A couple of questions

[PoohBears#1fan]

Hi,

We're about to take the plunge and buy our first DVC, just had a coupld of questions to ask of this wonderful source of information.

1) If for whatever reason we needed to change our booking, are you penalised for this - we're in the UK and worried about tying flights in with accomadation, so the possibility of being a few days out is very real.

2) Basically we want to stay onsite at WDW every year, we're very taken with the amazing looking BCV and are thinking of purchasing around the 200 points mark - would you recommend buying with that as our home for all the points or buying 150 points there and adding on with a resale, so we have our home resort. (I do realise we'd have to wait for the 7 month window to book the other points there) Any opinions?

3) Is it common for people to not be able to get booked at their home resort, is this just peak season? With 11 months to book, does this allow us to book before non-?DVC owners or are bookings already open to them?

4) I've read that the BCV get very crowded, is there a negative reason for this, or is it purely a new resort that's attracting a lot of interest?

Thank you

 

[Merilyn]

Changing reservations can be a problem if you are within 30 days of arrival. If you change your reservation within those 30 day, your points go into a holding account that must be used before your next use year. If you borrow points for that reservation they can't be returned to the use year you borrowed them from. They have to be used in the current use year. Most reservations can be changed without any trouble as long as you remember changed at the last minute can be troublesome. I personally like having all my point at one resort. I just recently added 150 to VB, but that was so I could have the 11 month window for the ocean. I have never had any trouble booking at any place I wanted to stay. I own at OKW, but have stayed at BW, Hilton Head and VB. I don't think you will have any trouble booking at most times of the year. Summer and Christmas may be a little busy, but with an 11 month window, it should be OK. We have even booked at the last minute and got just what we wanted. The 11/7 month window is for DVC members. If you are not a member and want to book a Disney vacations you can book it anytime. I am not sure about how busy the BCV's are. I would think it is because they are new. I hope this has helped you. The information DVC can send you will help with many of your questions about reservations. Good luck with your plans.

 

[PamOKW]

does this allow us to book before non-?DVC owners

As a DVC resort sells-out, the DVC members own the majority of the resort. Disney maintains 4% to use for rentals and for maintenance. DVC members also sometimes "trade" their DVC to take some of the other trips and cruises available. These rooms then become available for non-members to book. With these exceptions, the rest of the resort remains available only to DVC members for 10 months. Within the 60 day window, Disney frees up more rooms for rentals so that the rooms don't go vacant.

 

[drusba]

1. Covered above, just understand that changes in your trip are actually considered a cancellation and then rebooking, and if you cancel 30 days or less from date of arrival, you have the holding account problem mentioned above--you must use points by end of use year and can only make ressies with those holding account points 60 days or less from arrival date. In other words, if what you are saying is that you will often need to make changes only a few days out then you could easily have serious trouble doing that. For example, if, at 4 days out, you want to move the trip two days forward, such as from Sun to Sun to Tues to Tues, that means there has to be availability for your new Tues to Tues ressie which likely will not exist;.

2. Personal preference is to own all points at one resort; the 11 month window is important (see next). Also, if what you are saying is to either buy 200 at BCV or buy 150 there and another 50 in resale elsewhere, forget it. There are rarely any resales under the 150 point range and also a 50 point resale, even if available, could have a prohibitive cost because of the need to pay closing costs for a resale-- closing costs of about $500 will apply to the transaction regardless of whether you buy 5 points or 1,000 points since such costs are fairly fixed regardless of the size of the transaction, and when the purchased point total is low those closing costs add a lot of dollars per point to the total transcation.

3. If you book 11 months out you will have no trouble getting what you want at home resort. Going elsewhere at 7 months can be a problem depending on time of year and which resort-- OKW is usually easier to get than others (it has the most rooms), BWV has proven to be the most difficult thus far. Moreover, busy DVC times of year are actually different from busy Disney in general times of year. For example, first two weeks in Dec are a Disney in general low season; that time is one of the most popular and hardest to get at 7 months with DVC. The opposite of that: summer other than the week July 4 is in, is usually easier to get at 7 months even though it is a very busy Disney in general time.

4. Not sure what you mean by BCV getting very crowded. If you mean people having trouble getting ressies, that may be because they are trying to make ressies 7 months or less out. You have quite a bit of the "new resort, I gotta try it" going on right now too. Again, you will have no trouble if you use 11 month window. But you should expect that BCV is going to be just like BWV for ressies--harder than others to get at 7 months out.

 

[PoohBears#1fan]

Thank you so much for your help - it's very much appreciated.

Can I just ask, if an ammendmend to a booking is made before the 30 days deadling, does the holding account then not apply?

Our big concern is that we'll book a room and then be unable to find flights to match - hopefully this won't happen as there are lots of airlines to choose from, but something we need to consider before going ahead.
We're more than likely to be planning our trips at the 11 month window rather than last minute to fit around school holidays.

Thanks again.

 

[drusba]

If you cancel 31 or more days out, points will be considered as being regular points. Note though: (a) if they are current use year points and you cancel past banking deadlines, you won't be able to bank them into the next use year; (b) if they are banked or borrowed points, they stay as such and cannot be sent back to their original use year and must be used by end of current use year.

In your situation there are some tricks you can use (as long as you change 31 or more days out). Suppose you plan on going a week Sun to Sun. If you reserve under one reservation that week and then later want to change from Monday to Monday, you would have to cancel entire ressie and make total new one and there may not be availability for that new one from Mon to Mon. If you have enough points at ressie time, you could do the following, as an example: (a) reserve the arriving Sun as a one night ressie; (b) reserve Mon through Sat night at same time for same type of room but under different reservation number; (c) reserve that last Sun night under a third ressie for same type of room. Thus, you would have 8 nights reserved rather than 7. Don't have the ressies linked at time of ressie. If later you need to change so trip is Mon to Mon, you can easily do it by just cancelling that first one night Sun ressie and then linking the remaining two ressies (once linked you won't have to change rooms).If you don't need to change, you can just cancel that one night ressie for the last Sun night and link the other two.