New policy for reservations based on check IN date

[jarestel]

Advance notification that included details probably would've cut down on the length of this thread

I agree the communication of the change was awful, but I doubt the thread length would have been any shorter. Advance notification and implementation details doesn't change any of the underlying issues people have with the new policy. At this point, we know all of the details and this hasn't soothed any savage beasts.

 

[LisaS]

For the past year DVC has been busy telling us how they're trying to "SIMPLIFY" our lives.

So do any of the myriad of new rules proposed in this thread seem "SIMPLE" to anyone?

Yes I think DVC was trying to simplify things with their new booking rules. The rules themselves are simple. It's the "booking optimizations" that have gotten more complicated. Here is what DVC has shared with us so far about the new booking rules:

You can book starting 11/7 months prior to check IN (rather than check OUT), and you can book up to 7 nights on that call. For stays longer than 7 nights, you can call back in 1 week to book up to another 7 nights.

Now on that last point, they are actually allowing people to call back the next DAY rather than in a week to add on another day to their reservation. So they are saying one thing but doing something different.

Do any of the calculations and speculations in this thread seem "SIMPLE"?

I've just spent the last hour reading various speculative calculations about how rooms are allocated, and whether, if Family A calls on this date for this many days, but really needs that many days, their other days will already be allocated to Family B, or possibly Family C on the 2nd call date for Family A.....

As a group we are analyzing what these changes mean and who is most affected by them. Some of the discussions are getting a bit complicated as we try to understand all the ripple effects. And since DVC has not spelled out everything for us, we are speculating about some things, which adds to the complexity since you have to spell out multiple options based on how things might work in practice. So I do think the new rules are simple, but the lack of detailed information has left us trying to "reverse engineer" the booking system and that is not simple.

Before, things were simple. If I wanted to stay for 12 days, I called - ONCE - at 11 months prior my checkout date, to book my 12 day stay.

And you can continue to do exactly that. Or you can call 11 months prior to the 6th day of your stay and book the entire trip because the first 5 days will be inside the 11-month window already and you are allowed to book up to 7 nights at 11 months from check in, so that covers your 12 nights. If you want to start booking at the earliest possible time, call 11 months prior to check in and book 7 nights. Call back a week later and book the rest of your stay. So you can call early (and call twice) or wait a few days and book it all on one call as you have always done in the past.

IF I wanted to stay in a dedicated 2br at BCV the week between Christmas and New Years, I had the OPTION to call day by day, if it truly mattered that much to me.

If you weren't compelled to call day by day, no reason to start now. There is no more competition for those rooms than in the past but those who used to call DBD and will now need to use a different strategy. And again, we can't even nail down the strategy yet because we don't have the complete set of booking rules.

I wasn't forced to make multiple calls for a 12 day stay, or worry about complicated workarounds and the resulting complicated string of rules and regulations for any length of stay, season, or room type.

You are not forced to do anything you weren't doing before. If you regularly called 11 months from check OUT and weren't getting shut out by DBD bookers, then you won't get shut out now just because those folks are using a different strategy to start booking earlier.

 

[squirrlygirl]

I agree the communication of the change was awful, but I doubt the thread length would have been any shorter. Advance notification and implementation details doesn't change any of the underlying issues people have with the new policy. At this point, we know all of the details and this hasn't soothed any savage beasts.

I assume "we" means you have a mouse in your pocket? Because I saw posts about "gosh they should've notified us" and "can you clarify this for me?" and " are they or are they not allowing you to book day 8 on day 2?" Not to mention some of the underlying issues seem to be based on misconceptions about how the booking system works and how it impacts how you make reservations. Lots of people will be unnecessarily calling because they don't understand what they do and do not need to do. They just know there's this big panic and think everyone else is going after the same dates as them.

So if you know all the details and know exactly how this will affect everyone, then please share with me because I'm not in your pocket.

 

[LIFERBABE]

The writing has been on the wall for the last couple of years. Jim Lewis and Co. are rolling right along and rolling right over its members.

I will actually benefit from this change. I have over 1k points and can book whatever I want, when I want. I still dont think its right and have pretty much put all future DVC purchases on hold in hopes that the current regime will move on to bigger and better things and someone with some magic takes over.

I will add this to the list of when DVC started to go downhill. Pool temps, changes to point transfers, adding the fees to DC, the removal of glassware and mugs, the OKW extortion (I mean extension), the AKV Tapestry mess, and now changes to the booking window. There have been some improvements, but not enough to cover for their contempt of the membership as a whole.

