Question for AP experts

[bornwiththeears]

We already have our reservations at the BWI for Thanksgiving. If we have an AP will they convert those rates (value season plus 50.oo per night for two children over 17) to the AP price?

 

[disneydill]

bornwiththeears,

It has been my experience that they apply the AP rate to your existing ressie as long as it falls within the dates of the AP rate discounts.

Good luck!

 

[GoldenOldie]

Just because you have an AP does not mean that your existing rate will automatically change to an AP rate. You must call WDTC/CRO and see if there are rooms available at your resort for your dates at the AP rate. If there are, you can request that they change your reservation. They do not do this unless you call and ask for it.

 

[disneydill]

bornwiththeears,

That's right - I figured you realized that they didn't "automatically" do it. You do have to call and ask...

 

[bornwiththeears]

thanks to both of you. I knew I would have to call - I just wanted to know if they could be changed.

 

[yyum168]

If somebody can shed some light in regard to my situation, I really appreciate it...
I have a ressie end of Oct to beginning of Nov. I called at 7 am this morning to ask to have AP rate applied on my ressie. I was told not all the days are available for AP rate, enen though it is within AP period and value season too, therefore they cannot apply AP rate on my existing ressie ?! I got a clear impression that what I am holding doesn't matter unless the system has a dulpicate AP opening. In other words they don't want to apply automatically even I asked. I thought it does not work this way. I am totally perplexed ! Of course they are staring at my ressie on the screen, may be this is a way for them to see if I would pay rack afterall. I really don't know.
And another unpleasant thing I found out is that if you book your ressie online using the system instead of calling, NO DISCOUNT CAN BE APPLIED on it. I would have to cancel the online booking and re-book in order to get the whatever discount available for the same period of time. WHY ?!

Thanks in advance !

 

[dznyntnh]

yyum168--

When they release AP rates or any other type of discount program (AP, DC, AAA) there are a limited number of rooms available at that rate.

When they release AP rates they only release a percentage of the available inventory at the discount to try to fill up rooms that would otherwise be empty.

To apply the AP rate to your current reservation, there would have to be availablity under for that rate at your chosen hotel for those days.

Just because they release some AP rates for certain days does not mean they will automatically give you the rate just because you have an AP.

Call back and see if there are days within your stay that offer the rate, you may have to cancel you res and create several new ones if the rate is not available for everyday.

Or see about switching to another hotel that may have availability for all of the days you are looking for.

Remember, the more people that book rooms expecting the AP rates, the fewer rooms that may be released to that rate, because Disney is already seeing those rooms as full.

 

[yyum168]

Thanks Dznyntnh,

Honestly, I got the impression all this time is you made the ressie first and when it comes out you just call and apply. The fact that I called at 7, and talked to somebody right away, I was surprised it did not work for me.
Anyhow, within that first hour I attempted to shorten the stay to 6 nights, and was already told POR is totally unavailable, AKL will only offer pool V and above, CBR has only King room available. My booking is at CSR which they can't apply the AP. (Sigh !) So it is not likely I can go back this Fall.
But, I am very happy for all others who got what they want and I am sure everybody will have a terrific time!

 

[disneydill]

yyum168 -
I would call back and see if someone can help you or at least explain it to you. I have been told by CMs that it is more difficult to apply an AP rate to an already existing "package" ressie. Maybe that is the problem? But there is no "guarantee" (as others are pointing out) that AP rate rooms are available.

I would try again though. Sometimes things are not explained very clearly and they were so crazy this morning. You might be able to get an AP rate for at least part of your stay. I noticed that others were having difficulties getting their whole stay under an AP rate.

Good luck.

 

[disneydill]

OOPS, sorry yyum168 - we must have been posting at the same time! Sorry it didn't work out for you!

 

[bornwiththeears]

The AP rate did not work out for me either. When I called about having an AP rate applied to existing reservations (made online) the first CM told me that there were only rooms availabe during half of my stay. I asked if I could have the rate applied to those days and she said no - it would have to be two sets of reservations and we would have to move to another room in the middle of our stay. She was very nice but not helpful. I called back again and talked to another CM who told me there were no rooms available at the BWI on any of the days of our stay.

I remembered an earlier post about using AAA discounts. I joined AAA, called reservations, and had the discount applied. The CM was very helpful...I had to make new reservations and then he cancelled the original ones. A little bit of work but it did save around $50 per night.

