RCI Booking Window at BLT

[Chic]

Does anyone know how far in advance RCI members can make reservations for Bay Lake Tower? A friend of mine claims she is about to book a July 2010 stay there and it's not too early to do so? That's more than 8 months out.

 

[DisneyWalker44]

RCI will sometimes have BLT inventory more than 7 months out. This only happens when a BLT owner (and that includes Disney) turns points over to them. Think of RCI as a glorified version of a rent/trade board. You'll find BLT inventory on them more than 7 months out too.

 

[1153rsmith]

You can currently book on RCI through about the end of August. (date changes daily) However, it seems the RCI inventory fluctuates rapidly. When we were booking for May, in the space of 2 hours, I saw 3 rooms at AKV pop up, then disappear, then 3 more pop up.

I was told by a consultant at RCI, if you find something you think you like, you better snag it. you have like 24 hours or so to cancel and get a full refund if you decide you don't want it.

 

[Chic]

Update-My friend who was going to book BLT for this coming July 2010 called yesterday and was told that there are no RCI rooms available at all in any of the Disney resorts. Looks like it DOES pay to be a DVC member!

 

[Dean]

I just exchanged my strongest trader and what I have left is unlikely to see BLT. Prior to that I had seen NO BLT for exchange but had seen plenty of rentals. I have also seen none on RCI points but haven't looked as much lately compared to what I usually do. It took a while for AKV to show up after that resort opened. Most inventory has seemed available at the 11 month mark for RCI weeks and 10 months out for RCI points, there has been some but seemingly not as much, at the 7 month out time. Any additional inventory available at 7 months out is likely to be lessor resorts like OKW, SSR, VB and HH. Some may remember that there was a period of time when you could only exchange your home resort.

 

[Purseval]

I just exchanged my strongest trader and what I have left is unlikely to see BLT. Prior to that I had seen NO BLT for exchange but had seen plenty of rentals.

Isn't RCI getting sued over renting prime times/resorts instead of letting people exchange for them?

 

[Dean]

Isn't RCI getting sued over renting prime times/resorts instead of letting people exchange for them?

Not exactly as stated. There is a class action law suit that is coming to a close that alleges they rented high demand units that were deposited and should have been available for exchange. RCI has several groups of weeks they rent. They have units that they get on consignment, they have weeks they purchase specifically to rent out, they have developer weeks that are specifically to rent out, they have weeks secured with RCI points used for cash options (similar to using DVC points for DCL). The accusation though is that they specifically rented weeks outside these legitimate groups of rentals, ones that should have been available for exchange and were not. One thing to realize is that neither RCI (nor II before them) are first in/first out. One must qualify for a given exchange AND request it for it to be exchanged to someone. They may have exactly what YOU want but if you don't have the trade power, you will not get it and if it goes unclaimed by someone with sufficient trade power, it will end up as a rental.

I'm figuring DVC is watching this issue closely and I'd hope they would have built in safeguards to their contract about such matters given it was a known issue when they signed up with RCI. As such DVC going to RCI was likely a help for all RCI members, even those that have no interest in trading to DVC. Still, like DVC, you never know what goes on behind closed doors.

 

[bwvBound]

Update-My friend who was going to book BLT for this coming July 2010 called yesterday and was told that there are no RCI rooms available at all in any of the Disney resorts. Looks like it DOES pay to be a DVC member!

The answer given your friend depends much on the trade strength of their available week to trade. There are DVC weeks out there ... but perhaps not for your friend's travel dates or w/in reach of their intended exchange week.

FWIW, my strongest trader sees a variety of units (studio, 1BR and 2BR) at AKV, BWV, OKW and SSR with dates out through Aug/Sept 2010. (These spotted through RCI Weeks as exchange options; not RCI Points and not rentals.)