Banked points question

[jar]

I think I know the answer to this, but want to confirm:

Assume I have a 100-point contract. If I bank 100 points this year, I understand that they would be the first ones used next year.

But let's say that I make a reservation for 100 points and then a 2nd reservation for later next year for another 100 points. Then for some reason I have to cancel my first reservation. Does the system simply consider the first 100 points actually used to be the banked points so that I can still bank again next year (since I would have banked 100 into next year then used 100), or by cancelling the 1st reservation and then using the 2nd reservation, does the system consider that I still haven't used the banked points because they were allocated specifically for the first reservation and next year's points had been used for the 2nd one?

I think that points are completely fungible so that the first 100 points actually used (not reserved) comes out of the banked points, but would like to be sure. If I'm wrong, then I want to use the banked points for the vacation that I'm most confident I'll be able to keep.

Thanks.

 

[drusba]

You are bringing up the issue of reallocating points among reservations. It does not happen automatically so you have to ask when the issue comes up but if you have to change a trip that has banked points they will then let you switch those banked points with the regular points in the other reservation you have. You have to make the switch to assure using those banked points for that other trip but it is easily done.

 

[lark]

I just had a similar situation that I posted about. It's not quite the same, so I'm not sure whether the rules are the same.

I wanted to change a reservation from using current use year point to using borrowed points. (I wanted to do this to free up the current use year points.) I was told that I could not simply change points for points. I had to cancel and rebook my trip to essentially reallocate the points. This would have been risky for me, because the reservation I had was no longer available and thus probably would have gone to waitlist if I cancelled it. We were able to work around the problem by just cancelling one day and then rebooking that one day, but it was complicated.

I'm not sure if the same thing would happen with banked points. I could see where it would be different, since you can bank points without making a reservation, but you can usually only borrow points to make a reservation. So, I'm interested to hear the answer to this question.