Parking at DL Hotel Villas

[iheartglaciers]

I'm visiting DL next month with friends and some of them are staying offsite and some are staying with me at the DL villas. The offsite friends are going to keep our shared rental car to drive to/from the parks. How does it work if I want them to be able to park at the hotel under our room since we get included parking? (room is booked on points). I'm guessing someone on the DL hotel reservation needs to be in the car when they enter the parking lot, or can we just give them a room key? (assuming Magic Bands don't work for this!)

 

[DonMacGregor]

VDH gives you a placard to place on your dashboard, showing the name of the party and the check in date. They will pull a ticket for you to enter the gate, but you don't need to keep the ticket, just keep the placard on your dash and they will give you in and out benefits. They do not use room keys or Magic Bands for VDH parking.

 

[Sunnyore]

What Don said is my experience too, but I did run into a small issue this last trip. Most of the time they just wave me through especially when they see the placard. One time though the CM at the gate asked for my room number and name and looked up my info. He then said I needed to go to the front desk to have them add complimentary parking to my reservation. I told him I had assumed they knew I was parking if they had a placard ready for me, but he said that placard was just a nice gesture to welcome us to the hotel. I stayed at VDH 4 times so far and not once did the front desk ask me about parking and I am almost afraid to ask because I know a few people ended up getting charged for parking. I will say 95% of the time I had no issue entering and exiting the lot with the placard alone.

 

[DonMacGregor]

I stayed at VDH 4 times so far and not once did the front desk ask me about parking and I am almost afraid to ask because I know a few people ended up getting charged for parking. I will say 95% of the time I had no issue entering and exiting the lot with the placard alone.

We've stayed twice since the new tower opened, and neither time did we go to the front desk, and neither time were we charged. We WERE told specifically to leave the placard on the dash, so it definitely wasn't just some nice "gesture". Being a local, I've stayed/visited the hotels dozens if not hundreds of times for staycations, dining, conferences, you name it, and the process was always the same and entirely unlike on the DVC reservations.