Has anyone else been told this???

[aaarcher86]

I've always said that the changes Disney implements to stop abuses or problems aren't what I'd choose. It's why I'd prefer these things not be done in in the first place. If people weren't doing it, there would be no need for any stricter policies. And perhaps people should consider the long term consequences. Surely no one thought people could continue making reservations they never intended to keep without Disney eventually stopping it.

And it could well be there's more to it than this and this was the easiest for them to implement. Who knows.

I don't think people who take advantage of loopholes tend to think about consequences to anyone else.

 

[cakebaker]

I don't think people who take advantage of loopholes tend to think about consequences to anyone else.

I agree with that too. It's too bad. I'm sure there will be a time this affects us as well. Our plans are never set in stone either.

 

[Astylla]

It's definitely unfortunate for those who aren't doing this to get around things , but out of necessity. With the rumors of FD coming out soon I have a feeling this is why it's being implemented now versus later.
I know DIS only accounts for a small portion but as word spreads it becomes a larger issue. I am hopeful those with legitimate concerns can be assisted on a case by case basis but not just to appease people.

 

[maxiesmom]

Whenever there are those threads about people taking advantage of various loop-holes, they always seem to have the attitude of Well, if Disney didn't like it, they would put a stop to it.

Boom.

Once again we are all punished for the behavior of some.

 

[jtowntoflorida]

I would guess that there are technical limitations to some of the other proposed solutions, if they really are doing this to stop people from making ADRs and/or FP+s outside their specified window. I would guess that it's easier to implement a solution like this, rather than trying to figure out how to make the FP+ and ADR system "interact" intelligently with each other and then cancel reservations that were made outside of certain parameters. I'm no IT person, but maybe someone with some technical expertise could weigh in. It just seems like it would be really, really hard to implement rules in MDE that would enforce this.

 

[mickeynut1]

If WDW thinks this change will "force" people to book longer stays, I think they are wrong.

So many valid reasons people need to shave days off a reservation.

I don't think people who take advantage of loopholes tend to think about consequences to anyone else.

Whenever there are those threads about people taking advantage of various loop-holes, they always seem to have the attitude of Well, if Disney didn't like it, they would put a stop to it.

Boom.

Once again we are all punished for the behavior of some.

I agree with all of the above .

 

[pampam]

It sounds like this is being done in all catagories. wow!

 

[MrKnight]

This is actually very common in the hotel industry, not just Disney, it is called a minimum length of stay, this is commonly put into place during periods of high demand to maximize revenue and to balance out hotel occupancy levels over a certain period. For those that say they are used to making frequent changes to their reservations, this is not a recommended practice, once you have confirmed a reservation any type of changes are not guaranteed and are subject to availability, rate differences, and restrictions. The best rule to play by is the less changes the better, I used be a WDW Resort Front Desk CM and can attest to this from personal experience.

 

[JohnDaleswife]

It doesn't effect me that much at all as I already have to adhere to this policy with Orbitz. But for others who have to fly and such, this could be a raw deal for them.

 

[gwynne]

This is actually very common in the hotel industry, not just Disney, it is called a minimum length of stay, this is commonly put into place during periods of high demand to maximize revenue and to balance out hotel occupancy levels over a certain period. For those that say they are used to making frequent changes to their reservations, this is not a recommended practice, once you have confirmed a reservation any type of changes are not guaranteed and are subject to availability, rate differences, and restrictions. The best rule to play by is the less changes the better, I used be a WDW Resort Front Desk CM and can attest to this from personal experience.

Most consider the pricing and product at a WDW resort to be vastly different than say, a Hampton Inn. Because WDW is so expensive, now guests will have to carefully decide how long to stay. Booking a very short stay makes much more sense, especially if the airfare is an issue as it is for many of guests. Changes in flight schedules, pricing, availability, it's not always easy to have it come together perfectly at the same time we book a WDW resort. The good news is, we can always move offsite or just choose another destination altogether.

 

[sndral]

This is actually very common in the hotel industry, not just Disney, it is called a minimum length of stay, this is commonly put into place during periods of high demand to maximize revenue and to balance out hotel occupancy levels over a certain period. For those that say they are used to making frequent changes to their reservations, this is not a recommended practice, once you have confirmed a reservation any type of changes are not guaranteed and are subject to availability, rate differences, and restrictions. The best rule to play by is the less changes the better, I used be a WDW Resort Front Desk CM and can attest to this from personal experience.

I've never worked in the hotel industry, but this was my theory as well. I assume a hotel operator's goal is to fill all of their rooms (w/ a few left out for breakage) all of the time. I suspect when Disney deals with late cancelations of only part of a stay they end up with 1 or 2 or 3 stray (what I called orphan) days which they find hard to fill. I suspect that what was an isolated problem has grown to the point where it is impacting profit and thus the need to put an end to the practice of allowing the cancellation of a few days without penalty.
When Disney does it's quarterly stock earnings reports conference calls they typically reference occupancy/booking trends and comment on how they seek to shape them, so it's clear that they follow this issue closely. I think Disney saw a trend towards partial cancelations, saw that this resulted in lost profit due to unoccupied rooms and decided to do something about it.
This practice is unlikely to effect lower attendance times of the year as rooms will be available in the resort, but for those times of the year when there is more demand for rooms than there is supply (and Disney's resorts have been running with remarkably high occupancy rates except for the deluxe resorts) I can't blame them for preferring to fill their rooms and not risk being stuck with unfilled rooms (lost profit) created by people canceling 1 or 2 or 3 nights.

