Steve is correct in that the owner's have first shot at whatever view class they own. I think the comment by the front desk person needs a little "interpretation." I suspect that when the Point banks weeks it banks only Garden Views, because the other "views" are held for the owners. So yes, RCI Exchangers would get assigned Garden Views. I know for a fact that when I "banked" one of my Ocean Front weeks, a Garden View was banked.
There are two banking operations that go on, one by the resort itself and one by the DRI Club. I think that is the source of some confusion.
To start, you need to recognize that resort inventory is divided into three pools, one for deeded owners, one for DRI Trust, and one for deeded members who have joined their week to the DRI Club. For each check-in day the available rooms in each view category are divided among those three pools based on relative ownership represented in each category.
Now Let's start with resort itself. The resort bulk banks weeks with RCI and II on behalf of owners
not affiliated with the DRI Club. The resort inventory control system identifies those as incoming exchangers, without assigning them to any view category. The total number of allowable reservations that non-Club owners are allowed to make for that checkin day is reduced by the number of incoming exchangers. The resort accepts non-Club reservation requests until the time when the maximum allowable number of owner exchanges is reached. The incoming exchangers who hold exchanges placed by the resort will end up in the units whatever units don't get filled by owners. Those can be any view category.
It's different on the DRI Club side. When the Club deposits a week with an exchange company, the Club deposits a specific week from the inventory that has been assigned to it. The Club then notifies the resort that particular week will be occupied by an exchanger. Since that is a specific week that has been assigned to the Club, an exchanger arriving through a reservation made by the Club will get the view category that was deposited by the Club.
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As far as the resort is concerned, the DRI Club is just like any other owner of multiple units. When the resort puts inventory into the DRI Club pools, that inventory becomes owner reserved inventory, and it's managed the same as you were an owner of mulitple units. For example, if you owned four weeks at the resort in differing view categories, and you were assigning those weeks to other people (guests, renters, independent exchangers), you would need to tell the resort which of the weeks you have reserved will be occupied by which of your guests.
It's the same with the DRI Club. The resort sees the DRI Club as the owner, and any person who comes to the resort through the Club activities is viewed as a guest of the Club in the same way that a person occupying your unit in your stead is viewed as your guest.
Thus, when the Club sends someone to the resort, they need to tell the resort which Club reservation right is attached to that person. The resort doesn't care whether the incoming person is an owner through the Club, an outside Club member, or an exchanger. All the resort cares about is knowing what view category goes with the reservation.
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Nutshell. If the exchange originated from DRI Club activity, it will be linked with a view category. So if the Club only gives garden view to exchange companies (as is likely), then all exchangers arriving through Club exchanges will be in garden view units. If the exchanger is arriving through resort bulk banking, they will end up in whatever view category has not been fully booked by non-Club owners.
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This is complicated. Few, if any, people working the sales floor at the resort understand how the system, nor do the people working the front desk really understand how the reservation system works. The only people that really understand it are those who are actually running the system and tracking inventory.