I am tired of being disappointed in DVC. There is no room to recover from the last disappointment before they are at it again. I still enjoy my points, and I just don't look for DVC management to look out for me or my interests. Point Blank they are liars and they play us for stupid.

I have a friend that owns Atlantis Harborside. She is there now. In order to get the days she really wanted, she had to book an entire week, Sunday to Sunday using her booking advantage. She checked in this Tuesday and lost the first 2 nights because of her flights. She could have waited until 7 months to book a lesser vacation, but she waited last year and there was no availability, thus her booking a week to get 5 night strategy this year. Pretty soon DVC will be locking us in like this too.

 

[Doctor P]

OK, now that things have started to appear to get clearer as to how some people are able to "game" the system, I'm thinking that the strategy for all future vacations will be to start calling on day one of my new use year and then keep adding and dropping days until I get the ones I really want. Let's see, with a June use year, that means day by day calls for approximately 7 months for a Xmas vacation. Hmmmm.....sounds fun to me, LOL. Banking and borrowing could get complex, but we will work through it, LOL.

 

[n2mm]

The writing has been on the wall for the last couple of years. Jim Lewis and Co. are rolling right along and rolling right over its members.

I will actually benefit from this change. I have over 1k points and can book whatever I want, when I want. I still dont think its right and have pretty much put all future DVC purchases on hold in hopes that the current regime will move on to bigger and better things and someone with some magic takes over.

I will add this to the list of when DVC started to go downhill. Pool temps, changes to point transfers, adding the fees to DC, the removal of glassware and mugs, the OKW extortion (I mean extension), the AKV Tapestry mess, and now changes to the booking window. There have been some improvements, but not enough to cover for their contempt of the membership as a whole.

I am tired of being disappointed in DVC. There is no room to recover from the last disappointment before they are at it again. I still enjoy my points, and I just don't look for DVC management to look out for me or my interests. Point Blank they are liars and they play us for stupid.

I have a friend that owns Atlantis Harborside. She is there now. In order to get the days she really wanted, she had to book an entire week, Sunday to Sunday using her booking advantage. She checked in this Tuesday and lost the first 2 nights because of her flights. She could have waited until 7 months to book a lesser vacation, but she waited last year and there was no availability, thus her booking a week to get 5 night strategy this year. Pretty soon DVC will be locking us in like this too.

Thanks, I thought I was the only one who felt like this. I have a ton of points and always start out with 1K (w/new and banked) every year. I too have been so disappointed with DVC, with the mug-gate, and the fact that everytime I use my account they mess up my point total (3 times over the past 6 months now), and now this. I bought BWV points to use at the 11 month window to get a standard room. If that becomes a problem and I no longer can achieve this during Oct/F&W and early Dec, then there is no reason to hang on to those points. I have a ton of SSR points that I end up banking every year (and that is with 6 weeks of WDW a year). I actually saved up money to buy at least 100 BLT points and the $$ is just sitting in my account waiting for the announcement. I really am having second thoughts at putting any further money into DVC. With the 3k I pay for dues each year....you would think they could at least have a summer party, but that's gone too! What's next?

I actually have 6 trips planned for 2009 and am dreading the call to reserve them starting in September.

 

[jdg345]

Forgive me for not reading every post in this thread - but do we know we will be allowed to drop days at the beginning of a reservation? Do we know they will allow us to add days on the end of the reservation? Seems to be they could kill the whole walking reservation issue by not allowing one or both of these.

The problem is there is NO (none, nada, zip) "fair" system for allocating scare resources. No matter how you set up the system, more people want NYE rooms than there are rooms. Somebody is going to get left out. Most of us believe the more-fair system is the one where we get what we want and are never in the group that gets left out.

PS - If nothing else, this incident will hopefully kill the notion that DVC is run by geniuses who never get anything wrong. Either they are lying about how carefully they thought out this new policy, or they are chowderheads.

Yes, I have personally had success on both fronts, and continue testing occasionally. Others have reported the same successes.

 

[Inkmahm]

...
PS - If nothing else, this incident will hopefully kill the notion that DVC is run by geniuses who never get anything wrong. Either they are lying about how carefully they thought out this new policy, or they are chowderheads.

Thank you for really and truly making me LOL.

