dcl points came out last night

[Pluto 2]

just got a call from ms wanted to know if i was still interested in the dcl i booked for feb2 2008. she said the points came out last night. the points were the same for my cruise from last year. i just checked dvc member website and they dont have the points listed yet. but im sure if you called they will let you know the cruise your interested in what the points will be,they should update their website

 

[simzac]

Thanks for the update, just checked the MS website before coming here. Still no points, but this news is encouraging.

 

[Anal Annie]

Encouraging news, yes....but why aren't they on the website yet?!?!

 

[SnowWhite2]

Hi, Pluto. I just received a call from MS also and converted my Feb 2nd cruise to points. We'll be on the same cruise. Have you visited the cruise section of the DIS and joined in our Feb 2nd cruise thread? We'd love to have you join in!

 

[Pluto 2]

Hi, Pluto. I just received a call from MS also and converted my Feb 2nd cruise to points. We'll be on the same cruise. Have you visited the cruise section of the DIS and joined in our Feb 2nd cruise thread? We'd love to have you join in!

i would love to but i made the reservations for my parents.

 

[Anal Annie]

I couldn't STAND the waiting so I just called MS & completed the conversion of points for our ressie for next July!! Our points for the 4 n stayed the same as 2007 too!! I didn't know what to expect since the 4 n is a double dip to CC next summer - wasn't sure how that might affect the charts! But I'm so-o excited 'cuz it actually left us with 10 pts. to spare!

 

[El&Asmom]

Do you mind my asking what a typical point cost it is for a 3 or 4 night cruise. I'm sure it ranges based on category but a ballpark would be great.
Every time I search, I just find that it is listed on the MS website.
We're not DVC members yet so we can't check, but would love info to see if we'd ever be able to book a cruise using points given that we're looking at buying a small resale contract.
Any examples would be great.
Thanks.

 

[simzac]

Do you mind my asking what a typical point cost it is for a 3 or 4 night cruise. I'm sure it ranges based on category but a ballpark would be great.
Every time I search, I just find that it is listed on the MS website.
We're not DVC members yet so we can't check, but would love info to see if we'd ever be able to book a cruise using points given that we're looking at buying a small resale contract.
Any examples would be great.
Thanks.

Just booked our 3 night cruise for next January. Reserved 2 Cat 11 staterooms for our family. Cost us 67 points per person, total of 268 points for the four of us. I'm sure this is the lowest point requirement for both staterooms and time of year. Point costs go way up from here. Hope this helps.

 

[Anal Annie]

Do you mind my asking what a typical point cost it is for a 3 or 4 night cruise. I'm sure it ranges based on category but a ballpark would be great.
Every time I search, I just find that it is listed on the MS website.
We're not DVC members yet so we can't check, but would love info to see if we'd ever be able to book a cruise using points given that we're looking at buying a small resale contract.
Any examples would be great.
Thanks.

We don't have access to the full charts yet either 'cuz they're still not posted online - so all I can tell you for sure is what we were able to book. We booked one of the "secret porthole" staterooms which book as a deluxe inside Cat. 10 (located on deck 5 next to the Cat. 8 oceanviews - but these have obstructed view portholes). There are 3 of us and we're doing a 4 n in July '08 (which is peak season). The point value is 144 per adult and 104 for our DS (who will be 11 - the 3rd & 4th person point value goes by age). So our 4 n, Cat. 10 for 3 in peak season will cost us 392 points.

I played around with a lot of different pt. options / scenarios before we decided how many to buy. We only own 250 pts. - so we planned this summer's vacation very carefully to save points so we could have as many pts. as possible to bank into our next yrs. points. Essentially, this cruise will be done on a combo. using almost 3/4 of this yrs. points + all of next yrs. We didn't want to borrow ahead into the NEXT yrs. points 'cuz we have something else we'd like to do in '09 - but we could've borrowed if we'd wanted to get a higher stateroom category or something. (Because we didn't want to borrow pts. we then booked the 3 n cruise back-to-back with this 4 n on a cash ressie thru D.U. and are keeping the same cabin so we don't have to switch or leave the ship.)

