thanks for the info, and great idea on purchasing all the tix along with the extra days prior to OKW! I priced out several options online last night and discovered that with the tiered discounts (20% off Value, 25% off Moderate) the difference between a Value and Moderate for our dates is only 60 bucks or so. Suh-weet!

Unfortunately, we can't book those extra days for about a month or so. My master plan is to leave for Disney on my kids' last day of school...straight from the school parking lot! But we live in Indiana where the weather is finicky, at best. If we should happen to get a bad winter storm in the next month and end up with snow days, the makeup days could be tacked onto the end of the school year, which means our departure could get bumped out a day or two (booooo!). So we have to get past the worst of the winter months to make sure we're free and clear of snow days.