Odd booking issue with VGF

[KAT4DISNEY]

How do we know that ALL GV's and 2Bedrooms are out of service? Just taking 1 room out of service will cause this issue.

I don't see how taking a room out at 11 months is out of line. its easier to take rooms out before they can get booked than hope that room opens up or move/upgrade guests.

It takes longer than a day to do a refurb and at times that's all that was missing further out. Just like walking at 11 months shouldn't be able to be blocked there also shouldn't be a single day outside that window that is blocked while dates before and after are not. Unless you believe a GV or 2BR can be refurbed in a single day? Maybe a studio can but they have always blocked off entire wings vs going room by room. (as they should of course)

 

[mathelete87]

In this thread I attached a PDF of the e-mail exchanges I had with Terri Schultz. That is probably the best background. Another member modifying a reservation does not make it more difficult to book per se. The issue is that the modification that Terri suggested, on 1/5 modifying a reservation to start on 12/6, is NOT allowed. If a villa is available at 11 months, then that same villa should be available for ALL days following the 11 month mark. The exceptions would be villas taken offline for maintenance/refurbishment (Really? Schedule 11 months in advance during the busiest DVC booking period of the year? Puh-leaze!) or pulling villas for marketing (seems counterproductive to me).

In what I believe is the smallest DVC in Disney World right?

 

[Marionnette]

How do we know that ALL GV's and 2Bedrooms are out of service? Just taking 1 room out of service will cause this issue.

I don't see how taking a room out at 11 months is out of line. its easier to take rooms out before they can get booked than hope that room opens up or move/upgrade guests.

Because if only 1 of all of the specific room category were being taken out of service, then availability at 11 months + 8 nights would not be wait list only at 3 AM EST. At midnight, you can see availability for the upcoming 11-month window that opens at 8 AM but you cannot book it. NO ONE can book a night that is 8 nights beyond the current 11-month. And if one villa were being taken out of service for the refurb, the remaining villas should show availability. They don’t.

 

[Marionnette]

To illustrate my point, here’s a screenshot from the 8th.

 

[JOLT]

It takes longer than a day to do a refurb and at times that's all that was missing further out. Just like walking at 11 months shouldn't be able to be blocked there also shouldn't be a single day outside that window that is blocked while dates before and after are not. Unless you believe a GV or 2BR can be refurbed in a single day? Maybe a studio can but they have always blocked off entire wings vs going room by room. (as they should of course)

From everything I saw it seemed to be multiple days during the week not just 1 single day. I just don't see any other option for rooms being taken out of service 11 month + 8 days. I do not believe DVC is taking rooms out to sell them like others speculated for AKL Value rooms a while back with turned out to be false.


thanks Marionnette I didn't see the 8 day pre 8am EST in previous posts.

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

From everything I saw it seemed to be multiple days during the week not just 1 single day. I just don't see any other option for rooms being taken out of service 11 month + 8 days. I do not believe DVC is taking rooms out to sell them like others speculated for AKL Value rooms a while back with turned out to be false.

It varied depending on when you looked. A couple of times when I looked it was a single day - Dec 13th in particular. And other times it was more.

But lets say it is refurb. If that were the case then DVC seriously has to stop starting refurbs during the busiest DVC week of the year. For AKV they may not have had a choice as it was based on the hotel side refurb but at VGF they'd have a say. Also VGF has fixed weeks to deal with and weeks 48 & 49 were the most sold. It's either extremely unlikely or extremely poor planning if they scheduled refurb during the two most sold fixed week periods.

The pattern doesn't fit refurb though.

 

[mlayman7]

This is the response I got from member services regarding this issue of December dates unavailable after weekend dates being available after the 11 month mark. Anybody had any luck getting dates in December?


Larry
at 11:08, Jan 16:

According to my Supervisor, those dates are not available as Members have been delaying their travel and want to travel during the 50th Anniversary and the Holidays. She suggested going on the waitlist for the dates, resort, and room category that you really want. When we get to the 7 month booking window, try to book another resort that is available for your dates. If you do book another resort, we can update your waitlist request to cancel that reservation should it match.

