DVC has a formal policy against late checkouts, any member should know this and I'm pretty sure it's in the check in paperwork. How busy the resort is makes no difference. I'm doubting they were told it might be OK, only to check back to see, a big difference in my book though it ultimately wouldn't affect me feelings on the subject.
I wonder if the CM thought the person had asked if they could stay late
-and told the friend "no"
and then was asked another question that the CM thought was whether the stay could
be extend
- which the CM answered, "the resort is not full, but you will need to call in the morning to make sure that it is OK."
We have been in a resort that was not full, but that doesn't mean our room was not going to be re-assigned the next day. From what I've seen, if the resort is not full, they group guests to certain buildings or certain parts of the building. So, even if the
resort was not full, the part of the resort the friend was in very well might have been. Grouping guests makes sense from a staffing perspective because it would be more efficient for Housekeeping to clean a lot of rooms in one place rather than a few here, a few there, etc.
Also, I'd would expect they staff based on occupancy. If there are a certain number of rooms to be cleaned as check outs during that day, that would be staffed for. That would also assume that Housekeeping would reasonably be able to get into any of those rooms by check out time (or maybe a few minutes after. Late checkouts mean the Housekeeper has to waste time going back and rechecking whether the guest is out yet.
Time that could be better spent cleaning. 5 minutes here and 5 minutes there add up. Late check outs could mean the Housekeeper(s) get behind enough that they have to stay overtime (costing us members more). It also could mean that the Housekeeper doesn't get the full time for cleaning. That may have something to do with complaints about rooms that are not adequately cleaned.
Because we need a room with a roll in shower, they can't just give us any room that is ready when we arrive - we need the room that has been assigned to us. That usually means that we won't get our room until after the 4pm check in time. Sometimes considerably later. We've already had to wait for a room until 6pm
Whether it was because someone didn't get out of
that room on time or whether other people didn't leave on time and the housekeeper got behind (or just because someone left a mess). At any rate, people leaving late does potentially impact other guests.
Its actually really nice to have a shower, shave etc before having the long flight home to.