Good luck with deciding how many points to buy!

 

[Don12]

Hi,
I'm relatively new to DVC, but my wife is definitely interested in eventually taking a Disney cruise. However, from my initial review of the point breakdown, it doesn't appear that trading my points for DCL is worth it. Wouldn't it be better to sell my points to get a cash reservation or just pay seperately? Please correct me if I'm wrong, thanks...

 

[Anal Annie]

Hi,
I'm relatively new to DVC, but my wife is definitely interested in eventually taking a Disney cruise. However, from my initial review of the point breakdown, it doesn't appear that trading my points for DCL is worth it. Wouldn't it be better to sell my points to get a cash reservation or just pay seperately? Please correct me if I'm wrong, thanks...

There's a lot of debates about using points to cruise - and it is totally a personal preference. It's worth it to US not to go thru the hassle of renting & reporting the income on our taxes, blah, blah, blah. Dollar for dollar we might've made out a few hundred ahead to have rented them - but there's piece of mind to just use our points in whatever way makes us happy and not have to deal with the stuff that goes with renting.

I also wanted to book one of those "secret porthole" rooms this time before they were gone - so I didn't want to fool around with missing out on it while I was trying to work everything else out. We plan to use points to cruise again in a few years on one of the new ships - and by then, maybe I'll be more comfortable with the idea of renting and will have more time to plan it out ahead of time... We did a cash ressie for our 3 n. cruise - that's enough cash out of pocket and we were happy to be able to cover all 3 of us with points on the 4 n. That's why we bought DVC - to limit our out of pocket vacation expenses every year and TO BE HAPPY! (Which we are!)

 

[Malibelle]

What are the "Secret Porthole Rooms" Can someone please explain. Are they less points? I want to look into booking a cruise with our DVC points. We have yet to use them and I am still learning all the tricks.

 

[Anal Annie]

What are the "Secret Porthole Rooms" Can someone please explain. Are they less points? I want to look into booking a cruise with our DVC points. We have yet to use them and I am still learning all the tricks.

Malibelle - there are 6 of these "secret porthole" cabins as well as 4 "secret verandah" cabins on each ship - since there are so few of them they all tend to book up quickly so if you ever find them available snag 'em quick! The SPH cabins are on deck 5 (adjacent to the Cat. 8 deluxe o.v.) and they sell them as "deluxe inside" Cat. 10's (which saves you $) however they're actually outside cabins with portholes - but they're inset on the ship a little bit so they have some obstructions outside...

The "secret Verandah" cabins are on decks 6 & 7 and they used to be Cat. 6's with the clear plexiglass balcony railing but there's a slight "obstruction" on one end due to the curve of the ship so they've reclassified them & now sell them as Cat 7's. Normally Cat. 7's have the "navigators verandah" which is not nearly as nice as it has the solid wall railing and a large porthole to look out of. With the clear plexiglass you can sit down and see thru. But it saves you a whole Cat. on the price & IMO you get a better balcony!

The best thing for you to do is to go to www.castawayclub.com where you can click on links to the various categories & balcony types. They have pictures of them from both the outside of the ship and from inside the cabins. They also provide all of the cabin numbers (we snagged 5520)!

Then to find out if they're available for the dates you're interested in, go to the DCL website & put in a dummy ressie for those categories and hand select / enter those cabin numbers (one by one). It will give you a msg. to tell you if they're already taken and no longer available. I think it's a great way to maximize your money and / or DVC points when you're on a budget!! Good luck!

 

[El&Asmom]

Thanks everyone for the replies. Given that we are looking for a small contract between 75-100pts, it doesn't look like we'll take advantage of using points to cruise. I suppose we'll just have to bank points and pay cash on the years we cruise.