 

[Marionnette]

This is the response I got from member services regarding this issue of December dates unavailable after weekend dates being available after the 11 month mark. Anybody had any luck getting dates in December?


Larry
at 11:08, Jan 16:

According to my Supervisor, those dates are not available as Members have been delaying their travel and want to travel during the 50th Anniversary and the Holidays. She suggested going on the waitlist for the dates, resort, and room category that you really want. When we get to the 7 month booking window, try to book another resort that is available for your dates. If you do book another resort, we can update your waitlist request to cancel that reservation should it match.

Well, that was a whole lot of nothing. It doesn't come near to addressing the lack of availability for dates that fall beyond the home resort booking window.

Either they are clueless about their product or they think that members are.

 

[mlayman7]

Yeah I went on to ask Larry if that answered his question to Charlotte, his supervisor, he said it in no way did but he had to tell me what she said. I asked for a call back but nothing yet.

 

[jscottnc]

Yeah I went on to ask Larry if that answered his question to Charlotte, his supervisor, he said it in no way did but he had to tell me what she said. I asked for a call back but nothing yet.

Basically the same result I got but the CM I spoke to KNEW that the villas should be available but had no explanation why. I had the presence of mind to book the available day AND start a wait list for the full vacation I want (timestamps are important). I have emailed Terri Schultz asking to speak to a member representative. I recommend you do the same. Terri.A.Schultz@disney.com

 

[mlayman7]

Basically the same result I got but the CM I spoke to KNEW that the villas should be available but had no explanation why. I had the presence of mind to book the available day AND start a wait list for the full vacation I want (timestamps are important). I have emailed Terri Schultz asking to speak to a member representative. I recommend you do the same. Terri.A.Schultz@disney.com

I just shot her an email and attached the conversation I had with Larry. Hopefully I get an explanation from her. Doubt it

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

This is the response I got from member services regarding this issue of December dates unavailable after weekend dates being available after the 11 month mark. Anybody had any luck getting dates in December?


Larry
at 11:08, Jan 16:

According to my Supervisor, those dates are not available as Members have been delaying their travel and want to travel during the 50th Anniversary and the Holidays. She suggested going on the waitlist for the dates, resort, and room category that you really want. When we get to the 7 month booking window, try to book another resort that is available for your dates. If you do book another resort, we can update your waitlist request to cancel that reservation should it match.

Ah Larry. And Larry's Supervisor. You know not what you speaketh about.
We thank you for your participation though,

 

[Cfrone]

This is the response I got from member services regarding this issue of December dates unavailable after weekend dates being available after the 11 month mark. Anybody had any luck getting dates in December?

FWIW, we have a reservation the first week of December for a dedicated 2BR, standard view. Sorry to hear so many people are having issues...fingers crossed for everyone.

 

[poofyo101]

Have been trying to pickup a 2 bedroom. Impossible.

 

[poofyo101]

This issue is awful.

 

[Snookies]

For what it’s worth - when this happened for reservations around the 50th, I emailed PDFs of screenshots to Schultz’s office, Member services, and Member Satisfaction and received 3 different callbacks. I wasn’t available for one of the calls, but the other callers understood why it should not be possible unless inventory was being pulled by DVC prior to the 11 month window, there was an IT glitch, or there was an inventory loading problem. The explanation offered was that inventory had not been loaded properly at all of the properties. If I had thought about at the time, I should have asked about it being seemingly strange that there was an inventory loading problem that impacted just 9/30 and 10/1, but not the days before or after, and not for every room category.

 

[mlayman7]

I got a reply from Terri, I am not sure what I think but I do understand that they could be doing room refurbishment especially since the dates that are taken up after the 11 month window are weekdays only. Sunday being the main takeaway for me since it is the low point day compared to Friday. I do wonder who decides which dates to refurbish rooms. In their arguments for changing the point charts they say they know which dates are the busiest time of year, so why would they choose to refurbish rooms during the busiest two weeks of the entire year?

Mr. Layman –

Thank you for reaching out to me, and sharing this chat, I appreciate the feedback.

