Hi Jennifer! I'm so happy you reached out to us again to get your question answered. We always love to help answer Guests'
Disney vacation planning questions!
When I celebrated a milestone birthday at the
Walt Disney World Resort, I hosted my family in a beautiful 2-bedroom villa at
Disney's BoardWalk Villas. Since there were multiple families in the room and we each wanted to pay for our own meals and souvenirs, we wanted our
MagicBands to be connected to our own credit cards. So, that's what we did...and that's what you can do too!
When
checking into your
Disney Resorts Collection Hotel, the lead Guest on the reservation must use a credit card for any charges to the room. This is the payment method that will be debited for anything charged to the room at the end of the resort stay. However, when you arrive at the resort, you can each visit the
Front Desk with your MagicBands and credit cards and a friendly Cast Member can attach the correct credit card to the corresponding MagicBand. This way, every time each person taps their MagicBand to pay, it will be added to
their balance. Then, their credit card will be charged for their own expenses at the end of the trip.
While you cannot connect a
Disney Gift Card to your MagicBand, if you don't want to carry your gift cards around, you can charge items to your MagicBand, and then at some point before the last day of your vacation, you can usually ask a Front Desk Cast Member to use your gift card(s) to pay down your balance. Otherwise, the full amount charged to the band will be charged to your credit card and you won't be able to use the gift card.
Jennifer, I know that your travel party doesn't want to carry
credit cards around when you're at the theme parks. However, while I always use my MagicBand to pay for items, I also ensure that I carry around my identification, one credit card, one debit card, and a little cash. Although very rare, there
are times when the system used to charge MagicBands is unavailable and I would hate for you to not have an alternative method of payment while waiting (the usually short time) for it to come back up. While I have never personally experienced this, I know it has happened before and I do not want you to have to wait to pay for your delicious
snacks or exciting
souvenirs!
If you have any other questions leading up to your vacation to the Most Magical Place on Earth,
please reach out to me directly. Ask me some questions, I'll get you some answers!
This is more than I could ever dream possible,
Matt