How do I combine points from different home resorts

[kocar]

Still in process of deciding on a purchase. Have found two low points listings for BCV and HHI. We would like to alternate between Hilton Head and Beach Club for our annual vacations. Since we don't want to purchase big points at both, how do I combine points so that every year we can use points from both accounts to cover our stays?

thanks to everyone for answering all of my questions. As an almost newbie, I have so many!

 

[WDWCRAZY32]

You could transfer the points from one to the other but you still have to deal with the 7-11 month window for the home resort you transfered them from. Even if you transfer points which really wouldn't make any difference they still retain they're own use year and home resort booking window. If you get the same use year for each account it would be easier to keep track of your points and you could reserve a few days at each resort during the same vacation using the 11 month window.

 

[Island_Lauri]

If you are going to go to HHI one year and BCV the next, you can do this by banking and borrowing. If you were going to HHI this year and BCV next, you would bank this years BCV points to next year and borrow HHI points from next year for this year. If you have a 100 point contract from each "home", then you would have 200 points at one "home" to use each year.

Hope this makes sense.

Lauri

 

[CaptainMidnight]

Originally posted by Island_Lauri
If you are going to go to HHI one year and BCV the next, you can do this by banking and borrowing. If you were going to HHI this year and BCV next, you would bank this years BCV points to next year and borrow HHI points from next year for this year. If you have a 100 point contract from each "home", then you would have 200 points at one "home" to use each year.

Hope this makes sense.

Lauri

That's what we do with our two home resorts. You can bank and borrow each home resorts points seperately, so you can have the advantage of the 11 month window at each resort. So by banking one year's points, and borrowing one years points all at the same resort, you can combine up to 3 years work of poitns to use the 11 month window. Then you alternate years at the other resort. We like the combination of a beach resort and WDW resort as well, and can always combine all our points at the 7 month window when we'd like. Hope this helps. You'll probably need the advantage of the 11 month window at HH if you'd like to stay there durning the prime summer season.

 

[kocar]

thanks everyone for your replies. This is how I thought we'd be doing it (banking and borrowing) so we can take advantage of the 11 month window at each resort. Since my husband teaches and coaches football and I'm a school administrator, the weeks available to travel throughout the year are limited. We like the idea of xmas break at Disney every other year and then a nice beach vacation in the summer the following year.

Now I just have to work out the details of which offer to buy. If I understand correctly, I could try to purchase resale points at HHI then since I'm considered a member, I can buy add-on BCV points directly through Disney so there's no closing costs. Am I understanding everything correctly?

 

[Dean]

Originally posted by WDWCRAZY32
You could transfer the points from one to the other but you still have to deal with the 7-11 month window for the home resort you transfered them from. Even if you transfer points which really wouldn't make any difference they still retain they're own use year and home resort booking window. If you get the same use year for each account it would be easier to keep track of your points and you could reserve a few days at each resort during the same vacation using the 11 month window.

Unfortunately this is not truly accurate. It's what the POS says but once the points are transferred, they can't track the points use year or home resort outside of the contract they are transferred to. If you transfer BWV poins to an OKW contract they become BWV points and are only availble during the use year of the destination contract whicch means you may lose a few months on a contract if they use years are different. In the future they may be able to track this correctly. It does make for interesting thinking about buying say a small contract at multiple resorts and then maybe a large OKW contract. Then transfer points as needed and use all points at the 11 month window for the selected resort that year. I'm sure this will eventually change.

The best methods are to bank and borrow alternating resorts. One alterntive is to transfer points. Another and my preferred is this. You book as many days as you can with this years (or banked points) from X contract at X resort. You then use Y contract to make the rest of the days reservations at Y resort. Then at the 7 month window you change all to one resort if available, if not you have the days covered but must change resorts. This obviously works best at the WDW resorts but can be helpful regardless of which resorts are in question.

 

[TiggerFreak]

Dean,

If I understand your statement:

We have 170 points at VWL and 100 point add on at BCV.
Are you saying we could transfer some of the VWL to the BCV and then get the 11 month window. Or will this only work for two completely diferent contracts, not add-ons?

 

[Richyams]

If it will work, its a mistake that will not work forever. Its not supposed to work that way....I didn't think it did.

In practice, I guess buying VB points cheap to transfer into your OKW account would give you 11 months with al your points every year....what a shame.

That is really awful. I am quite dismayed to hear that you can do that. I hope it gets changed soon.

 

[Dean]

Originally posted by TiggerFreak
Dean,

If I understand your statement:

We have 170 points at VWL and 100 point add on at BCV.
Are you saying we could transfer some of the VWL to the BCV and then get the 11 month window. Or will this only work for two completely diferent contracts, not add-ons?

That appears to be the case but there is risk involved. It'd be my luck they fixed it right about the time I tried.

Rich, I doubt there's much risk people using this to get he home resort priority when they aren't supposed to. More likely that one will buy points from another member expecting to get a home resort priority at somewhere they don't own and then not be able to use the transferred points at intended. I too hope it gets fixed but I suspect for totally different reasons. My guess you're thinking people will buy VB and HH and then a small OKW contract and take advantage of the 11 month window at OKW. From my perspective, I can't stand it when rules are not followed. I want things as much black and white as possible and this definitely isn't at least in practice.

 

[Dean]

Something happened to me Thursday in talking with MS that might add a piece to the points transfer puzzle.

I just bought (actually traded for) a 50 point OKW contract. It was to have all 50 2002 points and all 50 2003 points. The seller had two contracts, the master and the add on. Apparently she didn't have all 50 points in the 2002 use year she though so she transferred points from the 2002 master contract to my BWV contract (same use year, Dec). So I was calling to check if MS had me in the computer for the add on and figured out about the transfers. Nothing in the OKW 2002 and all 50 points in 2003. 50 unexpected points in my BWV 2002 contract which I banked for 2003. I could have used the points for OKW, transferred them back to the OKW contract or bank them to 2003 BW though the uniqueness of the situation may have given me options others may not have. In all three cases it would take a manual adjustment which they apparently do by paper and enter by hand.

The moral of the story is that if you have transferred points they have the mechanism to figure out where they came from and do the right thing. Now just to have it actually work for someone will make me feel better.

 

[Maistre Gracey]

Originally posted by Dean
The moral of the story is that if you have transferred points they have the mechanism to figure out where they came from and do the right thing. Now just to have it actually work for someone will make me feel better.

Good. I am happy to hear that there is a mechanism to uphold proper home vacation points and use year. I also hope DVC puts it into practice.

 

[Happy Birthday Cat]

The moral of the story is that if you have transferred points they have the mechanism to figure out where they came from and do the right thing.

I have told this story before but it worth telling again so that people are aware of transfer rules.

I transferred points in April from someone's BCV contract into my account. Since I own at BCV, I thought it would be a "no brainer". So when I called and found out that they were listed under my VWL master contract and that I could make 11 month reservations at the VWL with those BCV points I was thrown off.

Thankfully as Dean said, they did have the mechanism to track it down and they were switched to my BCV contract number.

So yes, I could have done exactly what has been outlined in this thread if I had chosen to.

HBC