Question about use year

[CBtoDisney]

Hi everyone, hoping some of you could take a minute and help clarify something for me - 2 years ago my wife and I purchased 160 pts @ AK resale and we love it! Addonitis has struck and we have been patiently waiting for something we liked..... and waiting..... and waiting.....finally found 200 pts SSR , 67 pp 200 pts currently available (current points were very important to us) and 200 coming in 2014. Here is the thing, it is December use year. We have been constantly advised that we should look for a contract with our existing use year which is February , but the only benefit I can see if the ability to combine the contracts and only give the 1 account # when booking..... am I missing something?

We take our annual trip in early January every year for 2 weeks . could some, of the vets weigh in here and tell me why same use year was being so heavily advised to me?

Thanks in advance

CMac

 

[Sur]

When booking online, there is a drop down menu with your different contract(s), if you have more than one. It's relatively simple to book this way. You choose the contract from which you are booking, it tells you your 11 month and 7 month booking window (based on that contracts UY) and you book accordingly.

Combining points (at 7 monts) is the benefit I see from same UY, no transferring points. That way you can use those points for one continuous stay, rather than book that same stay with each contract separately, then linking the reservations. This can cause a few "stray" points here and there, if you aren't careful with booking.

Keep in mind, you can also use "one time use points" to help out the stray point problem I mentioned. Purchase up to 24 points to complete a reservation, this way there are no stray points left on your contracts, but this can only be done at the 7 month mark, and through member services.

An advantage to different UYs is if you travel during two opposite times of year and have potential of cancelling (Spring and Fall)... the points don't go into holding if you have to cancel using the correct contract. I hope this makes sense, it's hard to explain without rambling.

 

[CBtoDisney]

Thanks Sur,

So it basically sounds to me like you agree that it is not that big of a deal to have separate use year's then, as long as you don't mind the separate contract #'s and can keep track of your "strays" as you call them. And like I say we almost always only go in January....