After doing some research we'll still have to pay a hefty amount in taxes for the "free" vacation. The retail value is $8000.00. Some people say that you have to pay around 25% of the retail value. Another person said that if you can prove that you could have paid for the exact same trip for less money then you only have to pay taxes on THAT amount.
I'm going to have to sit down with my financial advisor, AKA my brother, and get this all sorted. If I need to ahve more money taken out of my paycheck to make up for it then so be it. We were still planning on taking a vacation this fall anyway. Maybe not a $2000.00 vacation but still.
Matt threw the idea out there yesterday about asking our moms to help us out a bit with the owed taxed. I'd feel bad because we told them they wouldn't have to pay anything. I wasn't even thinking about the taxes and what not. Bah!
I guess i'll cross that bridge when I come to it.
First of all congratulations, I saw your post on Intercot. I took a look at the rules and it says there are no substitutions or cash alternatives except at the Sponsor's discretion. It might not hurt to mention to Orbitz that despite this being awesome, the $2K tax bill isn't what you would typically spend on a vacation. You could potentially work something out to keep the trip at $5-6K or less, still fairly awesome, and then have them give you cash for the difference, which you could use to pay the taxes. The worse they can do is say no and then you just take out another $55 a week from your check for the bill next April. Congrats again.
ReplyDeleteThat's a really great suggestion. I feel like I don't need a spa treatment and I don't need the water parks option. I absolutely would still like to stay at a Deluxe if offered because I couldn't otherwise afford that. The Cirque ticket's i'd also like to keep.
ReplyDeleteI should at least throw that out there and ask. And, like you said, take the cash and pay the bill for the trip next year. That's super smart.
Thank you for the suggestion!
I e-mailed the gal from Orbitz this morning and she said because it's already filed and bonded they can't change anything and give us the cash difference. It's not a terribly big deal. We'll figure something out! My mom has already offered to give us some money to help us pay for the taxes next year.
ReplyDeleteI entered a Disney sweepstakes (which I won't win because I never win) and it gives some money towards taxes. However, it's a mega-expensive grand prize so I doubt the money they give would even help much.
ReplyDelete*sigh* We won't win anyway. We'll just stick with our $1500 road trip instead of the $20,000 Disney cruise...haha.
Oh no, that stinks about the taxes! I was a little worried about that - my friend won a free stay in the Caribbean last year and didn't end up going since it was still about $500 tax (+flights). That sucks how they get you with those taxes! I hope you can still work it out somehow!! That is a LOT of $$ but you are also getting a LOT more for it than you would otherwise, so it's still a big win...good luck!! I hope you get to stay at the Poly! :)
ReplyDeleteThanks!! Normally we spend about that much on a 7-8 day vacation anyways and we just stay at Pop. We sometimes do water parks and sometimes don't. We always do park hoppers though. I've never seen Cirque and never gotten a spa treatment so that will be a few nice bonuses.
ReplyDeleteI'm anxiously horribly anxious to find out if we can add the dining plan or not. I'll have to blog about my stroke of genius as far as dining goes!
I won a trip last year (through Lou Mongello's podcast) -- 7 nights WL concierge, tickets, dining plan, $1000 gift card for travel, etc. It was booked through Mousefan Travel, who sent us a receipt for the entire prize. They reported it was around $5300 and we ended up paying $1800 in taxes, along with the other expenses.
ReplyDeleteWe originally won a 5 night vacation but when the 'buy 4 get 3 free' deal came out, Mousefan bumped us up to 7 nights. Hopefully Orbitz will do the same for you with free dining!
I'm looking forward to hearing about your planning and trip!
(A fellow Intercot member -- TikiGoddess)
AKA Kathy
Hey Kathy!
ReplyDeleteThanks so much for the info. They are working on the booking process right now.. so... we'll see. Ugh, i'm so anxious I could burst!