Room Block question thread- Post your questions here!

[lurkyloo]

You can set up the dates any way you want. Usually they block it so that the period starts a few days before the wedding day and ends a few days after. We extended ours by almost 2 weeks after the wedding day so that we could get the discount at one of the places we wanted to stay on our honeymoon.

Just have them make it as long as it needs to be to include the dates you want.

 

[GreenDisneyBride]

You can set up the dates any way you want. Usually they block it so that the period starts a few days before the wedding day and ends a few days after. We extended ours by almost 2 weeks after the wedding day so that we could get the discount at one of the places we wanted to stay on our honeymoon.

Just have them make it as long as it needs to be to include the dates you want.

So in order to extend it, I just need to have 1 day on each night either before or after?

 

[lurkyloo]

If that's what you need, then yes. If you need the Wednesday before your wedding to count, have the block start on that Wednesday or Tuesday—it's all up to you!

 

[KMS'sGlassSlipper]

Believe me, the room block was the scariest thing to me and my parents. I put what nights I needed (I was staying Thurs-Mon for my Saturday wedding), and then I predominantly put room nights on Friday and Saturday (because I live within driving distance, I knew these would be the most popular nights for my guests).

With that being said - Disney told me that as long as there is availability, the guests would get the nights at the discounted rate no matter if I had reserved these nights on my room block or not. The nights that you put in there are simply the number of nights that they guarantee will be there for your guests.

So say that third cousin twice removed decided the week before my wedding that she wanted to come. (This is purely hypothetical... I promise!) If she called the wedding reservations, and needed a room for my wedding, and the hotel still had availability, she could still get the discounted rate.

I just want to put some people's minds at ease that the number of nights and what nights aren't a huge deal. Just remind your guests to book in advance... and everything should work out!!

 

[princesswendy720]

Ok so I understand most of the room block, but there's something I can't wrap my brain around. Say I block 10 nights at pop, and someone books 2 nights at pop with another discount via another method. I know I can manually add this so it will count towards my room night minimum and my free room night, but does it fill the rooms that I've blocked? So then 8 room nights would be open to our guests? I'm concerned about having extra rooms left in the block that we will have to pay for. Also, if they book at a resort where we don't have a block, I'm assuming it will count toward the minimum requirement and free night but will NOT affect the rooms we've blocked elsewhere (therefore leaving us susceptible to having too many rooms that won't get filled). Is this correct?

 

[Firefly09]

If someone books a room outside your room block (like with a general public discount) and you add it to your room block, it counts towards your minimum for your free night as well as the requirement for your room block. But it does not take away from the number of room nights you have blocked for your guests. Same for booking at resorts outside your block.

 

[lurkyloo]

Exactly—you don't have to worry about having "empty" room nights if people book at Disney but not through your wedding block. In your scenario, if 2 nights were booked at Pop NOT through the block, you would still have 10 nights available at Pop in your block, not 8. But their nights still count toward your minimum, so now (pretending 10 is your total room-night guarantee) you only need to fill 8 more nights.

Really, it doesn't matter if NOBODY books a single one of the nights you have set aside in your block. As long as what they do book is at a Disney resort and is enough nights to fulfill to your requirement.

 

[PinkSleepingBeauty]

Hi, I'm sorry if this has already been asked but I wonder if you could clear this up for me please. I'm sure I read somewhere that you only have to guarantee 80% of the room block? Was I dreaming or am I right? we have 10 nights blocked, so we only need to guarantee 8 rooms? The reason I ask is we've had a two people drop out who were going to use a couple of nights from the room block. I swear this room block is thing that is causing me the most worry about our wedding! Thanks for your help.

Edit: Ok just read Lurkyloo's post above and I think that has just answered my question! That will teach me to read things properly before post a question!

 

[princesswendy720]

Exactly—you don't have to worry about having "empty" room nights if people book at Disney but not through your wedding block. In your scenario, if 2 nights were booked at Pop NOT through the block, you would still have 10 nights available at Pop in your block, not 8. But their nights still count toward your minimum, so now (pretending 10 is your total room-night guarantee) you only need to fill 8 more nights.

