Using Airmiles to go to Disneyland

By Jennifer Stuart

If you are Canadian, those little blue Airmiles are a great chance to help you save on your next Disneyland holiday.   I have used Airmiles to pay for my Disneyland tickets for three vacations now and this has been a great savings for our family.  

Airmiles has had a lot of bad press lately but we really love them.  We are not worried about them expiring because we use them so often. I should say right away that I am not being paid to say this.  Everyone always asks how we can afford to go to Disneyland so often...well here is one of my tricks.

The first time I redeemed for Disneyland Park Hoppers---it was a surprise to me, I thought that you could only use them for flights.  I had been doing some research on ways to save on Disneyland tickets and I found 2 sentences at the end of a post saying that Canadians could use Airmiles to buy tickets. I checked into it and was surprised to find that it was true.  I then checked my Airmiles balance which was pretty low, even after having had the card for years.  I did some more research  on how to get more miles and set a goal to pay for 2 of our tickets with miles.

It takes a little pre-planning to make sure that you are collecting the maximum miles you can but it is so worth it.  I met my goal of 2 tickets  and since then have been able to collect enough miles to pay for all 4 tickets I need for our family.

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You can redeem your Airmiles “dream miles” for 3 and 5 day park hopper passes for both adults and children.  On our most recent trip I redeemed enough miles to pay for 5 day park hopper passes for all four of us (3 adults and 1 child—as 10 and over are considered adults). That was a savings of  $1,244 USD!!!  

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When redeeming, the website says to allow up to 6 weeks for delivery—although we have been lucky and received them in 2-3 weeks (and most recently in only a week).

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The tickets when they arrive are regular paper tickets that you can take straight to the gate.  Remember the fist time you use a multi-day ticket the cast member at the gate will take your photo as tickets are non-transferable.  Also when exiting the park make sure you keep your ticket and get your hand stamped so that you can either hop to the other park or re-enter the same park later in the day.  As these tickets are for 3 or 5 days they also include 1 Magic Morning Disneyland entry.  To find out more about Magic Mornings and Extra Magic Hours read our post here.

If you are planning a longer trip or are going to be able to do a second trip in less than a year you should consider upgrading your ticket to an annual pass.  You can pay the difference to upgrade as long as you still have admissions left on your ticket and it is less than 2 weeks since your first entry.  Or if you only have enough miles for a 3 day ticket you can pay the difference to upgrade to a 4 or 5 day ticket.  See this link to the Disneyland website which explains the process in more detail.

​Insider Tip:
Take a photo of the back of your pass that includes the barcode.  This is the only proof of purchase you have if your passes are lost or stolen.  There is no guarantee that Disney will honour this but you have a better chance.
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A lot of people have been asking how I collect enough Airmiles to pay for our passes so here's how I do it:

• I do a fair bit of my shopping online- Amazon, Indigo, Old Navy, Apple etc…  Before logging into your favourite online site login to the "Airmiles Shops" website first and you will get Airmiles on your purchases even if you can’t usually earn Airmiles in that store. 

 Link to Airmiles Shops site:
http://www.airmilesshops.ca/shops/airmilesshops/Home

• Shop at Safeway and Sobeys. One of my local grocery stores is Safeway.  I make sure that I pay attention to bonus Airmiles offers such as Customer Appreciation Day (currently 20X base miles) or bonus offers on specific products and I combine these with coupons whenever possible.
• I registered my airmiles card online with Safeway and signed up for emails…now they send me weekly airmiles bonus offers that are tailored just for me and loaded directly to my card…no need to print and often an excellent way to quickly add to my Airmiles balance.
• I carry my Airmiles card in my wallet.  See the list of partner shops on the Airmiles website but you might be surprised where you can collect miles for example Staples, Recall, Rona, Shell, Sobeys ….
• I signed up on the Airmiles website for bonus offers.  These are often emailed to me or sent in the mail.

How can you collect more Airmiles before your next Disneyland trip?  There have been extensive articles written on this subject by far more expert people than I.  I would suggest reading this post by Mrs. January for a start.
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Insider Tip:  You can also redeem Airmiles for Disney World or Universal Orlando Tickets!

All Photos by Jennifer Stuart

Thoughts?  Questions?  We would love to hear from you.