Unused Military Salute tickets that will expire?

[twodogs]

My parents, my DH and my daughters and I were planning a trip in a few weeks for OBB and the parks. My Dad is retired military and had purchased his 6 military salute tickets for this trip for all of us to use. Unfortunately, he was just diagnosed with cancer last week and is starting chemo next week. The trip needs to be cancelled, and his chemo treatments will continue throughout the rest of the calendar year, making him unable to travel to Disney safely. The Salute tickets expire in mid December. I know that they are non-refundable. Can the value be applied to another Salute ticket next year or to another type of ticket (if my parents are not able to travel with us ongoing, we would like to use the value to get a regular ticket)?

I have thought about calling Disney to see if they would do a refund, but since we buy them at our local military base, I don't think Disney would do that. If anyone has experience with this, please let me know. It is a tough time for our family, but I would like to get some resolution on this, since my Dad is worried about it.

 

[twodogs]

Bumping this up in case anyone has any advice or experience with this. Thank you. And thank you @Cal-Pie.

 

[MilitaryMouse]

So sorry to hear about your dad. Wishing him strength and success in his treatments!

Not sure how helpful this is as it’s not the exact situation but I purchased WDW Salute tickets from Shades of Green last year. My husband then got tagged for mobilization and we had to cancel the trip. His tour of duty was for a year so the tickets would’ve expired too.

I called Shades and they said they couldn’t do anything. Called Disney and they refunded my money - it took a few transfers to upper management and the right ppl (understandable, since it’s an unusual situation) but they said it’s totally something they would sort out and not Shades or a military ticketing office.

So I’d just give Disney a call, explain the situation, and make sure you ask for a manager if the first CM who answers doesn’t know what to do. Good luck!

 

[twodogs]

@MilitaryMouse, thank you so much for this. I will try calling Disney and see if they are able to help. I just want this off of my Dad’s list of things to worry about since he has plenty of other things right now. If they won’t refund them, we will just lose the money, and that may be the only way. He simply can’t medically fly to California and be in a theme park during these next 4 months of chemo. Thank you again for your help and the support of this community.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

I'm so sorry to hear about your dad. What a devastating blow. I hope his treatment goes smoothly and I hope Disney refunds your money for this unfortunate situation.

 

[twodogs]

Thank you so much @SOCALMouseMommy.

 

[Ryan120420]

@MilitaryMouse, thank you so much for this. I will try calling Disney and see if they are able to help. I just want this off of my Dad’s list of things to worry about since he has plenty of other things right now. If they won’t refund them, we will just lose the money, and that may be the only way. He simply can’t medically fly to California and be in a theme park during these next 4 months of chemo. Thank you again for your help and the support of this community.

If Disney wont refund you, hold on to your tickets. The value of the tickets can be applied to a new ticket on a future visit.

 

[twodogs]

If Disney wont refund you, hold on to your tickets. The value of the tickets can be applied to a new ticket on a future visit.

I know that is true of regular tickets; is this also applicable to Military Salute Tickets?

 

[twodogs]

Additional question: My parents are very sad that the trip would have to be entirely cancelled since my Dad can't go. If my mom flew out with us to activate our Salute tickets, would she need to use a day of her ticket also (she has a full Military ID herself; my Dad would likely not be well enough to fly out and back to activate our tickets) upon activating our Salute tickets? She might be able to fly out and activate our Salute tickets and fly right back home, but then I don't know if she would also need to "use" a day of her own ticket since the T&C say either the military member or the military spouse must use one of the 6 tickets. Thanks all... just trying to come up with alternative plans.

 

[heidica]

Additional question: My parents are very sad that the trip would have to be entirely cancelled since my Dad can't go. If my mom flew out with us to activate our Salute tickets, would she need to use a day of her ticket also (she has a full Military ID herself; my Dad would likely not be well enough to fly out and back to activate our tickets) upon activating our Salute tickets? She might be able to fly out and activate our Salute tickets and fly right back home, but then I don't know if she would also need to "use" a day of her own ticket since the T&C say either the military member or the military spouse must use one of the 6 tickets. Thanks all... just trying to come up with alternative plans.