Really, it doesn't matter if NOBODY books a single one of the nights you have set aside in your block. As long as what they do book is at a Disney resort and is enough nights to fulfill to your requirement.

But what if, for some reason, all (or most) of our guests don't book through our room block and we have a ton of hotel rooms open in the block. Doesn't Disney charge you if you don't fill a certain % of those blocked rooms? Because they were holding them for you instead of selling them to the public? I know you can reduce the number of rooms in your block at a certain date, but how many can you get rid of?

 

[lurkyloo]

Hi, I'm sorry if this has already been asked but I wonder if you could clear this up for me please. I'm sure I read somewhere that you only have to guarantee 80% of the room block? Was I dreaming or am I right? we have 10 nights blocked, so we only need to guarantee 8 rooms? The reason I ask is we've had a two people drop out who were going to use a couple of nights from the room block. I swear this room block is thing that is causing me the most worry about our wedding! Thanks for your help.

The thing is, that extra 20% has to be built into your block. For example, if your contract says you have to fill 10 room nights, you are allowed to block up to 20% more (in this case, 12 nights) but only have to fill the original 10. So it isn't that you only have to fill 80% of the contract number, it's more like you have a buffer of 20% of extra rooms you can set aside without penalty.

In your case, I am thinking that your contract probably states you must fill 10 room nights. Definitely talk to your sales consultant about this so you don't have to worry about it—maybe they can reduce your guarantee.

But what if, for some reason, all (or most) of our guests don't book through our room block and we have a ton of hotel rooms open in the block. Doesn't Disney charge you if you don't fill a certain % of those blocked rooms?

At your cut-off date you can release the rooms that no one has booked, so Disney doesn't lose out on filling those rooms. For example, we had to guarantee 25 nights, and 6 of them were at BoardWalk Inn. None of our guests booked at BoardWalk Inn, but we weren't penalized. They just stopped holding the rooms after the cut-off date. Your sales consultant should be keeping you in the loop about all this so that it's not a huge surprise at your cut-off date.

 

[One_Song]

For some reason, I was under the impression that ALL of our on-site guests (even those not staying at a resort in our block) should call the special wedding reservations number. Somehow, I got it in my head that Disney would still document all guests' reservations, so we would know where our guests are-- I was mainly thinking about welcome bags and such. This morning the weddings line told my FBIL that they can only take reservations for the blocked resorts, and he had to call regular vacations booking. Also, after flipping through this thread, surely they can still call if it's possible to get a discount at all the hotels? I'm totally confused. Any pointers?

 

[MissManners]

Also, after flipping through this thread, surely they can still call if it's possible to get a discount at all the hotels? I'm totally confused. Any pointers?

We were told by our planner that the discount only applies to the resorts that you have blocked rooms in. We blocked at Grand Floridian, Boardwalk, and Coronado Springs. So if we have a guest who wants to stay at Port Orleans, they can, but they will not receive a discount on their room. Their reservation however will still count towards the total number of rooms that we are required to fill for our block. Hope this helps!

 

[lurkyloo]

For some reason, I was under the impression that ALL of our on-site guests (even those not staying at a resort in our block) should call the special wedding reservations number. Somehow, I got it in my head that Disney would still document all guests' reservations, so we would know where our guests are-- I was mainly thinking about welcome bags and such. This morning the weddings line told my FBIL that they can only take reservations for the blocked resorts, and he had to call regular vacations booking. Also, after flipping through this thread, surely they can still call if it's possible to get a discount at all the hotels? I'm totally confused. Any pointers?

What MissManners said! The discounts are only available at your blocked hotels OR if one of your blocked hotels fills up, Disney will give the discount at a comparable hotel. You are correct, though, that you should give Disney the reservation numbers of all your guests no matter where on property they are staying so that their reservations count toward your guarantee.

