The Downside of Buying Discounted Disney Gift Cards for Trips

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Many Disney fans know that the “secret” way to save on a Disney vacation is to pay for it with discounted Disney gift cards. There are several channels through which you can get at least 5% off the price of Disney gift cards. I even wrote a post about it a few years ago.

Saving money on a Disney trip is all well and good. But what happens when your trip is canceled because of a global pandemic?

The Unexpected Storm

Nobody knew it would get this bad. Because of coronavirus, Disney closed all of its parks indefinitely. Disney Cruise Line canceled cruises for months. We still don’t have a re-opening date for anything Disney-related.

People who paid for their trips entirely with Disney gift cards received refunds on those Disney gift cards. Yep, the money refunded goes back to the original source. So now, I’ve seen people on Disney message boards talk about how they have refunds of $3k up to $17k on Disney gift cards that they can’t use in the immediate future.

Under normal circumstances, those high refunds on Disney gift cards might not be a huge deal. Just re-book a cruise/parks vacation for a few months later.

But these aren’t normal circumstances. Projected unemployment is over 15% as we head into the summer. Now more than ever, people need vacation cancelation money in cash for food and shelter.

Options

The most obvious option is to hold onto the gift cards to use for a future trip. However, you could be holding them for a year or more. For people with Alaska cruises or early summer cruises that conflict with the CDC’s recent “no-sail” order, they will likely have to reschedule for 2021.

But for folks who are kicking themselves for being Disney-gift-card-rich and cash-poor, you can always re-sell the gift cards. Ebay and online gift card re-sellers will allow you to re-coup some of your cash. And right now, especially for those who are furloughed or unemployed, cash is king.

My Experience with Discounted Disney Gift Cards

I’ve purchased discounted Disney gift cards for almost every Disney vacation. I can easily get 5% back if I use my Chase Ink card for Disney gift cards at office supply stores. However, I never fund our entire vacation with gift cards. If our main source of income ever dried up, we wouldn’t be thinking about going on a Disney vacation any time soon.

My family was supposed to go to Disney World next month (but we postponed). I did use Disney gift cards to purchase our park tickets. But in this case, Disney is not refunding park tickets. For now, Disney is just extending the ticket expiration dates. So, I wouldn’t have been able to get cash back anyway.

But, seeing the predicament of people with their large stockpile of Disney gift cards during the pandemic has made me more cautious of buying too many gift cards for future trips. I will think long and hard about what % or dollar amount I buy for future trips. I hope this pandemic is not a recurring incident, but you never know.

Do you have a stockpile of Disney gift cards from a canceled trip? What is your plan?

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Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, hotel, airline, or other entity. This content has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of the entities included within the post.