 

[jdg345]

My initial thought about this system is that it will probably be less stressful for those trying to change reservations at the 7 month window. No more posts wondering "should I call DBD and switch if that day is available but what if the next one is not?" Now when you call on Day 1 of the 7 month window you will know if availability of the first day is just a fluke or if you can string more than 1 night together at the non home resort.

Of course, this may have been the same 7 month reservation that would have been avialable even without DBD booking. If so, all this does is reduce the stress of deciding whether to book DBD at 7 months.

My second thought is that this system, as currently implemented, may actually decrease the ability of some members to switch at 7 months. For example, someone own lots of OKW points and 50 WLV points and wants to stay 7 nights at WLV the week before Thanksgiving. They use 46 points and book 3 nights in a Studio Sat - M in the 11 month window. Lets call Sat Day 1.

At the 7 month window for Day 1, they call MS and ask to extend the 3 day reservation by adding 4 more nights using OKW points. It looks like this should be possible because it would be a single reservation number stretching no more than 7 nights out. For all the reasons discussed in many other posts, only this member can book those next 4 nights. Any other member calling that day will be told that room is unavailable.

Thus, booking a few home resort nights may help you get an edge over others with only non-home resort points. Those small add-on at multiple resorts may have a benefit after all! -- Suzanne

Actually, by the time you get to 7 months, this is no longer the case. If you don't extend your trip before that 4th day, anyone else can get your room because you are no longer in it. That gives folks a good 4 months to take up the same unit you're in, and lock you out of extending. Now, if there is another unit available, you can still do this. The reservations will be linked and MS will let you stay where you are for the duration performing a 'back end swap'.

Which, frankly, is all moot anyways as you can maybe pick another unit (if you get there first) when you check-in.

 

[jdg345]

The writing has been on the wall for the last couple of years. Jim Lewis and Co. are rolling right along and rolling right over its members.

I will actually benefit from this change. I have over 1k points and can book whatever I want, when I want. I still dont think its right and have pretty much put all future DVC purchases on hold in hopes that the current regime will move on to bigger and better things and someone with some magic takes over.

I will add this to the list of when DVC started to go downhill. Pool temps, changes to point transfers, adding the fees to DC, the removal of glassware and mugs, the OKW extortion (I mean extension), the AKV Tapestry mess, and now changes to the booking window. There have been some improvements, but not enough to cover for their contempt of the membership as a whole.

I am tired of being disappointed in DVC. There is no room to recover from the last disappointment before they are at it again. I still enjoy my points, and I just don't look for DVC management to look out for me or my interests. Point Blank they are liars and they play us for stupid.

I have a friend that owns Atlantis Harborside. She is there now. In order to get the days she really wanted, she had to book an entire week, Sunday to Sunday using her booking advantage. She checked in this Tuesday and lost the first 2 nights because of her flights. She could have waited until 7 months to book a lesser vacation, but she waited last year and there was no availability, thus her booking a week to get 5 night strategy this year. Pretty soon DVC will be locking us in like this too.

What finally happened with that? Aren't people supposed to get something?

 

[jdg345]

OK, now that things have started to appear to get clearer as to how some people are able to "game" the system, I'm thinking that the strategy for all future vacations will be to start calling on day one of my new use year and then keep adding and dropping days until I get the ones I really want. Let's see, with a June use year, that means day by day calls for approximately 7 months for a Xmas vacation. Hmmmm.....sounds fun to me, LOL. Banking and borrowing could get complex, but we will work through it, LOL.

Just btw, you can still book at 11 months to the date you want to arrive. You don't need to wait until June to use those points if the vacation/reservation is after June.

 

[jdg345]

Thanks, I thought I was the only one who felt like this. I have a ton of points and always start out with 1K (w/new and banked) every year. I too have been so disappointed with DVC, with the mug-gate, and the fact that everytime I use my account they mess up my point total (3 times over the past 6 months now), and now this. I bought BWV points to use at the 11 month window to get a standard room. If that becomes a problem and I no longer can achieve this during Oct/F&W and early Dec, then there is no reason to hang on to those points. I have a ton of SSR points that I end up banking every year (and that is with 6 weeks of WDW a year). I actually saved up money to buy at least 100 BLT points and the $$ is just sitting in my account waiting for the announcement. I really am having second thoughts at putting any further money into DVC. With the 3k I pay for dues each year....you would think they could at least have a summer party, but that's gone too! What's next?

