COME ON DVC....GET YOUR Stuff together....

[Robin"D"]

Has anyone called DVC member services to try to get answers about up coming trips/ what if/ if we have to Cancel our trip are they going to be flexible with this year/ banked and next year points.....NO ANSWER/ they told me by the end of May the will re look at this.... AAAAAGGGGRRRRRRR!!!
We are suppose to head to Aulani, but it is not looking good.....COME ON DVC/ GET YOUR Stuff TOGETHER!!!
sorry for the "**" but a little upset

Robin & Angel "D"

 

[_auroraborealis_]

I am surprised they are giving that answer. The official current word is no flexibility with expiration or banking.

They don't know what is going to happen by end of May right now. No one does.

 

[crisi]

And Disney can't tell you until they have some idea of how hard this will hit them, what they can legally do, what any changes will do to availability, etc. They won't know that until they know when they can open, how long they will be able to be open for (there may be waves of quarantine), whether they will put in attendance restrictions in the parks to keep some amount of distancing possible, etc. This is unprecedented. Disney, like many large companies that have travel as a significant component of their business model, is losing millions of dollars each day.

 

[Robin"D"]

DVC is a footnote to the decision of how and when to reopen the theme parks. I would expect the DVC call center to be laid off, but since their salaries are paid by our dues, they may stay on the job longer than they would otherwise.

I called they answered/ they saw my trip/ but could not give me anytime of answer/ but the end of May they will relook

NOT A GOOD WAY TO RUN A BUSINESS!!!

 

[cmrdgrs]

Has anyone called DVC member services to try to get answers about up coming trips/ what if/ if we have to Cancel our trip are they going to be flexible with this year/ banked and next year points.....NO ANSWER/ they told me by the end of May the will re look at this.... AAAAAGGGGRRRRRRR!!!
We are suppose to head to Aulani, but it is not looking good.....COME ON DVC/ GET YOUR S**T TOGETHER!!!
sorry for the "**" but a little upset

Robin & Angel "D"

I'm with you. This entire situation is just upsetting and disruptive. Is the answer you're looking for from DVC a firm answer about Aulani being open? Are your questions about potential lost points if Aulani isn't open? Both? I don't mean to sound dumb, but I'm not clear what answer you're looking for from DVC.

 

[tjkraz]

Absolutely nobody can predict how federal, state and local governments will be addressing the virus 2 months from now.

The longer DVC resorts remain closed, the more capacity they lose. A time will come when DVC determines it cannot guarantee use of all points to all owners. Presently they are not allowing any extension of use time for expiring points.

You may need to take matters into your own hands. If canceling now helps protect your points, that may be the smart move. Disney won’t know for certain until mid-may. If you wait until then, they may not be able to help to your satisfaction.

 

[Ms.Minnie]

I can understand your frustration but I think Disney can't give you a better answer at this time. Nobody, not even the experts know what's going to happen, we are in unprecedented territory with this whole thing.

As far as your comment saying "NOT A GOOD WAY TO RUN A BUSINESS!!!", I think this is unfair to DVC/Disney and is coming from your personal frustration. I think if you could/would step back and look at the situation objectionably you would be able to appreciate the situation DVC/Disney is in. Kind of like being caught between a rock and a hard place, no mater what they do somebody is going to upset or angry. Basically they are dammed if they do and dammed if they don't.

In the end I hope it works out for you, sending you some pixie dust that you soon get a satisfactory answer.

 

[McCrae]

Has anyone called DVC member services to try to get answers about up coming trips/ what if/ if we have to Cancel our trip are they going to be flexible with this year/ banked and next year points.....NO ANSWER/ they told me by the end of May the will re look at this.... AAAAAGGGGRRRRRRR!!!
We are suppose to head to Aulani, but it is not looking good.....COME ON DVC/ GET YOUR Stuff TOGETHER!!!
sorry for the "**" but a little upset

Robin & Angel "D"

What were you expecting at this time? You need to have more realistic expectations during this crisis, we are all in the same position and a bit of patience is required.

 

[yankeesfan123]

I think it’s perfectly acceptable to expect an answer from DVC if a reservation needs to be canceled. Calling DVC member services to ask, “hey, it’s not looking great for June for my trip. Can you please let me know my options?”

I would be upset if the response was, “no, I won’t let you know your options. Call back in 5 weeks.”

I get it. Disney is taking this, it seems, month by month at this point. They don’t know what June holds (no one does). But it’s not great customer service to not have a plan in place. They should at least have a plan to the point where they can say “well, right now June is a go, but if something changes, then you will have the following options: xxxxxxx.” Even if it is bad news or what the person doesn’t want to hear, they should still be able to tell a member something.

