Reserving Rooms prior to Codes?

[GoofyJim]

I know a common strategy used is for people to reserve a room for their desired dates at rack rate and then call when codes are available and adjust the room to the lower rate using a code. My question is does this really help getting the code rate?

My thoughts are Disney has a finite number of rooms offered at the code rate so it shouldn't matter if a caller is reserving a room for the first time or a guest is changing their reservations the first callers will get this rate thus the people with previous registrations really have no benefit.

I agree that it does secure a room but if you have flexibility with your dates or are travelling at a time period that never sells out this really shouldn't be a factor.

Am I missing something. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated. Have a great day!

 

[Kallison]

We reserved our room in August because we definitely wanted two rooms at the Beach Club. When AP's or codes come out or if they come out -- our Dreams Unlimited agent will automatically make the price adjustment. If the desired codes do not come out, we will live with the AAA rate we currently have. This way we are assured of getting our first choice of a resort. I think it is hard to gauge which resorts which will sell out and when. It is not only determined by the busy time of years, you have conventions, foreign visitors with different vacation schedules, other parts of the countries with different school schedules etc. I don't want to have to worry about my choice of resort being gone. Yes if you make the ressies and don't realize a code is out you will miss out, however that doesn't happen to the obsessive compulsive Disney planners on the board. It does happen to your average Joe clueless about Disney person. It happened to us on our first trip, paid rack rate for three rooms at Port Orleans through a travel agency, I had no idea about codes etc.

 

[CarolMN]

As you posted, booking a room at rack rate (or with the DC/AAA discount) doesn't help to get a code rate later. If enough people do that, the number of code rate rooms will probably be significantly decreased - why would Disney offer more discounts if the rooms are filling at rack rate?

I think most people who book early at rack rate are willing to pay that rate if necessary. They want to guarantee themselves a place to stay at a particular resort for their specific dates. If a discount comes along, great. If not, well, they'll still be where they want to be, when they want to be there!

I do worry a bit when I read that people book at rack rate with no intentions of paying that rate - they intend to catch a code discount later or they will cancel the reservation. That is counter-productive and as mentioned above, may result in less or no code discounts. So I don't know why they do it - maybe they just get caught up in all the fun of planning!

JMHO. YMMV.

 

[Tink]

I booked my room last night for two reasons:

1. The airfare had gone down (we are paying 155.oo on American from NY, also Delta had dropped their rates also.) I hate to have plane tickets and not know if I can get a hotel room for the same dates.

2. Since we stay at moderates, I was a little nervous about getting a room since POFQ (where we normally stay) and sections of POR would be down for rehabs. We did not want to stay at CSR.

If those were not factors, we would have waited for a code to come out, and booked then. Actually, that is what I was waiting to do. But this is the cheapest airfare I have gotten in years. We need to book with a little lead time, since we use Frequent Flier miles. Sometimes they don't have available seats.