VERY late check-in?

[ksoehrlein]

I have a studio reserved at SSR using my in-laws' points (October 13-17). We will be driving down as soon as school lets out on the 13th, which would put us arriving sometime between midnight and 3 am the morning of the 14th -- it all depends on the number and length of our rest stops. If we note this super-late arrival with MS ahead of time, will we have any problems?

We once arrived at OKW around 4:30 am without planning to (we'd thought we'd sleep somewhere along the way but were "too excited to sleep" just like in the commercial). That was a disaster because the system was down until 6 or 6:30 -- and then we ended up with a smoking room when we finally could check in.

I'd like to avoid a repeat performance. Anyone know the latest time we can check in before the system shuts down for the evening?

 

[CarolAnnC]

We knew we would be arriving late on one of our trips so I notified MS in advance as well as the resort (SSR) itself. Around midnight they print off all the ressies for those who are later arrivals and had them all ready with our paperwork when we arrived around 1 am. Good luck.

 

[Chuck S]

If you are going to be driving all night, I personally would just allow a couple extra hours for rest stops and meals and try arriving about 7am, rather than "waste" the points required for a room for two or three hours.

 

[ksoehrlein]

If you are going to be driving all night, I personally would just allow a couple extra hours for rest stops and meals and try arriving about 7am, rather than "waste" the points required for a room for two or three hours.

Thanks for the suggestion, Chuck. Normally, that's what I would opt for, too, but my in-laws' points had been banked and will be lost at the end of the year, so it's not a "waste" of points -- unless I can find a way to use them for another trip this year!

CarolAnn, did you get a decent room at 1 am, or were you stuck with something that didn't suit your needs? I'm not picky about location, but REALLY prefer nonsmoking and non-HA.

 

[PBB]

We had a different situation happen to us when we first purchased our membership back in 1999. We purchased a resale from the Timeshare store and went to OKW in Late May right after school was over. We drove down from Atlanta and we had planned on finding a hotel along the way to stay the night. I had a second wind while driving and instead of staying in Gainesville or Ocala I drove straight through to Orlando.

We arrived in Orlando and began to think about a hotel to stay. My wife suggested that we try one of the all star properties or a few other cheap hotels off property. On a whim I wondered how much I would be charged to stay at OKW for the balance of the night. We went to the resort and we were enjoying the night time views of OKW and went to front desk and explained we were checking into the resort the next day and told him our reservation number and we were just wondering how much for an extra night on cash. The night clerk on duty stated......."Technically, it is the day of your arrival date. Why dont we check you in as an early arrival and get you folks to bed". He stated further that he would have to charge us a $ 35 cleaning fee,however, he could not take my charge card due to the computes changing for the night. We checked into our room and I went to the front desk the next day to officially give the my credit card and pay for the fee. They had no clue what was going on and I guess the clerk should not have done what he had done. LOL.....they even forgot to charge me the cleaning fee.

I hoped he did not get in trouble,however, he did make feel at home our first stay at OKW and it sure did make us feel right about purchasing our points.

 

[CarolAnnC]

We were very pleased with our SSR room assignment that late evening. We also request non-smoking and non-HA both of which were granted. It may help to mention those requests if you do call the resort directly earlier that day - we called while waiting for our flight at the airport.