 

[Jennifer Stork]

I was reading your post . I had a reservation at POR 11/9-11/16 with the Dis club and wanted to switch to the AP rate. The CRO Ispoke with said that would not be a problem and redid the ressies to show the AP rate even with 3 rooms. I think it may depend on who you talk to as to what you get. I would keep trying.

 

[hulabird]

I think its kind of obvious that the FTP filled up quite a bit of the rooms and they would normally have had more AP rooms available had they not had that good of a package deal. In the past I have always booked my room about 8 months out at rack and then applied the AP to my existing ressie with no problem. The FTP kinda sucked the well dry for AP holders. I think it's kinda like being given the left overs. and a luck of the draw. I am not going back to the world until next summer, but I will be watching everything with bated breath as my time approaches.

 

[DisneyGina]

Those of you who want ap rates for the first two weeks of october may have difficulty with the ap rates because rooms where filling up rather nicely for some of the hotels way before ap rates were announced. I know, I was paying rack rate at the Contemporary and I watched for a good month and they had no rooms available, so naturally there would be no ap rates or at least extremely limited ap rates offer to a few rooms. Remember, even though people like to think disney is giving ap rates out of the kindess of their heart unfortunately that is not the case. They do it to fill up those rooms that are sitting empty.

It also, may have to do with the fact that October 8th to October 10th. Disney is hosting a major media blitz in Epcot center for their new space mission ride. Epcot is even closing at 3pm on one of those days. Those reporters have to sleep somewhere

Gina

 

[dznyntnh]

Originally posted by Jennifer Stork
I was reading your post . I had a reservation at POR 11/9-11/16 with the Dis club and wanted to switch to the AP rate. The CRO Ispoke with said that would not be a problem and redid the ressies to show the AP rate even with 3 rooms. I think it may depend on who you talk to as to what you get. I would keep trying.

A lot will depend on how you booked your original reservation. If it was room only or a room only 'package', was it CRP or WDTC or online.

Some CMs may also take the time to explain they are changing the reservation, others may just do it.

When I changed my room only reservation, which I booked through DC (thus it shows as a package) to FTP I kept the same rez number but everything else changed.

Like everyone keeps saying, if you are looking for the AP rates, keep calling. I'm sure a lot of people canceled or changed reservations yesterday when they released rooms booked for moderates (and moved to deluxes) or were holding multiple reservations.

You might have better luck now that the initial 'shakedown' is over.

 

[GoldenOldie]

Originally posted by yyum168
...I have a ressie end of Oct to beginning of Nov. I called at 7 am this morning to ask to have AP rate applied on my ressie. I was told not all the days are available for AP rate, enen though it is within AP period and value season too, therefore they cannot apply AP rate on my existing ressie ?! I got a clear impression that what I am holding doesn't matter unless the system has a dulpicate AP opening. In other words they don't want to apply automatically even I asked. I thought it does not work this way...
In order for the discount (any discount, not just AP) to be available, there has to be rooms available at the discounted price for the dates you need. Just because AP discounts are offered for your time frame, it doesn't mean that there are necessarily rooms available at the discount price. They are capacity controlled.

For Monday of your week, they may have 100 rooms available. For Tuesday, 50. For Wednesday and Thursday, 20 each For Friday and Saturday, none. When this happens, you cannot get the discount applied to your entire existing reservation. What you can do is split up the reservation to get the AP rate on the days it is available on one ressie and the other days on another. The down side to this is that you will have to put another room deposit on the second reservation. But you can keep calling back to see if the nights you couldn't get at a discount before become available. When they do, you can add them to the AP reservation and cancel them off the second one.


And another unpleasant thing I found out is that if you book your ressie online using the system instead of calling, NO DISCOUNT CAN BE APPLIED on it. I would have to cancel the online booking and re-book in order to get the whatever discount available for the same period of time. WHY ?!
Because the online reservation is through WDTC and the AP reservation is through CRO. They are two separate computer reservation systems. The CM does not have a choice of which one to use when booking your AP rooms. It has to be through CRO. That means that your original online ressie through WDTC needs to be cancelled. They will refund the deposit you put on it. You just go ahead and make a new reservation through CRO and put down the one night's deposit. This is done all the time.