Day by Day Booking?

[nunzia]

I'm confused about day by day booking. Does it mean you book your resort one day at a time and then call over and over? I don't understand why you do this? What circumstances make this way of booking needed?
I'm confused alot I guess

 

[spiceycat]

hey everyone get fusses at some time.

day by day booking is just that.

when do you need it

Thanksgiving week - lower points and great time

Dec 1-14 - lower points and Christmas has arrived at the WDW parks and resorts.

if BWV or BCV - then over the food/wine festavial.

other times that have been say are hard
Easter week, Christmas to NY, July 4 week.

that say I got a July 4 week (okay only 4 days) in May - but that was a few years ago. Never tried for Easter or Christmas week - way, way to crowded for my taste.

Now at the BWV or BCV - some days during the flower/garden festavial will also sell out - if the group giving the concert is really popular. but since the schedule doesn't come out until a few months before the start of the festavial this information is hard to come by.

 

[jomik1]

I book day by day when I am booking a Grand Villa. I do this because there are a limited number of them. The first phone call is the longest, I let them know I am booking day by day. After that, the calls only take a few minutes. I call first thing in the morning, as soon as they open then I'm all set. It's really very easy.

 

[nunzia]

OK..so, you would call in on the earliest day possible and ask for the whole reservation you'd like? Then if they said you couldn't you'd go for Day by Day? Or does Disney, during busy times, only let you book a day at a time? I am really confused why you couldn't book your whole visit at once. Let me see if I am getting this..
Your 11 or 7 month window is from the last day of your visit right? So if you want certain days for sure, they may be sold out by the time you could book them? Like, if I want OKW five days, I would need to call 11 months from the LAST day I'd be there..which might be sold out, so I'd call and make a one day reservation to get an earlier day to call? Man...this is like Normandy Invasion planning..

 

[jomik1]

Here is the scenario for my upcoming trip in 2008. We are staying at our home resort SSR in a Grand Villa. We are arriving 5/31/08 and checking out 6/8/08. If I want to book this trip all at once, I would have to wait until 7/9/07 (11 months from my check out date). Because I am booking a Grand Villa and there are not a lot of them available, I chose to book day by day. This way I can almost guarantee no wait list. Since I arrive on 5/31/08, the first day I can book is 7/2/07. I can book both 5/31/08 and 6/1/08 on this date. (Technically, I was eligible to book 5/31/08 on 7/1/07 but that was a Sunday and Member Services is not open on Sundays so I have to wait for the next day). I let them know that this is a day by day ressie and they note my "real" check out date. On 7/3/07 I called and booked 6/2/08, on 7/5/07 I booked 6/3/08 & 6/4/08. (Again, member services was closed on 7/4 so I had to book 2 days on 7/5). I book 6/5/08 on 7/6/07, I booked 6/6/08 on 7/7/07 and finally I book 6/7/08 on 7/9/07 (Again, I can't book on Sunday)

The reason for doing this is so I didn't have to wait until 7/9/07 to book the whole thing at once and run the risk of a Grand Villa not being available for all or part of my trip. If I was just booking a 1 bedroom, I would have waited until 7/9 and booked all at once (There are 8 of us going, so I needed a bigger room.)

I hope this helps you.

 

[Mirthrindr2]

I'm confused about day by day booking. Does it mean you book your resort one day at a time and then call over and over? I don't understand why you do this? What circumstances make this way of booking needed?
I'm confused alot I guess

I'm a brand new DVC owner, but I think I understand the purpose of Day by Day booking. Let's just assume you are booking a stay at your Home Resort for the sake of simplicity.

What you need to remember is, you can only book a stay for a DATE that is 11 months or LESS from the day you are calling to make your reservation. The rule is NOT that you can call and book your whole stay once your 'arrival' date is 11 months away (unless of course you are only planning a 1 night stay).

Let’s say today you are exactly 11 months away from the date you plan to arrive and check in at your DVC resort. You CANNOT call and book your ENTIRE stay at this time because day 2 of your stay is still 11 months and 1 day away..., day 3 of your planned stay is still 11 months and 2 days away, day 4 is 11 months and 3 days away, and so on. So you can only book your FIRST day at this time since the date of your arrival day is the only day in your planned stay that is currently 11 months or less away.

