7 Month window is a scam

[kbender23]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

 

[MAO]

There's lots of stuff available according to the availability tool at Kidani, OKW, and Saratoga Springs. Instead of complaining about something that's pretty much set in stone why don't you try booking your week at one of those places and then reserving the stay you want tomorrow, if it's available?

 

[CMNJ]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

Because you technically aren't 7 months from the start of your vacation (Oct 19th). If your wait list never came through then they would have allowed you to book your vacation at 7 months and 1 day (which violates the current home resort policy). Technically if an owner wanted to book today for a stay starting Oct 19 on they are entitled to that room not you or me.
If you are trying to book at the 7 month window for Oct dates you need to book online right at 8 am (unless you are looking for a less popular room at a large resort like SSR or OKW). For example the Poly studios have consistently been booking up within a couple minutes of 8 am when the booking window opens EVERY morning and presumably it has the best 7 mo avail compared to the other popular resorts as the # of Poly owners is much lower right now than the rest.

 

[n2mm]

Remember to try throughout the day as folks are moving their reservations. Sounds like there are still other resorts available. Which resort were you trying for? I always book at the 11 month window for my October trips. October and early December are two of the busiest times of the year for dvc bookings. Btw, this rule is not a scam, it's a rule. They are not going to let one member book a day earlier than others. You should've waitlisted the entire reservation and booked a second choice. Good luck.

 

[nkosiek]

It's not a scam. The 7 month window is there in the event that the resort has openings because it's owners didn't reserve all the rooms from 11 months to 7 months & 1day. If the resort owners booked all those rooms what is there to complain about? To quote someone from the boards, "own where you want to stay."

 

[Debby7]

I had been watching the WLV on the RAT the last week and noticed that every day by 9 the corresponding 7 month date was gone, but everything after that would still be available. I was getting discouraged since I needed to cancel an OKW reservation to have enough points to book at WLV
and so needed to wait until 9 , call in and talk to a CM to cancel and book. What worked for me was this: I was online right at 8. By the time I was in the site, my room was gone for the first night. However,20 minutes later it reappeared! I had enough spare points to book just the first night. Then at 9, I called MS and cancelled the original ressie and added 5 more nights to my now existing one night reservation. I know an owner could have grabbed those days before me, but that was not the booking pattern I had observed. The cm even said how smart it was to grab that first night online. it made it possible to complete my reservation , even though I needed to wait until 9 to call.

 

[lovin'fl]

Book from Oct 17th...with the 18th wait listed and then call tomorrow to cancel the 17th. Kinda like walking.

 

[moobar25]

Book from Oct 17th...with the 18th wait listed and then call tomorrow to cancel the 17th. Kinda like walking.

You can't do that. The system will only allow you to book a continuous block of dates. So if the 17th is available you can book that one night. But if the 18th isn't available you can't book the 19th.

 

[moobar25]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

Not a scam - just the way it works. Would you call the 11 month window a scam when the dates you want are not available? No - it simply means someone else beat you to it. Just like someone already mentioned: BUY WHERE YOU WANT TO STAY!

 

[MAO]

Maybe we need to modify the statement to be "Buy where you want to stay or be quiet when you don't get what you want at 7 months"?

 

[CMNJ]

So many people on DVC forums advocate buying SSR due to longer exp date and low MF but this is exactly why we bought BWV-we'd love to trade into other resorts and try them out but since the 7 mo window is dicey for months of the year we bought at a resort we'd be happy being "stuck" at. That being said I do feel bad for direct purchasers. I am sure direct purchasers (who maybe didn't even know about the resale market for sold out properties when they bought) are frustrated when they can't trade. The guides lead you to believe it is so simple to do (as they tried to convince us 10 years ago when we toured SSR). Luckily for us we didn't believe him and when we started considering DVC last fall we found the resale market

 

[skier_pete]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

Agree with the rest - now sure why this is a "scam". At popular times, the 7-month date books up almost instantly in the morning. Others have covered this, and you may not like the system, but that's how it works. And that's why many of this say "own where you want to stay" just so you don't run into that. (Mid October is probably the 2nd most popular time of the year for DVC, after the first week of December. If you are going after a popular locale/room type, then there is no surprise you can't get it.)

