quick use year question

[mickeyman42]

We've been considering buying DVC for some time now but I have a quick question. if we bought 100 points at AKV and 100 points elsewhere could we book with 200 points at AKV at the 11 month mark if both contracts had the same use year? would they have to have the same use year to do this or do you only need to have the points when you actually arrive at the resort, not when you book? I think I confused myself!

[VWL Mom]

You can only book your home resort at 11 months so if you bought 100 AKL those would be the only points you would be able to use at that time.

[DizneyRox]

Home resort is a function of the points, NOT the account. As mentioned, if you get two different home resorts, you will have two resorts you can book at 11 months out, but you can only use the points for that resort at the 11 month window. In your case, you'll need to wait until the 7 month window opens to use the other 100 points at AKLV.

Use year really doesn't have an impact on when you can book, it's always 11 months out from your check-in date. What year the points come out of is determined by the use year, but not when you can book.

[mickeyman42]

ok, so when booking at 11 months, they would only be looking to see that I am booking at my home resort, and that I have enough points on that contract to book at that time. If I had more contracts at different resorts I would have to wait until 7 months to combine the points.

do you need to actually have the points to book or do the points get redeemed when you check-in? for example, if my use year is may, can I book now (march) for october, even if I wont actually get my points until may?

[TheDuckRocks]

for example, if my use year is may, can I book now (march) for october, even if I wont actually get my points until may?

Yes. I'm still pretty new to using my points but I have done this as they see if you will have the points available from the next use year.

[mickeyman42]

ok, good, thats what I thought. I think I'm starting to get the hang of this..........but probably not!

[DizneyRox]

Correct... The use year is when you would have points available to USE at check-in. So, generally, if your vacation starts AFTER the first of the month of your use year, you would use those points for your vacation. If your vacation is before your use year month, you would use the previous years points (or have to borrow fromt he next year).

The 11 month window is just when you can start booking a room.

You don't get a voucher for points that you redeem, it's all done on the computer.

To make things easy, here's a scenario or two (depends on how lazy I get).

Your account:
100 AKLV points UY Jan
100 WLV points UY June

Vacation 1: February 1, 2012 - 150 points at AKLV

You can call for that vacation on (or about) March 1, 2011 and book 100 AKLV points. You would probably use 100 of your 2012 AKLV points and need to wait until July 2011 to book the extra 50 points from your 2011 WLV contract.

Vacation 2: July 2012 - 200 points at SSR

You can call for this January 2012 and be able to use 100 points from AKLV and your 100 points from WLV. You would use points (probably) from the 2012 contract from both.

Now, if you bank/borrow, etc the above scenarios could all be different and more confusing. For example on vacation 1, at 11 months out, you could use 100 points from AKLV from 2012 and borrow 50 from your 2013 use year if you wanted, instead of waiting for 7 months. You could wait until the 7 months window and book using both sets of points. Maybe you had 50 points banked, so you could use those from 2011 and the full 100 from 2012.

But the important facts are, the 11 or 7 month window is based on the check-in date of your stay. It has virtually nothing to do with use year other than you must be able to have points to use at check-in (either banked points, current points, or have the ability to borrow from a future use year). Obviously, if you used all your points, calling at 11 months out or 7 months doesn't mean anything, you won't be able to make a reservation.