I actually have 6 trips planned for 2009 and am dreading the call to reserve them starting in September.

1k Points and only 3k Dues? Wow ... How?

 

[jarestel]

I assume "we" means you have a mouse in your pocket? Because I saw posts about "gosh they should've notified us" and "can you clarify this for me?" and " are they or are they not allowing you to book day 8 on day 2?" Not to mention some of the underlying issues seem to be based on misconceptions about how the booking system works and how it impacts how you make reservations. Lots of people will be unnecessarily calling because they don't understand what they do and do not need to do. They just know there's this big panic and think everyone else is going after the same dates as them.

So if you know all the details and know exactly how this will affect everyone, then please share with me because I'm not in your pocket.

I have no mouse in my pocket, let me clear about that, nor am I just happy to see you.

The only real change to anything that didn't exist before is that members may now book up to a 7 day vacation from the check-in date and wait lists have moved to an all-or-nothing status. Nothing else has changed. If it does, you'll see the information on the DVC web-site. Until then, there's not really much of anything that's new.

How this will impact individual members remains to be seen, but the details of the changes are fairly straight forward.

 

[jade1]

Wow, after the last page or so it looks like were over the shock and moved on to anger . Soon will be depression and finally acceptance.

 

[Doctor P]

Just btw, you can still book at 11 months to the date you want to arrive. You don't need to wait until June to use those points if the vacation/reservation is after June.

I was talking about booking SEVENTEEN months in advance. Waiting until the prior use year begins makes the appropriate banking and borrowing possible without losing any points.

 

[snackyx]

Wow, after the last page or so it looks like were over the shock and moved on to anger . Soon will be depression and finally acceptance.

Wow--Elisabeth Kubler-Ross is a DVC member!

 

[mello]

You're not forced to call multiple times now, either. You can still call at 6 months out and book your entire room at once. You can do that at the end of your 11-month window for you checkout day, too. The limit is for booking at the beginning of the window. The same chance of getting a room exists. They could possibly be booked or there might be availability.

Or, you have the OPTION of going through the walking reservation if it truly mattered that much to you.

But to wait and call at the end of my stay while everyone is calling at the beginning of theirs, would virtually guarantee that I will not get a room - especially during the month of December, or at BCV duriing F&W, during the spring break weeks, etc., and also for several different room types in any season, because you're talking about a 10 day disadvantage. And think of the waitlist ramifications for the scenario of calling at the end of your stay. For planners such as most of us here on the Dis are, that is unthinkable!

What we are trying to say here, is that that, under this new system, preference for any reservation is given to those who are arriving earlier, whereas before everyone had exactly the same opportunity to reserve any room. Whether they took the opportunity was up to them.

True, as it stands now, we have the option of "walking" a reservation to get the dates or room types we want, and that is essentially no different than calling day by day currently, so nothing has really been solved, IF they were trying to stop day by day calling, that is.

And to make matters worse, a number of people, who seemingly had no problem with day by day calling, appear to regard "walking" as an abuse to be stopped, so many are calling for additional rules and regulations to be put in place. Such rules were unnecessary before, and they have the potential to hurt many people, not just "commercial renters". (The irony is that such rules wouldn't stop commercial renting anyway, and that whole discussion just opens up a whole different can of worms...)

People who are in favor of these proposed "fixes" to thwart other members from getting an advantage, have been saying essentially, "It doesn't matter to me, I only book 7 day stays during the off season anyway". That may be the case at this point in their lives, but that seems short-sighted to me; circumstances change; they may find themselves wanting or needing to do something different some year. If the proposed rules went into effect (to not allow cancellations or additions without rebooking for instance), nobody will ever be able to book, say a short stay at BCV during F&W, or 10 days spanning Christmas and New Years, or any number of other options that we have had under the old system. And additionally, if you ever needed to adjust your vacation dates for any reason - flight changes, job issues, personal issues, etc., - you would find that you could not.

I just cannot understand why anyone would view that as a good thing?

The thing about the old system is that it didn't seem to require any "fixes" to keep "others" from getting any "advantages".

 

[aurorafan]

I can't believe I'm making my first post on this board in such a heated thread, but here it goes

Does anyone think that any of the higher ups at DVC read these threads? I sure hope they do because I think they would get a good feel for what members think of the new booking rules and maybe see a few things and problems with the new system that maybe got overlooked in the creation of the new booking regulations.