I had been watching the WLV on the RAT the last week and noticed that every day by 9 the corresponding 7 month date was gone, but everything after that would still be available. I was getting discouraged since I needed to cancel an OKW reservation to have enough points to book at WLV
and so needed to wait until 9 , call in and talk to a CM to cancel and book. What worked for me was this: I was online right at 8. By the time I was in the site, my room was gone for the first night. However,20 minutes later it reappeared! I had enough spare points to book just the first night. Then at 9, I called MS and cancelled the original ressie and added 5 more nights to my now existing one night reservation. I know an owner could have grabbed those days before me, but that was not the booking pattern I had observed. The cm even said how smart it was to grab that first night online. it made it possible to complete my reservation , even though I needed to wait until 9 to call.

I'm really posting to comment on this post. That is EXTREMELY clever way to get around the delay between when you can book and when you can cancel. Nice strategy.

 

[tasha99]

Where did you try to book? Because of F&W the Epcot resorts are hard to book in late September to October. All of late Sept though December is high DVC season. The 7 month window is why we have several smaller contracts. You can use the 7 month window to explore (we're using our SSR pts at BLT this summer) but you have to be flexible and a little lucky.

 

[minniqt7]

Same thing happened to me today too. However I have to buy points to complete my reservation so I can't waitlist because if it doesn't come through I will lose the money spent. I'm not able to use the purchased points by Nov. Kept looking and a studio different catagory came up for the day I wanted so I booked it and will try tomorrow for the rest of my stay. Wish me luck!!!!

 

[bumbershoot]

Maybe we need to modify the statement to be "Buy where you want to stay or be quiet when you don't get what you want at 7 months"?

I would modify it to at least keep from calling it a scam. Being bummed you didn't get exactly what you wanted is fine, but plenty of us are able to book at 7 months just fine. We are either lucky or not trying for the most popular resorts at busy times, but since it works often it's not a scam.

 

[chalee94]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

most of us tell new buyers to "buy where you want to stay" and book at 10-11 months out if you have strong preferences.

if you expected the 7 month window to always be a sure thing, then you didn't do your homework.

 

[daisyx3]

We have SSR points. We stayed there in 2009. We liked it, but we also like to try new things. So since then I have booked:
2012: 3 nights BLT 1 BR LV/4 nights Kidani 1 BR for over Easter
2014: 1 week BWV boardwalk view studio in June
2014: 3 nights BLT lake view studio in October
2015: one week BWV garden view studio over Easter (except recently switched first two nights to Poly LV studio)

All booked at exactly 7 months out first thing in the morning. Granted I could not get an Epcot area room in October (during food and wine) but I was very happy with what I did get. I have not been available to get any GF studio yet. But if I can't, we did really like SSR anyway. It is not a scam.
Daisyx3

 

[com_op_2000]

I tried to book something at the 7 month window today (for October 18th). The 18th is full but the rest of my trip is available. DVC will not let me book the vacation and waitlist the one day. They said you have to have your first day available to book so I have to call back tomorrow. I am sure the 19th will be booked tomorrow. Why can't I book 6 days and just waitlist the first day?

OP, IMHO to me it appears that you do not have a complete knowledge/understanding of DVC and how it works when you bought in. The system is what it is and you agreed to it when you bought in.

 

[drusba]

The time of year you are trying to get is a high demand time when near park resorts can be very difficult at 7 months out. You can book up to 7 nights at 7 months out from date of arrival but if your arrival date is not open, you cannot immediately book any dates beyond then because your "start" date, i.e., first date you can get, is beyond the 7 month window. The only way to get nights beyond 7 months out from date of arrival is to get your arrival date. There is no scam. When you see you arrival date full at 7 months out but not the next day, it is very possible that the next day will also disappear before you can get to it during this time of year. Basically, what is happenning is that the number of rooms left in the category you are trying to book is very low and high demand hits right at 7 months out and you can lose the reservation to someone else just because the other's computer communicates with Disney's computer a moment before it does with yours at 8 a.m.

 

[Brian Noble]

I needed to cancel an OKW reservation to have enough points to book at WLV

For most unit sizes, and at most times of the year, OKW is available well into the 7-month window. Next time, it might be worth canceling the OKW reservation late in the day the day before your 7-month window opens---again depending on unit/time of year.