How points work when staying over use year month?

[ajsamett]

I'm trying to decide on what would make an hood use year for me, and was wondering what happens if you have a reservation that spans a use year? For example, if you have a reservation for 3/28-4/2 with an April use year, how does that work points wise? What if you have to cancel the trip and they go into holding (would also appreciate a crash course in how holding works in general if close to use year)

 

[intamin]

I'm trying to decide on what would make an hood use year for me, and was wondering what happens if you have a reservation that spans a use year? For example, if you have a reservation for 3/28-4/2 with an April use year, how does that work points wise? What if you have to cancel the trip and they go into holding (would also appreciate a crash course in how holding works in general if close to use year)

You would need to have two separate reservations. One for the the 28 to the 31st and then one for the 1st to the second. You can call member services and ask them to link the reservations so you don't have to switch rooms assuming you don't change room types.

If you have to cancel and you're less than 31 days out the points that are from the 28th to the 31st at the end of the use year so they would essentially only be good til the end of March from when you cancel. The points for the reservation from April 1st to the 2nd would expire at the end of March in the following year. Assuming of course you had cancelled within the 31 day period before April 1st.

 

[VGCgroupie]

The only way to book a cross use year reservation as one reservation is to call MS and have them book it for you. I booked mine as 2 separate reservations and then they merged it.

 

[ajsamett]

Damn, two reservations, is that as annoying as it sounds? How does that impact LL/reservations?

 

[VGCgroupie]

Damn, two reservations, is that as annoying as it sounds? How does that impact LL/reservations?

No clue. I havent thought that far ahead yet. Actually mine is for DLR so no advance reservations. Hopefully someone else has the answer for you

 

[intamin]

Damn, two reservations, is that as annoying as it sounds? How does that impact LL/reservations?

For reservations at WDW it means you have to wait until 60 days out from the date of your second reservation to book the remainder of your dining.

I'd imagine it works similarly for lightning lanes where you'd have to wait until 7 days out from your second reservation to book the lightning lanes for that portion of the trip. Truthfully though I'm not sure as I've never purchased a lightning lane and don't have plans to in the near future.

 

[CarolynFH]

Damn, two reservations, is that as annoying as it sounds? How does that impact LL/reservations?

For dining, you have two booking windows, as above. For LLs, you only have one - at 7 days before checkin for the first reservation, you can book for your entire stay.

Don’t ask me why the LL booking computer can see the entire stay while the ADR booking computer can’t, because I have no idea!

 

[foodiddiedoo]

I have another (probably dumb) question to add here. I’m getting a resale BLT contract that has a Dec UY. The points will most likely be added by end of August/Early September. One stipulation of the contract was that the seller would bank the remaining 2024 points into 2025 for me. Since I’m a newer DVC member (joined Fall 2024) I haven’t had a single banked point because I’ve spent all of mine planning this year’s trips. Does the system know which points are banked and automatically spend them first on a contract? I am planning a trip for next June before a cruise and want to use my new to me contract to use up some of those 2024 points, but won’t be using all of them. Basically since I can’t bank those points again, I want them to have priority. Is this something I don’t have to worry about at all?

 

[sndral]

I'm trying to decide on what would make an hood use year for me, and was wondering what happens if you have a reservation that spans a use year? For example, if you have a reservation for 3/28-4/2 with an April use year, how does that work points wise? What if you have to cancel the trip and they go into holding (would also appreciate a crash course in how holding works in general if close to use year)

Here’s how I did it for a Nov./Dec. 2023 reservation w/ my Dec. use year. I booked the Nov. days online using 2022 use year points, waited an hour until the phone lines opened up & called & had MS add the Dec. days using 2023 use year points. I did it that way because that first week of Dec. books really fast & by grabbing the Nov. days online my reservation blocked anyone from getting ‘my’ villa while I waited an hour for the phone lines to open to get my Dec. days.
Regarding holding points, the points used for the first days of the reservation (the ones using the ending use year points) would be hard to use. W/ the points used for the newly beginning use year you’d have a full year to try & find something w/in the 60 day window to book.
In my scenario if I’d canceled, I’d likely have lost my Dec. 2022 points because w/ 30 days or less before they expired finding something at that time of year would have been tough. The 2023 points OTH, would have been good through 11/30/24.