I think if DVC higher-ups are reading this thread what they will see is about 40-50 members (I counted 32 from page 69 backwards through 48) who are firmly against this new policy. And truthfully, although it's an insanely long thread, the *vast* majority of the replies have been from about the same dozen or so people (both for and against). I know there are other Disney boards out there where people are unhappy, but I imagine the numbers are similar to here, so all told you're looking at maybe a couple hundred unhappy members versus 100,000+ who are either blissfully unaware and won't be affected anyway, or who are aware and are happy with the new changes. I think making comments (and I've seen others here as well) that "membership" is unhappy with the new policy is misleading--some are unhappy with it but many many more are happy or don't care .

The majority of DVC members do not read forums like these, so when MS says the change was initiated at membership request they are most likely telling the truth. People complained about having holes in their reservations and wanted a system more like a hotel system and MS listened. The majority of DVC members do not read these forums, and so will not know, or even think about (it certainly never occurred to me until I read it here ) how to "work" the system to their advantage (they didn't know about DBD booking either). The majority of DVC members are good people who will play by the rules (just as they did before), and so in the end it will be a wash--hard to get times and room types will still be hard to get and other times will still not be a problem. There will be those who will take advantage, but that was the case before as well, and will be no matter what system is in place.

For the record--I sent an email saying that while I like the new system I'm appalled at how it was rolled out and with the inconsistent information the CMs have been giving out. Hopefully the dust will settle soon and it will turn out to not be as bad as has been predicted, but then what do I know, I'm an optimist

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

Just a thought ...

DVC says this new ressie format was brought about by member input as stated in several responses from the special CR task force as mentioned in earlier postings. I think that is true.

I was one who was told this when I received a call back and I do think it was true. But if people have difficulty with something then they will complain. If it's working fine your apt to not say anything. Now, the original "complainers" are happy and the others who were happy aren't and are now the ones providing input.

I can't quote my conversation about this part word for word, but the complaint that they indicated they were addressing was the "need" of members to call day by day. I pointed out that there never was a "need" - unless there was some special category or time that you wanted to go. Otherwise you could call on your final check out day and book everything at once if available. My plan for us is that we would typically fall into that category - except early Dec. at VWL or if I wanted to try Concierge at AKV. And those two things were the reason we bought specifically where we did - in order to provide us the best possibility to get those. Now it's back to much more of a crap shoot and I'm not happy.

Disney and DVC aren't going to (and don't) get everything as correct as we like to think they do. If the feedback has all been about making one phone call then that is probably what they were most concentrated on trying to make happen. That's where the feedback now is very important and I don't think there's a need to just go with it and see how it all plays out. If that is done then they'll never know what the problem was when in the future members start selling or stop adding on b/c they can't ever get a booking for that particular time or place that was a factor for their buying.

Anyone who knows me will tell you I am the least hysterical person around. Heck - people get hysterical with me b/c I don't get hysterical! What I have been doing is reading what was provided about the booking change and also what people have experienced while doing it. I have then evaluated those comments and determined where I see problems for myself (and for others in different situations) and expressed that I think the old system was more fair due to the various booking options that DVC does offer to members. With the new system I think it would be more beneficial and less stressful for members if room categories were eliminated and it was just studio/1 bedroom/2bedroom and I would hate to see that happen. And honestly I keep trying to see how this really is much more beneficial for those who booked their whole stay at once. I haven't been able to see that they have gained much, if anything, from it to really stand behind the change. Before, if you booked from check out day you were competing with day by day bookers and those checking out before you do. Now, your competing with those who start their stay before you and those adding on to their 7 day stays or walking their reservations. If you previously called day by day and didn't like it, then you could have stopped and just made one call to take what you could get. Now you can make one phone call and take what hasn't been taken by those checking in before you. And not to leave out that you can then call again to get a longer than 7 day stay if you called for your original check in day.

It's essentially same song, different tune with an important verse left out (day by day to give you equal opportunity with all members).

So, I told DVC that I would like to see them go back to the old system.

Whew - sorry for the length but I was responding to thoughts I had from several posts I read!

 

[jdg345]

I was talking about booking SEVENTEEN months in advance. Waiting until the prior use year begins makes the appropriate banking and borrowing possible without losing any points.

Ohhh! LOL !

That just means I'll need to book EIGHTEEN months ahead of you!

btw, Glad you made it to this thread.