DVC Not...Rack Rate wide open

[senecabeach]

This is the 1st time I had nothing planned for my 11/7th month availability ...and now thought I'd try to get a few days at the F&GF in late March.

I called MS on Saturday....
Nothing available for point stays at either BLT, BCV or BWV during my time period...BUT...IF I want to pay "rack rate" on the Disney web site...there's plenty of availibility for villas and at ALL 3 resorts...studio,1, 2 bdrm.

Boy....does that make my blood boil !!!!!!!!!!!

 

[vicki_c]

But you know there are two different pools of rooms, right? Availability for cash through the regular reservations is not related to DVC availability at all, or vice-versa.

 

[senecabeach]

But you know there are two different pools of rooms, right? Availability for cash through the regular reservations is not related to DVC availability at all, or vice-versa.

Yes...I know... Im just venting..its just very, very annoying and doesn't make it the right thing to do when a "member" is trying to get late ressies when there are still available "Rooms @ the Inn"!!

It seems to me that there should be a way for MS to pull from the regular cash inventory, as needed, to accomodate "members". Rack rates are really outrageous $$...wonder if they really fill that occupancy?? WOW!!

 

[mic_KY_mouses]

This is the 1st time I had nothing planned for my 11/7th month availability ...and now thought I'd try to get a few days at the F&GF in late March.

I called MS on Saturday....
Nothing available for point stays at either BLT, BCV or BWV during my time period...BUT...IF I want to pay "rack rate" on the Disney web site...there's plenty of availibility for villas and at ALL 3 resorts...studio,1, 2 bdrm.

Boy....does that make my blood boil !!!!!!!!!!!

You might try to reserve something available and then waitlist for what you would really like. I took me a while to understand that the pools of availability are completely separate from each other and using our points is still the best value. Good luck!

 

[diesel]

did you ask MS if there were cash ressies available? DVC members can get a discounted room at DVC resorts if they are available. You can't book these rooms through regular Disney reservations. Yes I know you don't want to pay cash but it would be cheaper than the rack rate.

 

[DebbieB]

Member Services can sometimes get rooms moved last minute, like within a week of arrival. But not this far out for March. That room does not belong to the members and they want to try to get cash for it.

 

[HallsInTheKingdom]

I suggest you waitlist what you want. You would be surpises how often those actually come through. I have had 3 waitlist happen just this year. One was for the weekend of the DISapalooza, another was for an extra night for THV labor Day weekend and the third was just this week for an extra night on Jan 1st.

I understand the frustration you feel of not having immediate availabilty for what you want, but let me tell you, the feeling to find out your waitlist came through far outweights the initial feeleings of denial. This too may be a DIsney "ploy" but we will save that for another thread. lol.

Good luck!

 

[Lynne M]

It's not a ploy, or a scam....just normal operations.

There are three ways that villas become available for cash reservations by non-members.

1. Disney retains ownership of a very small ( <10%) portion of the inventory at every DVC resort. These are their rooms, not ours, and there's no reason to expect that they should give them to DVC members.

2. When a member exchanges out of the DVC system, to RCI, Concierge Collection, etc - that receiving entity expects to be paid for the use of the room the member is using. DVC sells an equivalent villa to CRO, and uses the money from that to pay RCI, or the other resort. This is what allows exchanging to happen - you take this away, and no more RCI, DCL, etc.

3. At 60 days out, DVC villas that aren't booked by members go to CRO to be rented. The money generated goes to offset our dues. These villas can be pulled back into DVC inventory if a member wants to make a last-minute reservation.


So, since the OP can't get a booking thru DVC, this tells me that the villas in CRO's inventory are in category 1 or 2 - meaning, they're not ours, or they're being used to pay for a member's exchange.

 

[dianeschlicht]

Yes...I know... Im just venting..its just very, very annoying and doesn't make it the right thing to do when a "member" is trying to get late ressies when there are still available "Rooms @ the Inn"!!