 

[Babsy]

I've never worked in the hotel industry, but this was my theory as well. I assume a hotel operator's goal is to fill all of their rooms (w/ a few left out for breakage) all of the time. I suspect when Disney deals with late cancelations of only part of a stay they end up with 1 or 2 or 3 stray (what I called orphan) days which they find hard to fill. I suspect that what was an isolated problem has grown to the point where it is impacting profit and thus the need to put an end to the practice of allowing the cancellation of a few days without penalty.
When Disney does it's quarterly stock earnings reports conference calls they typically reference occupancy/booking trends and comment on how they seek to shape them, so it's clear that they follow this issue closely. I think Disney saw a trend towards partial cancelations, saw that this resulted in lost profit due to unoccupied rooms and decided to do something about it.
This practice is unlikely to effect lower attendance times of the year as rooms will be available in the resort, but for those times of the year when there is more demand for rooms than there is supply (and Disney's resorts have been running with remarkably high occupancy rates except for the deluxe resorts) I can't blame them for preferring to fill their rooms and not risk being stuck with unfilled rooms (lost profit) created by people canceling 1 or 2 or 3 nights.

Length of stay restrictions are all well and good. However, you should be told about that when you book, not after the fact! If WDW began this policy for new reservations and we were told up front then I would expect to deal with it. Reservations made in good faith according to the rules in place at the time should be honoured. There was no wrong doing on the part of those of us who booked longer stays than might be needed. In fact the CM's in reservations were aware of this occurrence and were fine with it. To now be stuck with a higher rate or resort unavailability because you booked longer than you would have if you foreknew about this policy is perhaps legal but unfair to the point that I believe that it is, in spirit, borderline unethical.

Shame on you WDW! Your pixie dust is tarnished.

 

[yooperfan]

Is it even legal to say a hotel is sold out when obviously it's not if they say they will only book week long stays?
Sounds like bait and switch if they are going to have ads for resorts at a price starting at xxxxxx for 3 days or more and then not book rooms under 7 days saying there is no availability when there are rooms, if you book 7 days.

 

[MakiraMarlena]

I don't see anything here that says there will be no ability at all to book a stay of less than 7 nights. the issue comes when you try to change what you booked by subtracting nights

 

[buzznina]

This is actually very common in the hotel industry, not just Disney, it is called a minimum length of stay, this is commonly put into place during periods of high demand to maximize revenue and to balance out hotel occupancy levels over a certain period. For those that say they are used to making frequent changes to their reservations, this is not a recommended practice, once you have confirmed a reservation any type of changes are not guaranteed and are subject to availability, rate differences, and restrictions. The best rule to play by is the less changes the better, I used be a WDW Resort Front Desk CM and can attest to this from personal experience.

You are correct, BUT every one that I have seen they have it in writing or let you know this when you make your reservation and not after the fact. When I made my last BB (last month), no where on the pamphlet did it say you had to stay a certain number of nights, nor did the CM that made my reservation ever mentioned this. So I will have a BIG problem if I have to shorten my stay because of my job and am told I cannot

 

[aaarcher86]

Is it even legal to say a hotel is sold out when obviously it's not if they say they will only book week long stays?
Sounds like bait and switch if they are going to have ads for resorts at a price starting at xxxxxx for 3 days or more and then not book rooms under 7 days saying there is no availability when there are rooms, if you book 7 days.

You can book less than a week. You just can't CHANGE your dates unless the dates you want are available.

They're essentially requiring people to make a new booking with the desired nights instead of just modifying.

 

[MakiraMarlena]

You don't have to book a certain number of nights. This only applies when you have booked more nights than you end up actually wanting to use, and try to subtract those nights later on (based on availability at the time you try to subtract them).

They're going to be like Orbitz probably - you want to subtract nights, and the time you want is no longer available, you need to cancel and rebook. And lose your promotion if you had one (if it has expired or is no longer offered for your resort or category).

 

[cakebaker]

They were never required to let anyone make a change to their reservation and allow them to keep the old one. Granted, a little advance notice on this would be nice, but it does look like they're making exceptions for those already booked before the policy change.

What I think you won't get away with from this point on is if you have already booked say a 10 day stay and you want to drop it to 1. Those are obviously not bookings that were ever intended to be kept. If I was one who had done that and was waiting to cancel until I got my adr's and fp+'s selected and my bands shipped-- I'd be very worried and making some alternate plans.

 

[MakiraMarlena]

Well, you can still cancel. You just can't keep the reservation and drop it from 10 nights to 1 unless the entire 10 nights are still available.

 

[cakebaker]

Well, you can still cancel. You just can't keep the reservation and drop it from 10 nights to 1 unless the entire 10 nights are still available.

True, but I'd bet anything there wouldn't be any availability. I'm just saying, this may be just the first step in the process. Maybe they'll do nothing more, maybe they'll start cancelling fp's. All I know is this development would worry me.

I'm glad they are making exceptions for those who had no warning and are honestly needing to make changes though.