I am going to ask one of my leaders to call you back and walk you through how this can occur. There are a multitude of reasons, including the 11 month window starts on the booking date so dates into the future can get taken up. Additionally, we have a room refurbishment that will be happening at Grand Floridian during this time and it is resulting in some unusual looking inventory during this time due to rooms being out of service.

Anyway, you should be able to get answers to your questions and I so see several opportunities in this chat whereby we can enhance our communication, we will take this and learn from it.

 

[Sandisw]

I got a reply from Terri, I am not sure what I think but I do understand that they could be doing room refurbishment especially since the dates that are taken up after the 11 month window are weekdays only. Sunday being the main takeaway for me since it is the low point day compared to Friday. I do wonder who decides which dates to refurbish rooms. In their arguments for changing the point charts they say they know which dates are the busiest time of year, so why would they choose to refurbish rooms during the busiest two weeks of the entire year?

Mr. Layman –

Thank you for reaching out to me, and sharing this chat, I appreciate the feedback.

I am going to ask one of my leaders to call you back and walk you through how this can occur. There are a multitude of reasons, including the 11 month window starts on the booking date so dates into the future can get taken up. Additionally, we have a room refurbishment that will be happening at Grand Floridian during this time and it is resulting in some unusual looking inventory during this time due to rooms being out of service.

Anyway, you should be able to get answers to your questions and I so see several opportunities in this chat whereby we can enhance our communication, we will take this and learn from it.

Given that it is only occurring at VGF, and that rooms are being refurbished, it does allow for some level of explanation.

But, it does give you pause as to why it’s being done then...the only thing I can think of is that when it was decided in late 2020...i believe this wasn’t originally scheduled for 2021...people had already begun booking and so we may not see the effect in previous months that we would with December?

I would assume they are starting before then but with booking already in place, maybe it’s why December needs to be used? Then again, having a refurb go over a deadline isn’t new.

 

[Marionnette]

Given that it is only occurring at VGF, and that rooms are being refurbished, it does allow for some level of explanation.

But, it does give you pause as to why it’s being done then...the only thing I can think of is that when it was decided in late 2020...i believe this wasn’t originally scheduled for 2021...people had already begun booking and so we may not see the effect in previous months that we would with December?

I would assume they are starting before then but with booking already in place, maybe it’s why December needs to be used? Then again, having a refurb go over a deadline isn’t new.

But again, they are taking EVERY room in a booking category out of inventory. You would think that they would reduce the number of available rooms by the number on a single floor. There are 17 LV dedicated 2BRs. They cannot all be under a soft goods refurb for 3 weeks (and they apparently aren’t because Saturday and Sunday nights were bookable). Why not take 5 or 6 out of inventory each week until all 17 are expected to be completed? It makes no sense to deny owners the chance to book their home resort at 11 months by removing all units in a booking category. I wonder what they are telling those members with guaranteed weeks?

Foot note: 2BR LV villas will finally be available to book mid-week for December 23 and forward..more than 3 weeks after they were all removed from inventory (except on weekends).

 

[Sandisw]

But again, they are taking EVERY room in a booking category out of inventory. You would think that they would reduce the number of available rooms by the number on a single floor. There are 17 LV dedicated 2BRs. They cannot all be under a soft goods refurb for 3 weeks (and they apparently aren’t because Saturday and Sunday nights were bookable). Why not take 5 or 6 out of inventory each week until all 17 are expected to be completed? It makes no sense to deny owners the chance to book their home resort at 11 months by removing all units in a booking category. I wonder what they are telling those members with guaranteed weeks?

Foot note: 2BR LV villas will finally be available to book mid-week for December 23 and forward..more than 3 weeks after they were all removed from inventory (except on weekends).

Oh, it does not seem to explain it all, but it has happened before where rooms were removed and then back and the reason given was they were working on the schedule, etc, and took all before releasing back the number of rooms not scheduled for those days.

What the online system doesn’t show is how many rooms were taken via DVC or an owner.

For GW, those never show online because they are taken first. It is possible that they booked those first, and then did something else with what was not showing online,

Again, there was definitely some weird things going on, but it is only at VGF which is scheduled for soft goods...some of it could be that and because we don’t know if a room being available is one or 20,