It seems to me that there should be a way for MS to pull from the regular cash inventory, as needed, to accomodate "members". Rack rates are really outrageous $$...wonder if they really fill that occupancy?? WOW!!

So are you willing to give up the ability to trade out to the Disney Collection, cruises etc? The inventory from DVC available through CRO is mostly point that have already been used for member's exchanges into the Disney Collection. There have been a few instances where members have been able to pull something back about a week to 10 days out, but it's not our inventory any longer. Someone else has already used those points, so to "pay" for that usage, CRO now has that inventory to sell. You could see if there is a DVC discount for any of it during that time period.

 

[Deb & Bill]

It's not a ploy, or a scam....just normal operations.

There are three ways that villas become available for cash reservations by non-members.

1. Disney retains ownership of a very small ( <10%) portion of the inventory at every DVC resort. These are their rooms, not ours, and there's no reason to expect that they should give them to DVC members.

2. When a member exchanges out of the DVC system, to RCI, Concierge Collection, etc - that receiving entity expects to be paid for the use of the room the member is using. DVC sells an equivalent villa to CRO, and uses the money from that to pay RCI, or the other resort. This is what allows exchanging to happen - you take this away, and no more RCI, DCL, etc.

3. At 60 days out, DVC villas that aren't booked by members go to CRO to be rented. The money generated goes to offset our dues. These villas can be pulled back into DVC inventory if a member wants to make a last-minute reservation.


So, since the OP can't get a booking thru DVC, this tells me that the villas in CRO's inventory are in category 1 or 2 - meaning, they're not ours, or they're being used to pay for a member's exchange.

Excellent explanation, Lynne. Makes it easy for everyone to understand. Your post should be a sticky at the top of the page.

 

[CarolAnnC]

In 2010 Easter will be April 4. That means the two weeks prior (the last two weeks in March) will be exceedingly busy as well.

To attempt to reserve on points only 4 months out prior to a very high occupancy season is very difficult to be succesful with.

Perhaps you can be flexible with your dates? Flower & Garden Festival does run beyond that time frame, too.

 

[hakepb]

Obviously with no trade-outs you would see very little CRO inentory, but that would just force members to book more rentals and you would still not see any DVC availability.

Its possible that there could be a little better balance between CRO "weeks" and DVC weeks, but I doubt there is too much CRO wanting additional availability at a time when there are aailable DC rooms.

It does make me wonder if DVC could do anything additional to promote CRO inventory at the DVC resorts with more aailability.
i.e since "free dining" is so popular with cash guests, make SSR Carousel year round "free dining" for full price CRO guests (studio=QSDDP, 1 and 2br=DDP and GV=DxDDP) and then trade those extra CRO rooms from BCV to SSR, thus DVC members get greater availability at the smaller resorts, and DVC owners probably get more $ and better point trading alues in the future...

 

[Anal Annie]

Member or not, the last week of March starts spring break weeks with the weekend starting 4/2 being the worst. My DS's last day of school is Fri. 3/26 and we're going down that Fri. nite for 6 nights. I made our ressies right at the 7 month mark with no problem. We were open to options and had several resorts to choose from, including BLT if we'd wanted to spring for that many points (there were 2 resorts that already had limited availability even back then tho - BWV was one). (BTW if you fly the flights for that time period are running really high right now. I booked ours as soon as the "budget" airlines opened their schedules & they've gone WAY up since.)

ETA - I made our ADR ressies on Oct 27 as well bcuz that's when they started taking them at 180 days again and I tried NUMEROUS times all day to get thru. It took me hours actually. The dining res. system crashed and even DVC couldn't make ressies. So note that dining ressies will be hard to get for that week now too. Earliest time I could get at either T-Rex or Rainforest Cafe was 9:00 pm!! And that was on day # 1 of booking.

 

[kevmag]

Newbie question....I get conceptually the pool of DVC rooms available on points VS rooms available for cash ressies, etc.

