Holding point questions. Want to make sure I understand

[diznyfanatic]

We have some holding points that need to be used by the end of July. I know that reservations using holding points can only be booked 60 days in advance of your stay.

However, if I'm understanding what MS advised me, if we wanted to book now to get better availability, we could borrow the points for that stay and then request that MS reallocate the points to use up the holding points at the 60 day mark.

Any borrowed points however, would be a permanent transaction.

Do I have that right?

 

[Deb & Bill]

If you borrow points into the current use year, they will expire at the end of the current use year. They don't go back.

You must have an August Use year if the holding points will expire the end of July. If you borrow Aug 07 point to make the reservation, they will also expire at the end of July 07. Not much point in borrowing the points.

Also, if you make a reservation, only to cancel to use other points, you have to make sure there isn't a wait list for your time period. If you cancel on the other points, and a wait list exists, you go to the bottom of the wait list. You can't just change out the points. And you lose your reservation.

 

[diznyfanatic]

If you borrow points into the current use year, they will expire at the end of the current use year. They don't go back.

You must have an August Use year if the holding points will expire the end of July. If you borrow Aug 07 point to make the reservation, they will also expire at the end of July 07. Not much point in borrowing the points.

Also, if you make a reservation, only to cancel to use other points, you have to make sure there isn't a wait list for your time period. If you cancel on the other points, and a wait list exists, you go to the bottom of the wait list. You can't just change out the points. And you lose your reservation.

Thank you for the help.

Yes, we have an August UY. We had reserved two studios for all of us for Spring Break this year, but due to a job offer my son received, they are unable to go and we had to cancel one of the studios.

I should have clarified that he points for that cancelled studio went into holding as '06 points that expire 7/31/07.

We also have some points left for '07 which I thought didn't expire until 7/31/08.

I think I'm confused.

 

[Caskbill]

You are currently in your 2006 use year, which goes Aug 1, 2006 thru July 31, 2007)

You cannot make a reservation more than 60 days out with regular (or borrowed) points, and then at 60 days reallocate that reservation to use the holding points.

If you think about it, that would completely defeat the purpose of the 60 day rule.

If you want to take a vacation then, you could make a regular reservation now, and at 60 days, IF there is availability, cancel that reservation and make a NEW reservation using the holding points.

If there is no availability then what would you do. You'd have holding points you couldn't use at all.

And, if you borrowed points for that vacation, and were able to make a new reservation at 60 days using holding points, you'd be cancelling the reservation you made using your borrowed points, and since they can't be returned to their original use year (2007), they would expire on July 31, 2007.

 

[diznyfanatic]

Thank you Caskbill. That's exactly what I thought too and why I'm completely confused now.

I wasn't the one that even asked about "reallocating" as I didn't even know such a thing existed.

When I had to cancel the reservation, MS was explaining to me about the points having to go into holding, how we couldn't reserve more than 60 days out to use them, all of which I knew.

We then started talking about what I would need to do to complete a reservation at the 60 day mark to keep from losing them if using the Holding Points, the rest of our '07 points and the fact that we might be short a few points to book what we needed for the end of July.

It was at the point that MS started talking about how MS could "reallocate" the points.

My OP was what I thought was the gist of that conversation with MS. Apparently I misunderstood.

 

[Dean]

DVC is very inconsistent in the reallocation rule. Given the situation I would make a reservation but NOT borrow any points to do so. I'd first try to rent them out if I could.

 

[Caskbill]

MS does 'reallocate' points, but I think the agent you were speaking with was getting confused, or getting to complicated.

Here's an example of a real reallocation:

Suppose you have a February Use Year month, so the examples below are for a 2007 Use Year

You make a reservation for this July using regular points.

You make a 2nd reservation for September, using borrowed points.

You subsequently have to cancel the September reservation. This returns those borrowed points into your account. Borrowed points must be used in the assigned use year as they cannot be 'unborrowed'.

MS can reallocate the borrowed points and apply them to your July reservation instead. This then frees up your regular points originally used for that reservation. Regular points can be banked into the next year.

You see in this example you are not bypassing any of the rules such as the 11/7 month booking window or the 60 day rule since you could have used borrowed points for the July reservation in the first place. That's why this type of 'reallocation' is allowed.

Hope this helps.