Use year

[Tdisney]

What is the big deal about use years as long as all he contracts are the same use year. Does it give you a better chance at reservations if you have a certain use year. Im on the waiting list for BCV thru TSS and didnt specify use year. Should I Have?

Less then two weeks to the Yacht club.

 

[tmt martins]

The biggest thing of USE YEAR is when you get to banking deadlines.

I do my big Vacation in JUne and have a June UY so thats fine If I have to cancel I have plenty of time to bank my points or reschedual another trip.
Now say I had a AUG UY and cancled I would only have so many weeks to unload or lose those points.

 

[CarolMN]

If you're up for a bit of a read/tutorial, here's some help for -

Understanding Use Year -

Use year is the month your points are renewed each year. You have one year to use the points before they expire (unless you bank them).

Use year determines your banking deadlines, but it has nothing to do with when you can make a reservation. You can always call 11 months prior to check out for a reservation at your home resort and 7 months prior to check out if you want to reserve something at a non-home resort.

Let's say you get October for your use year. Let's say you decide to buy 200 points.

On October 1, 2006 you would get 200 points to use for stays between 10/1/2006 and 9/30/2007. Those would be considered your current use year points for the 2006 use year and any stays that occur during that time period. (If you buy now from Disney and get an October use year, you also get 2005 use year points with your purchase).

If you don't plan a trip before 9/30/2007, you'll want to bank your 2006 points so that they do not expire. As long as you call before the end of March 2007 (the 100% banking deadline), you can bank all 200 points. If you wait until the end of June 2007 (the 50% deadline), you can only bank 100 points. If you wait until the end of July 2007 (25% deadline), you can only bank 50 points. You may not bank at all in August and September if you have an October use year.

Your 2005 use year points are good for stays between 10/1/2005 and 9/30/2006.
Your 2006 use year points are good for stays between 10/1/2006 and 9/30/2007.
Your 2007 use year points are good for stays between 10/1/2007 and 9/30/2008.
Your 2008 use year points are good for stays between 10/1/2008 and 9/30/2009.
etc.

You may bank points one use year ahead and borrow from one use year ahead.

Let's say you want to stay in May of 2008 and your stay will cost 500 points. May, 2008 falls within your 2007 use year. For that reservation, you may use current use year points from the 2007 use year, any banked points originally from your 2006 use year and you may borrow points from your 2008 use year.

Banking and borrowing are final transactions. If you cancel a reservation made with banked or borrowed points, they cannot be returned to their original use year. So they would expire at the end of the current use year unless they were used before then. You may not bank or borrow the same points more than once.


Let's say you have to cancel that May, 2008 vacation. You call to cancel it in March, 2008. To make that reservation, you used 200 current use year points, 200 banked points (from 2006) and borrowed 100 points from 2008.

After you cancel, you would have 300 points to use or lose before the end of your current use year (9/30/2008) - the 200 that were banked and the 100 that were borrowed.

If you called before the end of March, 2008, you could bank all 200 of your 2007 use year points. Now those points are good for stays between 10/1/2008 and 9/30/2009. They expire on 9/30/2009 if not used before then - you cannot bank the same points more than once.

ADVICE: If you travel about the same time of the year on a regular basis, it's best to choose a use year that falls no more than 4 or 5 months prior to that time.

Use year only matters if you have to cancel a vacation that was scheduled to occur late in your use year - because banking is limited late in the use year and you wouldn't have much time to reschedule before the points expire). Many owners never have to cancel a vacation (lucky them, LOL) so they don't worry about use year. Remember, use year has nothing to do with when you may call to make a reservation.

Keep in mind that your travel pattern may change over the course of your ownership. What starts out as a "perfect" use year may end up to be not so perfect.

Hope all that helps you understand how use year works.

Best wishes -

 

[Lisa0503]

Thanks for that wonderful explanation!!! I have been trying to figure out use year and that post answered all my questions!!!! (It also helped that I have an October use year)

 

[Tdisney]

Thanks carol for that explanation. One more question. Is cancelling and moving your vacation time the same thing as far as points go. Would you still loose the banked and borrowed points if you decided to move your reservation but not cancel it.


Thanks

 

[CarolMN]

Thanks carol for that explanation. One more question. Is cancelling and moving your vacation time the same thing as far as points go. Would you still loose the banked and borrowed points if you decided to move your reservation but not cancel it.


Thanks

You don't lose the points as long as the "new" vacation occurs within the same use year as the cancelled vacation.

When you cancel a vacation, the points go back into your account with the same status they had just before you made the original reservation.

So if you used banked points, the points are returned to your account in the banked status and can be used until the end of the current use year to reserve something else.

If you used current use year points, the points are returned as current use year points and can be used for a stay in the current use year or they can be banked (if you are still within banking deadlines).

If you used borrowed points, they are returned with a status of "borrowed" and expire at the end of the current use year if not used for a stay before then.

Points that are borrowed or banked cannot be returned to their orignal use year and they expire if not used before the end of the year into which they were banked or borrowed.

Best wishes -

 

[ttepsich]

CarolMN
Great explanations of use year. But if I may indulge you a little more.....we are looking to purchase DVC, we almost always travel to Disney over Thanksgiving, once the week before Christmas (which was really nice too) and a couple of times in October. What do you think the very BEST use year would be for us. (We usually go every other year.) Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

 

[CarolMN]

CarolMN
Great explanations of use year. But if I may indulge you a little more.....we are looking to purchase DVC, we almost always travel to Disney over Thanksgiving, once the week before Christmas (which was really nice too) and a couple of times in October. What do you think the very BEST use year would be for us. (We usually go every other year.) Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

For the vacation times you list, August, September or October would all work well for you.