The naive question I have..are there actually physical sections of each resort sectioned this way? For instance (as a new owner at BLT) are certain floors for DVC point use, and 1 (or 2) floors used for cash ressies?

 

[DebbieB]

Newbie question....I get conceptually the pool of DVC rooms available on points VS rooms available for cash ressies, etc.

The naive question I have..are there actually physical sections of each resort sectioned this way? For instance (as a new owner at BLT) are certain floors for DVC point use, and 1 (or 2) floors used for cash ressies?

No. Although some rooms are rarely available for cash - BWV boardwalk or standard view, BCV 2 bedroom w/2 queens.

 

[Cyndibear]

Not sure what your looking for but last week Dh was able to book OKW studio for March 17-19 and 22-23. (our Phillies Spring Training trip) Maybe try to go a little earlier and you'll have luck.

Cyndi

 

[DisDaydreamer]

Newbie question....I get conceptually the pool of DVC rooms available on points VS rooms available for cash ressies, etc.

The naive question I have..are there actually physical sections of each resort sectioned this way? For instance (as a new owner at BLT) are certain floors for DVC point use, and 1 (or 2) floors used for cash ressies?

As Debbie said it is no to the actual physical sections, but I don't think any of us know or understand how the pool of points are applied to the room size categories. Meaning if they have 1000 points in the pool... how and when do they decide whether those points apply to a studio, 1 bdrm, or other room size category.

I'm hoping it is somehow a fair process.

That said it is a necessary process. We have traded out on a few occasions and Disney had to pay cash for those trades and in turn must recover the cash.

 

[hakepb]

As Debbie said it is no to the actual physical sections, but I don't think any of us know or understand how the pool of points are applied to the room size categories. Meaning if they have 1000 points in the pool... how and when do they decide whether those points apply to a studio, 1 bdrm, or other room size category.

I'm hoping it is somehow a fair process.

That said it is a necessary process. We have traded out on a few occasions and Disney had to pay cash for those trades and in turn must recover the cash.

That is interesting..
As BLT sales began, only lower level units were declared, but owners were able to stay on higher floors. It seems that DVC uses their allocation of points, then before the stay the CRT resort "Scheduler" assigns the rooms within the DVC caegories, but never contemplates what physical units are DVC vs unowned.
There were (and are) cases of MK view being booked, but other categories open. Does that mean DVC owners used all MK View, or just the owner's portion(i.e. 50% of MK View)

 

[Dean]

This is the 1st time I had nothing planned for my 11/7th month availability ...and now thought I'd try to get a few days at the F&GF in late March.

I called MS on Saturday....
Nothing available for point stays at either BLT, BCV or BWV during my time period...BUT...IF I want to pay "rack rate" on the Disney web site...there's plenty of availibility for villas and at ALL 3 resorts...studio,1, 2 bdrm.

Boy....does that make my blood boil !!!!!!!!!!!

I don't understand why you'd be angry in this situation. There are a number of pots of rooms that are not, and should not be, available to members on points. They include breakage inventory, undeclared units, unsold inventory and units given up by members for cash type exchanges (DCL, etc). It's no different than having seats on one airline for a given flight but not another in a code sharing situation. The idea that members should get what they want no matter what if any room is available in any way is simply inappropriate, IMO.

 

[Dean]

That is interesting..
As BLT sales began, only lower level units were declared, but owners were able to stay on higher floors. It seems that DVC uses their allocation of points, then before the stay the CRT resort "Scheduler" assigns the rooms within the DVC caegories, but never contemplates what physical units are DVC vs unowned.
There were (and are) cases of MK view being booked, but other categories open. Does that mean DVC owners used all MK View, or just the owner's portion(i.e. 50% of MK View)

To my knowledge, the only time whether a unit was declared or not made any difference for unit assignment was when it wasn't available for occupancy as in SSR when the building was not yet open.