To book your ENTIRE stay all during one call, the date for ALL days in your planned stay must be 11 months or less away. So the earliest you can call and book your entire stay in one call would be when you are 11 months away from the date of your CHECKOUT date, because then, all dates of your planned stay would thus be 11 months or less from the date you happen to be calling to make the reservation.

The reason people do Day by Day booking is to minimize the risk of calling and finding there is no availability for a given room type for a given date/s, by calling and booking each day as soon as they are eligible to do so for each individual day. This is as opposed to waiting till all dates of their planned stay are 11 months or less away. If you wait until you are 11 months away from the date of your LAST day’s stay (so that you can just book your whole stay during one call and one reservation), you may well find that when you call, there is no availability for the DVC resort, room type, or dates you want. This is because while you were waiting for all dates of your planned stay to become 11 months or less before calling to make your reservation, many other people have been calling and reserving rooms, meaning there will be fewer rooms and availability by the time you finally make the call yourself.

I’m sure more seasoned DVCer’s will correct me where I may be wrong if so, but I believe this is pretty much the reason why people do Day by Day booking, though I’m sure there may be other reasons.

 

[nunzia]

<<<The reason for doing this is so I didn't have to wait until 7/9/07 to book the whole thing at once and run the risk of a Grand Villa not being available for all or part of my trip. If I was just booking a 1 bedroom, I would have waited until 7/9 and booked all at once (There are 8 of us going, so I needed a bigger room.)

I hope this helps you.>>>

Aha! I get it now. Thank you. You guys have this down to a science. I would have never thought of that without this board, and would have called 11 months out and found everything gone. I bet people do that all the time and wonder how the heck that happened. This is mainly just for busy times, though, right? My next trip I plan to be a value, studio OKW.

 

[dianeschlicht]

<<<The reason for doing this is so I didn't have to wait until 7/9/07 to book the whole thing at once and run the risk of a Grand Villa not being available for all or part of my trip. If I was just booking a 1 bedroom, I would have waited until 7/9 and booked all at once (There are 8 of us going, so I needed a bigger room.)

I hope this helps you.>>>

Aha! I get it now. Thank you. You guys have this down to a science. I would have never thought of that without this board, and would have called 11 months out and found everything gone. I bet people do that all the time and wonder how the heck that happened. This is mainly just for busy times, though, right? My next trip I plan to be a value, studio OKW.

We have been OKW members for 11 years, and the size of the resort makes it easier to book all at one time at the 11 month booking window for the entire stay. The only times in those 11 years we have booked day by day was for New Year's 1999/2000 and both times we have booked a GV. Once was during Holiday time, and once was during fall school break. I see no reason to book day by day at OKW for anything other than a GV except for holiday times.

 

[drusba]

I generally assume day to day booking is needed for GVs. Our experience has generally been it is not needed for a 2BR. At BWV we usually get a 2BR boardwalk view. We have been many times of year (although not the first two weeks of December). Those times have included Easter,other spring break weeks, summer, part of Christmas week, first week of January, Thansgiving, different times in Ocotober, and Memorial Day. We have always gotten the 2BR boardwalk view by calling 11 months out from scheduled date of departure; in fact we have always gotten it even when calling 10 months out.

 

[DebbieB]

When I was booking Dec 1 to 7 back in January, I called on January 2 for the night of Dec 1 (checkout Dec 2). I was busy and didn't call until around 2:00pm. I wanted a boardwalk view studio. The cm said I got the last one. So if I would have waited until Jan 7, I would not have got it. I made sure I called at 9:00am the rest of the days and got them all.

 

[robinb]

I would have never thought of that without this board, and would have called 11 months out and found everything gone.

My friends tried to book a standard view 2BR at BWV for 12/31 at the 11 month window but waited until the day after 12/31 came available. All the standard view 2 bedrooms were gone as were boardwalk view 2 bedrooms. They were forced to book a preferred view instead.

 

[LisaS]

Let’s say today you are exactly 11 months away from the date you plan to arrive and check in at your DVC resort. ... So you can only book your FIRST day at this time since the date of your arrival day is the only day in your planned stay that is currently 11 months or less away.

Just one correction: the rule is 11 months prior to the check out date not the date of stay. If you are 11 months away from the date you plan to check in, you would have to wait one more day before you can book that first night. In other words, the first opportunity to call would be 11 months prior to the the theoretical check out day of the first night of your stay, or looked at another way, one day later than 11 months prior to your check in day.