Late check in ?

[GlendaO]

We'll be checking in around 11:30 pm - midnight in our arrival day. Will we be stuck in a bad room because of this? I heard that the earlier you arrive to check-in, the better your room assignment. Is there any truth to this?

 

[GlendaO]

We'll be checking in around 11:30 pm - midnight in our arrival day. Will we be stuck in a bad room because of this? I heard that the earlier you arrive to check-in, the better your room assignment. Is there any truth to this?

Forgot to mention, we're staying at POFQ, arriving in two weeks.

 

[buzznina]

We always arrive late, anywhere from 11pm to as late as 3AM(car problems) and rarely had a bad room. I really thinks it's 50/50 because we have also been upgraded to the next room level becasue all standard rooms were taken. I will say if you have very specific requests like a corner room, then I think the chances of getting that will be a lot less.

 

[GlendaO]

My requests were building 4 or 5 and a corner if available. I'm fine either way.
I was really just curious. My understanding is that your room assignment is made days before your arrival. If so, it seems like it should be your room whether you arrive at 11 am, 4 pm or 11 pm. I'll be good no matter what though.

 

[danceintherain]

It is possible that if all the "good" rooms have been requested by the time you check-in, you will be left with a worse one.

POFQ is so parsed out into room categories that I doubt it matters much anymore. (ie. there used to only be water view, now there's water view AND river view)
As a PP indicated, it depends on your requests. The higher number of rooms in the resort altogether that fulfill your desires, the more likely a room will be available when you check-in. Something else you have to consider is that you can only be placed in a room that is vacant the night you check in and will be so for your entire stay (the second really is only applicable for upgrades). It's possible that NO rooms that met your requests were available at all for your check-in day. In other words, you may not get your request, even if you show up at 6am when the computers roll over.

You're right though. If 100 people are checking into 100 available rooms that day, and you're the last one to check-in, they will have only one room available to put you in. The only thing you can do at that point is request to be moved should a room open up, but that would require you to be ready to move every morning.

Just hope that most of the people checking in that day have no idea what to request or don't want what you want, so the room you end up with is exactly what you want.

 

[danceintherain]

My requests were building 4 or 5 and a corner if available. I'm fine either way.
I was really just curious. My understanding is that your room assignment is made days before your arrival. If so, it seems like it should be your room whether you arrive at 11 am, 4 pm or 11 pm. I'll be good no matter what though.

Rooms are assigned in advance, yes, but CMs can take rooms from guests who haven't arrived yet in favor of those who have. So if someone who arrives early in the day is unhappy with the room they are assigned, they can reiterate their requests to a CM, and their assignment can be changed to a room already "assigned" to someone else.
I'm not sure how often it happens, but probably more so for truly popular requests. A request to be in a specific building at POFQ is probably more likely to be filled as the resort is so small that most people probably don't care which building they end up in. A similar request at CBR may be denied, because many people request Jamaica as an alternative to booking a preferred room.

Most people probably think as you did, and would never consider double checking to see if there's a better room available. I also don't think the CMs are in the practice of looking for "better" rooms for guests during check-in, unless someone expressly asks.

 

[mickeynut1]

Some people have posted that it's better to check in early in the day as all the "good" rooms are usually taken early on, but we have not found that to be the case (for us). We always check in late (usually after 11:30 pm or midnight) and we have yet to get a "bad" room. In fact, on our first Poly stay, I had 3 requests noted on our reservation. We arrived at the Poly around 12:30-1:00 a.m. and our first 2 requests were met, with the 3rd being met if we wanted to change rooms the next day. So, in our experience, checking in late has never effected our room assignment.