One more newbie UY vs reservations question

[drdelsol]

I just sent back my papers today for our first DVC points at AKL. I picked up on a cruise and we have a June use year. So here are my kind of stupid and I'm sure asked before question- booking 11 months out when it's another use year.
My points come up in June so I believe I have to decide to bank by end Of January. If I want the February 11 month window for a Christmas holiday trip,
am I needing to decide how many points I will need in January and have those already banked to use for the February reservation or can you book in anticipation of the next use year points coming up? I understand the expriation of the points, just a little confused on how you use the points booking versus use year. I am so used to thinking January through December that the June use year is throwing me off.

Thanks and also thanks, reading the boards helped me to decide AKL over saratoga and I feel it was a better fit for us.

 

[LisaS]

First of all, welcome home!!

It helps to think of your points like this:

Your 2007 points are valid for stays from 6/1/07 through 5/31/08
Your 2008 points are valid for stays from 6/1/08 through 5/31/09
Your 2009 points are valid for stays from 6/1/09 through 5/31/10
and so on

If you want to book a stay for late Dec '08 into early Jan '09, you can book that trip in early Feb '08, 11 months prior to your check out date. (Actually you can start calling day by day in late Jan '08. More on that later.) Your 2008 points are valid for that stay. You can also use 2007 points for that stay provided that you bank them into your 2008 UY before you make the reservation. As you said, your banking deadline is Jan 31, 2008 so if you want to use 2007 points for the trip you must bank them no later than 1/31/08. So you will be in your 2007 UY when you make the call, but since the trip takes place in your 2008 UY you need 2008 points (or banked 2007 points or borrowed 2009 points) for the trip. You must have enough points in the same UY as your trip dates to pay for the trip at the time you make the reservation.

I've read here that New Year's Eve is the hardest date to book so you should consider booking this stay day by day rather than waiting until 11 months prior to your real check out date. When booking day by day, you make your first call 11 months prior to the check out date for the first night of your stay. You tell the MS CM that you are starting a day by day reservation and he/she will note your real check out date. You call back again the next day and tell the MS CM you want to modify a day by day reservation, to extend the reservation by one more night. You do this every day until the reservation is complete. MS is closed on Sunday so you would call on Monday and add 2 nights to the reservation. When all nights are booked, MS releases your confirmation letter.

If you decide to book the trip day by day, you would be making your first call some time in late January. You could bank your points during that same call (prior to booking the first night of your stay) if you had not banked them previously.

Hope that helps!

 

[drdelsol]

Thanks, thats was very helpful.