You pose an interesting alternative. Your mom will definitely be able to activate the tickets with her military ID. I do it all the time without my husband who is the veteran. I honestly don’t know if your Mom could activate everyone else’s ticket without scanning hers but I’m doubtful because the intent behind the special offer is the military person is with the group. As others have speculated, you may be able to apply the dollar amount of unused tickets to future tickets but if your Mom uses a day off her ticket to activate yours, I don’t think she would be able to apply any remaining unused days to a future ticket. The ticket has to be unused. So I think the question to consider is - is it worth the cost of an airline ticket and the loss of her ticket to activate yours? Maybe take the money that would be spent on an airline ticket and buy regular DL tickets and save the unused military tickets for another calendar year. If you were able to confirm that you really can apply the unused dollar amount to a future ticket that would dg a long way in informing your decision. Have you tried the online chat feature to chat with customer service to see if you can get an answer? I’m so sorry about your Dad. I hope everything works out for you Dad’s treatment and the trip.

 

[twodogs]

Hello to all of you who helped me 18 months ago with these questions above. I am back with an update and more questions.

As I stated above, we cancelled our 10/22 trip due to my Dad's cancer diagnosis. A few weeks after my post above, my mother was also diagnosed with cancer (breast). Needless to say, it has been a rough time, but after 3 surgeries between them and a lot of chemo, they are both finally cancer-free! It took time for them to build back up the strength and their immune systems to even think of another DLR trip. We are gratefully planning a trip in June, and my daughters are so happy to get to go on this trip with their grandparents after all of this!!

I did eventually call Disney in 2022 about the tickets, as you all advised. The CM was very kind and sympathetic, and she stated that we should hold onto the Military Salute tickets, let them expire since my parents couldn't travel before the expiration, and then exchange them at our ITT office for current Military Salute tickets once my parents were healthy enough to travel. She said she made a note to this effect in my Disney account, and advised me to have the ITT office call Disney if they had any questions about how to do the ticket exchange (we would need to pay the difference between our 2022 and the new Military Salute tickets at the ITT, as expected). She did not indicate if this was standard Disney policy or pixie dust because of our situation.

We went to our local ITT today, and they said they didn't think they could do this exchange, and they advised me to call Disney. I told them Disney doesn't sell Salute tickets, so I didn't think they could help me. As well, I explained that the CM in 2022 said specifically that the exchange would need to be done at the ITT. UGH. I called Disney again today, and they said they can't see any notes on the tickets since they are expired and are no longer linked to my account. She said she could only use the value of the Salute tickets to upgrade them to a regular park ticket at full price. She confirmed that DLR doesn't sell Salute tickets, even at the ticket booths (which would not help anyway since we live in Texas). I am contacting the manager of my ITT on Tuesday when she is back in, as well as I have started a chat with Disney (but Chat is currently closed for the night), but the process has been fairly frustrating!

If anyone has experience doing an exchange of expired Salute tickets to current-year Salute tickets, I would really appreciate your advice.

Thank you all again for your kind wishes above. It brought tears to my eyes to reread this thread from that terrible time for our family and to see so much support here.

 

[crystal1313]

I am SO happy to hear about your parents Michelle!! I wish I could help the issue about the tickets. I hope that you are able to have it all sorted and you all have a fantastic trip!!

 

[twodogs]

I am SO happy to hear about your parents Michelle!! I wish I could help the issue about the tickets. I hope that you are able to have it all sorted and you all have a fantastic trip!!

THANK YOU, Crystal!!! We will get something done, even if we have to buy new tickets, because this is almost certainly my parent's last trip to Disney, and we will work something out for sure!!

 

[twodogs]

Unfortunately, Chat was not able to help me. First they said that I needed to go to the Ticket booth to do the exchange. When I told them that the booths can't sell the Military Salute tickets, they said they were unfamiliar with anything to do with military tickets and advised that I call the Ticket Line (which is who I got my original information from in 2022 and who gave me conflicting information when I spoke to them yesterday). I think my only option now is to wait for my ITT to reopen on Tuesday and try to speak to the manager there who has always be super helpful.

 

[irlandaise]

Unfortunately, Chat was not able to help me. First they said that I needed to go to the Ticket booth to do the exchange. When I told them that the booths can't sell the Military Salute tickets, they said they were unfamiliar with anything to do with military tickets and advised that I call the Ticket Line (which is who I got my original information from in 2022 and who gave me conflicting information when I spoke to them yesterday). I think my only option now is to wait for my ITT to reopen on Tuesday and try to speak to the manager there who has always be super helpful.