 

[_auroraborealis_]

I mean, my kids' school can't tell you if they will be back in the building this year. Little League and MLB doesn't know if there will be seasons. All the major sports leagues are shuttered. Hawaii has mandatory 14 day quarantines for any arrival or any inter-island landing.

Context is key. Disney has no idea what is going on now, let alone 2 months from now.

We're all frustrated by the ambiguities right now, and I'm sure you want the confidence that you can return to Disney in 60 days and it will be like Disney always is, and people won't be wearing masks, and it will all be normal. But the reality is that even if Disney is open, it won't be as it was. There will be changes. It will be different.

 

[tjkraz]

I think it’s perfectly acceptable to expect an answer from DVC if a reservation needs to be canceled. Calling DVC member services to ask, “hey, it’s not looking great for June for my trip. Can you please let me know my options?”

All of the standard options still exist. Sounds like the trip is more than 30 days out, so the reservation can be cancelled without holding rules applied. If it’s still within the first 8 months of the Use Year, banking is an option.

But DVC is not allowing any additional exceptions for trips that are still 2 months away.

 

[Robin"D"]

What were you expecting at this time? You need to have more realistic expectations during this crisis, we are all in the same position and a bit of patience is required.

The person I talked to was himimg & hauling with no straight answer/ but FINALLY came out with that they would look again at the END of may/ ok....so put this on the web site....

 

[yankeesfan123]

All of the standard options still exist. Sounds like the trip is more than 30 days out, so the reservation can be cancelled without holding rules applied. If it’s still within the first 8 months of the Use Year, banking is an option.

But DVC is not allowing any additional exceptions for trips that are still 2 months away.

So, couldn’t the member services rep have just said that and reminded the member of those options? That’s not difficult.

It sounds like the member got a DVC rep who was sick and tired of receiving these phone calls (and probably sick and tired of other things). To be fair, we only have one side of the story, so that is what I’m basing my response on

 

[lovin'fl]

People have to make tough decisions and take action into their own hands. I get that we don't want to. We want to be told 'X will not be open so you get this Y in way of refund'. But that can't happen as they don't have a crystal ball. So we have to make some tough calls on our own to protect the monies we have vested in these trips. In the maximum way we can. There will be some loss. But we need to figure out, for ourselves, how to minimize the loss.

For example...we had a Holland America cruise to Canada booked for July 11 (Canada closed their ports until July 1). We paid the deposit (2 cabins with 2 pax in each) and I booked 2 of the extra cost restaurants for 4 of us. Had to pay when booking those. I had like $950 all in. BUT, the final payment was due April 11. I had read that the folks on the March cancelled cruises still hadn't gotten refunds and they were starting to worry that the company would go bankrupt and they would never get refund. If I made final payment we would have had about $4800 all in. I'd rather lose that $950 instead of ALL $4800. So we cancelled. Supposed to get refund. The normal policy says it will process within like 7 days. We cancelled like 2.5 weeks ago and no refund yet. And the early MArch folks also still have not gotten refunds. Been over a month.

So I moved my May WDW trip to end of June. I have June and Aug UY. Will lose the Aug. I am not sure how many but some are borrowed. I have 44 banked for sure. Not sure how many, of another 77, are regular and past banking window and we be gone July 31...some are borrowed and will be put back to Aug 2020 (I hope). I have 141 June and they are good until May 31, 2021 but will be tough to find availability.

 

[tjkraz]

The person I talked to was himimg & hauling with no straight answer/ but FINALLY came out with that they would look again at the END of may/ ok....so put this on the web site....

Bottom line: there is no guarantee things will change by the end of May. I would consider whatever you were told to be unofficial, and if nothing comes of it you’ll have no recourse. “We’ll look at it” does not mean any policies will change for the better.

DVC is being forced to make some tough decisions in the interest of protecting the integrity of the reservation system. When the dust settles, not all owners will get the answers they are hoping to hear.

You can either act proactively to protect your points within the established rules or roll the dice. I was scheduled to check-in at WDW on May 23. I didn’t wait for DVC to grant me exceptions...I rebooked my trip. It was painful because we had great rooms booked, dining reservations, vacation time, period tends to be moderate weather and crowds, etc. But I had low confidence that the parks would even be open, and even less confidence that DVC would make exceptions if I were forced to re-book on short notice.