Best wishes -

 

[Caskbill]

Use year is only relevant in the event you may need to cancel a reservation. In such case you want to still be in the early part of your use year so that you can still bank the points if you need to.

Therefore, a use year that begin just prior to the time you expect to vaction would be best.

So if you intend to stay in November/December, than a September or October Use year would be good. The 100% banking deadline for September is Feb 28th, and for October it's Mar 31. In both cases, cancelling a Nov/Dec reservation leaves plenty of time to bank those points.

If instead you had a December use year, and cancelled a November vacation in October, you would be in the 0% banking window, could not bank those points returned from the cancelled vacation, and would have until Dec 31st to use them or lose them. (The 100% banking window for Dec UY's is May 30th, 50% is Aug 30th, and 25% is Sep 30th)

Hope that helps.

 

[ttepsich]

CarolMN and Caskbill
We always stay at the Beach Club so obviously that's where we want to own. So ideally I would like to make a ressie at the 11 month window with Thanksgiving being so busy. I will have my points already if september or october is our use year to make the ressie at 11 months out, correct? sorry if i'm being anal, but i just dont want to make a mistake. Thanks again.
Tina

 

[CarolMN]

Use year has nothing to do with when you can make a reservation. You can always make a reservation at your home resort 11 months prior to check out.

When making a reservation, use year is not important. Use year is important because it determines your banking deadlines.

Try re-reading my post about understanding use year. I know it's long, but you need to understand how this works before you buy.

Pretend you have a December use year, make the December use year charts using the ones I posted for October as a guide. Then pretend you want to reserve a 2006 Thanksgiving vacation. If you can see that with a December use year, you would need to use 2005 use year points for that vacation, you are on your way to understanding.

Then pretend you have to cancel the 2006 Thanksgiving vacation and that you call to cancel in August. What percentage of your points can you bank at that point? When do the points from the cancelled reservation expire if you don't/can't bank them.

We can tell you every time you need to know - but you really need to understand or you will always be afraid of making a mistake.


Best wishes -

 

[flechette]

Psst! For all the UY newbies (that includes me ) Caskbill has posted earlier in the thread - he has DVC planner programs which simply rock! Check out his sig to goto them.

Even tho I'm not a DVC member yet - his programs and the tutorials really helped expand my understanding.

OTOH I understood CarolMN explantion just fine so I guess maybe I've graduated from newbie to DVC hopeful!

Seriously tho - if you like programs or do better with visual aids Caskbill's programs can be a great learning tool

 

[OneMoreTry]

Most of the info about use year can be learned after you buy. For me, the most important thing to know BEFORE you buy has already been mentioned above:

It's best to have a use year that starts just BEFORE YOU PLAN TO TRAVEL. So if you travel in September DON'T buy an October use year.

It's BAD to have a use year that ends shortly after your vacation time because you LOSE THE POINTS entirely if you cancel -- because you're not allowed to bank them that late in the year AND you don't have time to reuse them before the use year is over.

 

[ttepsich]

Thanks Carol,
I reread your use year post again. Unfortunatly the first time I was trying to read it I was in a classroom full of high school seniors who were discussing graduation. Big mistake. I wasnt able to concentrate at the time. Got it now.

 

[abner1776]

To understand the perils of the UY consider the following example:

Points 150 - UY Oct

You make a ressie for Sept 15-22, 2006 using 300 points - 150 from 2005 and 150 borrowed from 2006.
On Sept 1, 2006 you have to cancel the ressie for a family emergency.
Under the DVC rules, you must use those 300 points b/4 Sept 30, 2006 or they are lost forever...ouch !!!

If instead you had a Sept UY, then the 300 points (150 banked from 2005 and 150 current UY) would have to be used b/4 August 30, 2007 which would give you an additional 11+ months to use the points.

So...does UY matter ?? In most cases...NO...but I don't ever want to be looking at my points expiring in 2 weeks with no possibility of using them.

 

[CarolMN]

To understand the perils of the UY consider the following example:

Points 150 - UY Oct

You make a ressie for Sept 15-22, 2006 using 300 points - 150 from 2005 and 150 borrowed from 2006.
On Sept 1, 2006 you have to cancel the ressie for a family emergency.
Under the DVC rules, you must use those 300 points b/4 Sept 30, 2006 or they are lost forever...ouch !!!

If instead you had a Sept UY, then the 300 points (150 banked from 2005 and 150 current UY) would have to be used b/4 August 30, 2007 which would give you an additional 11+ months to use the points.

So...does UY matter ?? In most cases...NO...but I don't ever want to be looking at my points expiring in 2 weeks with no possibility of using them.

This might be a better example, if you cancelled the reservation on August 1 instead of September 1.

Whenever you cancel less than 31 days prior to arrival, the points go back into your account and can be reused, but they will be in "holding account" status. There are additonal restrictions on the use of holding points.

In the first scenario (October use year), it wouldn't matter - you ware too close to the end of your use year to bank and you are less than 60 days from the end of the use year, so the holding account 60 day rule is moot.

In the second scenario (Sept use year), cancelling less than 31 days prior to arrival means that you wouldn't be able to bank the current use year points and that you wouldn't be able to make a reservation more than 60 days prior to arrival with the points from the cancelled reservation.

Best wishes -

 

[caven553]

Another thing is if you ever take last minute vacations around the same time of the year. My wife and I are most able to do last minute stuff in late January/early February.

Unfortunately we have a March use year so by that time we have already banked everything that wasn't going to be used so for the last minute stuff we have to borrow from the following year. This is a minor inconvenience because then we are borrowing from the next year while we still have points on the current year that were banked. If our use year was October or November then we wouldn't be anywhere near needing to make that banking decision yet.