 

[PinkSleepingBeauty]

The thing is, that extra 20% has to be built into your block. For example, if your contract says you have to fill 10 room nights, you are allowed to block up to 20% more (in this case, 12 nights) but only have to fill the original 10. So it isn't that you only have to fill 80% of the contract number, it's more like you have a buffer of 20% of extra rooms you can set aside without penalty.

In your case, I am thinking that your contract probably states you must fill 10 room nights. Definitely talk to your sales consultant about this so you don't have to worry about it—maybe they can reduce your guarantee.

Thanks for your advice, really appreciate it. We've been given an official contact for the room block now so I'm guessing she would be the best for me to speak to rather than our planner? I swear this room block worries the heck out of me and we only have 10 rooms blocked! Can't imagine the stress of 25 nights!!!!! I'm just worried about getting charged if we don't fill the rooms

 

[DoomBuggy0922]

I think I need to stop reading this thread--- it's starting to stress me out!

Our wedding is January 6th, and we've blocked rooms from January 4th-8th or something like that. We're going to be honeymooning from January 7th-15th. (One of those nights will be our free room, the other 7 nights will be at a DVC resort). These rooms will still count towards our room block, correct? Even though they're not included in the dates of our blocked nights?

 

[lurkyloo]

We've been given an official contact for the room block now so I'm guessing she would be the best for me to speak to rather than our planner?

You could speak to her, but your sales consultant (not your planner) is the one who deals with everything contract-related, so s/he is also the one who can reduce your guarantee.

I think I need to stop reading this thread--- it's starting to stress me out!

Our wedding is January 6th, and we've blocked rooms from January 4th-8th or something like that. We're going to be honeymooning from January 7th-15th. (One of those nights will be our free room, the other 7 nights will be at a DVC resort). These rooms will still count towards our room block, correct? Even though they're not included in the dates of our blocked nights?

Yes, they will count toward your room-night guarantee even though they are not in your block.

 

[SheilaHeartsDisney]

We just recieved out room block info. So let me see if I get this straight. We have to book 25 room nights in order to get the free room. So as of right now we have 25 room nights in DVC rooms. I am going to have a room block set up for those that don't have DVC and only do 25 nights but if for some reason nobody books the rooms at the hotels with the room block I won't have to pay for those rooms becuase the DVC rooms took care of the 25 room nights Right???? Also the free room...Do you have to get the free room for the night of the wedding or can it be say the last night of your trip??

 

[lurkyloo]

Correct—if you are already staying 25 nights in DVC accommodations, you just need to tell your sales consultant or room block contact to add them to your account so that DFTW knows you've fulfilled your obligation. Be sure that you've discussed this with your sales consultant, though, because if you block 25 additional rooms and don't fill any of them, there could be a penalty (because you've set them aside so Disney can't sell them to others). You might be safer skipping the extra rooms altogether or just blocking a few extra nights in case your guests need them. You can block about 20% more rooms than your requirement and not be penalized if they don't fill. Your sales consultant will work with you to configure the block in a way that works for you.

As for the free night, you can take it any time during your trip. We took ours on the last night of the trip because we didn't want to have to be changing rooms on the wedding day.

 

[super_k0116]

The room block discount/wedding hotline...can this be booked with park tickets and dining plan? Or if a guest wants to book these items they have to call the main disney booking line and they can't get the room discount? I'm a little fuzzy on this and I don't want to tell my guests the wrong thing.

Seems kind of silly if they can't book a dining plan and park tickets with their discounted room...

 

[foolinthemoon]

Ok! This room block thing has confused the ever loving crud out of me, so let's see if I've got this right...

I'm having a wishes wedding, my planner will give me a list of resorts to chose from. I can chose three different resorts for my guest to stay at. I can have 5 rooms at each hotel (5x3=15) for two nights each (15x2=30) which more than meets my minimum. I technically only have to fill 80% of what I promised and I can change anything as little as 90 days out if I have any cancellations??

*sigh* it's like reading stereo instructions... Lol