Mum spends $15k on Disney vouchers for family trip, then realises her mistake

“This is why my parents aren’t allowed to make these types of decisions without a child present.”

A mum has been left in a tizzy after realising the vouchers her parents bought in hopes of attending the Disney parks with family were actually for the studio’s streaming service. 

In the summer of 2020, mum-of-four Andie was hoping to spend some quality time with her family at the Disney parks, which her 78-year-old parents were organising. 

As you probably are well aware, the pandemic put a pin in their plans, so they weren’t able to organise another holiday until years later.

However, by the time they finally got the chance to reschedule, Andie realised her parents' enormous “fail”. 

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Parents accidentally buy 70 years’ worth of Disney+

After months of waiting and hoping for the pandemic to end, it was in Christmas 2023 when they finally settled on a date to catch up.

“All 16 of my family members are going,” Andie explained in a now-viral TikTok. 

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In an effort to save money, Andie’s parents decided to buy $10,000 (A$14,840) worth of Disney gift vouchers to “purchase our tickets and restaurant reservations”. 

It seemed like a smart idea at the time, but when Andie went to visit her parents shortly before the planned trip, she noticed something was seriously wrong. 

“I went home this weekend,” she began. “And [my parents] were having problems loading the gift cards correctly and purchasing the tickets.” 

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Tensions were starting to boil over; the family of 16 were set to leave in less than a week, and nothing was working the way they hoped. 

It wasn’t until Andie offered to help that she realised the problem. Her parents had, indeed, purchased 100 gift vouchers, valued at $100 each, but they weren’t for the Disney parks; they were for Disney+ ... the streaming platform. 

“Yup,” said a disappointed Andie. “We have $10k worth of Disney+ Streaming services.” 

Adding up the value of these vouchers, Andie calculated that her parents had purchased more than seven decades' worth of access to the Disney streaming platform. “That’s over 70 years of Disney+,” she said. 

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Andie's parents accidentally bought enough Disney+ vouchers to last seven decades. Picture: andieink/TikTok

Because the parents had already scratched off the pin numbers on the back of each card and were trying to load them into the website, they were unable to return them to the shop where they made the purchase. 

While Andie said her parents weren’t stressed about spending so much money on the vouchers, she was frustrated that the cash they paid wasn’t allocated to “the right form”. 

“The purchaser is not familiar with Disney+ and did not know the difference,” Andie clarified in the video. 

In a later update, she wondered why the staff member who sold the vouchers didn’t explain the situation to her parents. 

“I don’t know why somebody let them buy that many cards of streaming services. I’m a little dumbfounded, too,” she said. “My Mum is distraught, Dad frustrated, and the kids are worried we won’t go to Disney.” The mum-of-four then slammed the company’s marketing team for failing to make the gift vouchers more “clearly differentiated” from each other. 

But it wouldn’t be a Disney story without a happy ending, right?

Shortly after the TikTok went viral, the company reached out to the American mum and transferred the A$15,000 worth of streaming gift cards into Disney Parks gift cards. 

“I’m glad this is resolved,” the relieved mum said. “I really hope that it doesn’t happen to other people.” 

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“It's OK to admit they made a mistake…”

Online, people were left in stitches after hearing the awkward debacle, with many furious at the cashier who allowed such an exorbitant purchase. 

“Who the hell allowed them to buy all of those?” someone asked. “You would think that would raise some retail red flags at checkout.” 

“Shame on the store, the clerk that allowed this anyone would have known $10k for Disney+,” another comment read. “This is why my parents aren’t allowed to make these types of decisions without a child present,” wrote a fourth. 

“This is something I would do!” a person laughed. 

And it turns out that Andie's parents aren't the only ones to fall victim to the confusing gift card design. “I've seen this happen to other people as well!” a comment read. “In fact, one of the people is a Disney vacation planner.”

However, not everyone was as sympathetic to Andie’s awkward situation, with many labelling the mistake as a “user error” rather than Disney's fault. 

“It's OK to admit they made a mistake buying clearly marked streaming gift cards,” a person wrote.

“It LITERALLY says streaming on the front of the card. It’s not even in fine print,” another pointed out. 

“Yeah, I’m sorry this happened, and hopefully it can be rectified, but only one party made the error - it’s not Disney or marketing,” penned a third. 

Originally published as Mum spends $15k on Disney vouchers for family trip, then realises her mistake