 

[TraderSamWDW]

Absolutely nobody can predict how federal, state and local governments will be addressing the virus 2 months from now.

The longer DVC resorts remain closed, the more capacity they lose. A time will come when DVC determines it cannot guarantee use of all points to all owners. Presently they are not allowing any extension of use time for expiring points.

You may need to take matters into your own hands. If canceling now helps protect your points, that may be the smart move. Disney won’t know for certain until mid-may. If you wait until then, they may not be able to help to your satisfaction.

Exactly.

I understand your frustrations, but do not think Disney can do much at the moment.

DVC has a problem, and they do not know how big it is yet. Hard to create a solution when you do not know scope. What if the resorts are closed for a year? Totally different issue if they open up June 1.

Even if they do open the resorts June 1, who knows how many people are going to still cancel trips and bank points. 2021 is likely to have a 50 percent point surplus. (oh, and its the 50th on top of everything)

I have a Sept trip. If there is ambiguity at that time, its getting canceled 32 days out and points are getting banked. I have to make my own decision, and I am not banking on any flexibility.

 

[tellemarie]

It's things like this that remind me how seemingly better it sometimes is to be a cash paying customer. We're DVC and have recently stayed cash and were treated so much better when there was an issue than when we stay on points at a DVC resort. It's disappointing. I understand that things are constantly changing, but they've had time to review these things and make exceptions, adjustments, policies, notes on the website about time frames, etc. But they won't, because they don't care about DVC members - they have the money already. That's at least how it feels at this point.

 

[Sandisw]

I think it’s perfectly acceptable to expect an answer from DVC if a reservation needs to be canceled. Calling DVC member services to ask, “hey, it’s not looking great for June for my trip. Can you please let me know my options?”

I would be upset if the response was, “no, I won’t let you know your options. Call back in 5 weeks.”

I get it. Disney is taking this, it seems, month by month at this point. They don’t know what June holds (no one does). But it’s not great customer service to not have a plan in place. They should at least have a plan to the point where they can say “well, right now June is a go, but if something changes, then you will have the following options: xxxxxxx.” Even if it is bad news or what the person doesn’t want to hear, they should still be able to tell a member something.

In reality, DVCM has given an answer, It is just not the answer people want.

They have said that there will be no changes to banking rules and nothing done with points that expire until this is over,

CMs cant say what is a go when that decision is not yet made or if it is, it isn’t information that frontline CMs have,

Most are being told to protect your points from loss by either putting int RCI if they are expiring, or cancel and bank if you are still in the window,

I guess I am confused on how that doesn’t count as an answer, What people really want right now is the answer that they will be allowed to keep the points for booking DVC in the next UY.

While I am not confident anything will be done, no news, IMO, at least appears there is still hope,

 

[Sandisw]

It's things like this that remind me how seemingly better it sometimes is to be a cash paying customer. We're DVC and have recently stayed cash and were treated so much better when there was an issue than when we stay on points at a DVC resort. It's disappointing. I understand that things are constantly changing, but they've had time to review these things and make exceptions, adjustments, policies, notes on the website about time frames, etc. But they won't, because they don't care about DVC members - they have the money already. That's at least how it feels at this point.

The reason this is different is because you are not dealing with a hotel owned by Disney.

We own the resorts and are responsible to figure this out within our own system. Now, we can certainly ask for Disney, the company, to help out and for all we know, DVCM...the manager of our system...is trying to do that,

You are right about one very important point and that is staying a cash guest does keep you a customer of Disney for your reservation, and comes with better cancellation policies for reservations than we will see for our timeshare,

However, those cash guests are paying a premium for that service in terms of cash rates,

We traded the ability to have generous cancellations for the savings we get by becoming owners, It does seem that this has been forgotten in all of this.

 

[siren0119]

I would be upset if the response was, “no, I won’t let you know your options. Call back in 5 weeks.”

But that's not what's being conveyed. It's not "I won't let you know your options" (implying that they know something but aren't sharing it willfully). It's "we don't have an answer yet as to what is going to happen". They literally don't know and in EVERY business sector in the country right now decisions are being made on a day-to-day basis. My kids' school just went to online classes last week and we still don't have an answer on whether they will be allowed to return to school before the end of the year because nobody really knows right now. I am working from home and as of right now we have no end date for the WFH orders.

It's inconvenient yes - and ANY decision they make is going to have positive effects on some owners, and negative effects on others. But it's not bad business. Everyone - LITERALLY everyone - is navigating uncharted waters. This is an unprecedented event and there were no rulebooks for handling it.