Twodogs, it looks like Disneyland has changed the name of the military tickets since you purchased yours, so you may want to make sure the person at the PX or whatever an ITT is knows the latest name:

https://disneyland.disney.go.com/offers-discounts/military-tickets-discount-2024/

 

[twodogs]

Twodogs, it looks like Disneyland has changed the name of the military tickets since you purchased yours, so you may want to make sure the person at the PX or whatever an ITT is knows the latest name:

https://disneyland.disney.go.com/offers-discounts/military-tickets-discount-2024/

Thank you for this, and I will make sure to specify the new name. Here’s hoping they can help us.

 

[lanejudy]

"Military Promotional Park Hopper" is the same as the "Salute" ticket. But OP you are correct that Disney doesn't sell those tickets directly. While I'm much more familiar with WDW, I believe ticketing/credits work the same -- and I've never heard of anyone using a Disney ticket credit towards a new Salute ticket. You CAN use that credit towards purchase towards a new regular ticket. Unfortunately, I think the CM who advised otherwise in 2022 was mistaken. Check the pricing to upgrade the expired ticket credit to regular tickets. It may be similar or less than purchasing new 2024 Salute tickets.

And so glad your parents are both doing well now! That's been a long road for your family.

 

[twodogs]

"Military Promotional Park Hopper" is the same as the "Salute" ticket. But OP you are correct that Disney doesn't sell those tickets directly. While I'm much more familiar with WDW, I believe ticketing/credits work the same -- and I've never heard of anyone using a Disney ticket credit towards a new Salute ticket. You CAN use that credit towards purchase towards a new regular ticket. Unfortunately, I think the CM who advised otherwise in 2022 was mistaken. Check the pricing to upgrade the expired ticket credit to regular tickets. It may be similar or less than purchasing new 2024 Salute tickets.

And so glad your parents are both doing well now! That's been a long road for your family.

@lanejudy, I very much appreciate your helpful response here and your kind words for my family.

I have received a response from the manager of our ITT, and she says we have to exchange them at Disneyland. This is incredibly frustrating, as I know the parks do not sell Military tickets any longer.

As for applying the value to another regular ticket, could the ones assigned to my parents be used to buy tickets for someone else? I know it is "one for one" when you do an application of credit (only one ticket value can be used for one ticket/MK), but my parents likely won't come again due to their health. We do come without them on some trips, so we use regular day tickets, so if the value could be applied to a ticket that one of us could use on a later trip, that would be better than losing all of the value. My other concern would be that my parents might need to be present to use the credit from these tickets to regular tickets, at the booth. To me, that means that we have to figure this out on this trip, since I don't think they will be back to the parks again.

Thank you all for your help. I did contact Shades of Green in WDW to see if they had any advice, and they can't sell DL tickets, so they referred me back to my ITT. I will have to figure out where to go from here, but I think we will just have to buy current Military tickets for this year, so we know we have park reservations, and then try to figure out the credits at GS when we get to the parks (not really how I wanted to spend the short time we have there with my parents and my girls, but that is the only choice it seems that we have).

 

[MonocularVision]

I have zero experience with this but I do know there have been folks on this board that have been able to get these situations handled over the phone with Disney after a lot of persistence. There go-to is to get you to visit the ticket booths but they are capable of handling this remotely if pushed enough.

 

[twodogs]

I have zero experience with this but I do know there have been folks on this board that have been able to get these situations handled over the phone with Disney after a lot of persistence. There go-to is to get you to visit the ticket booths but they are capable of handling this remotely if pushed enough.

Thank you so much for the encouragement, @MonocularVision! I am going to keep trying by phone and hope that I get a more helpful CM. I have had great CMs in the past and then some that were not terribly interested in problem solving beyond the usual protocols. Maybe I will get a willing CM. I also thought about trying the ITT office at Camp Pendleton since they probably handle a very large number of DL Military tickets. I think it can't hurt to call them.

I just feel that there has to be some avenue to do this, as especially with military members, plans can be change for you by the military (new orders, change of station, etc) without notice. Then the tickets the military member bought may expire before the military member is even back in the US to be able to use them. I have to believe Disney would not tell those military members that they have to use the value of the expired Salute tickets towards a regular ticket, when the wonderful purpose of the Salute tickets is to allow the military member and family to go at a reduced ticket price?

I am so grateful to those of you on this board who have taken the time to post here and taken the time to listen to me vent my frustration. This trip is meant to be a joyous celebration after a scary and terrible 18 months for my parents. I know we will figure the tickets out, I just wish it was as easy as Disney made it sound in 2022 when I spoke to them.