Reservation question

[luv_maui]

If you are an owner at WKORV and make a reservation say 12 months out for say next Feb., can you cancel it and make a reservation for Thanksgiving 12 months out, based on availability, of course. In other words, does the 12 month home resort priority apply only to the first reservation? Is there a cancellation fee? Can you switch to Star Options after making a 12 month home resort reservation (i.e. reserve at home resort 12 months in advance and then switch to star options for a Harborside reservation if it were available?) because there is availability at another SVN resort say at 8 months?

 

[seenett]

Yes - This is the "game" that many owners play while hedging their bets against better future availability. The only catches are:

* Reservations may be cancelled within 24 hours of making the reservation request without incurring a fee ($29) unless the reservation was made less than 30 days prior to the check-in day.
* Cancellations or changes in reservations made more than 60 days prior to the check-in day will result in unrestricted restoration of the related StarOptions to your account for further use during that use year, although your related Home Resort Preference Period rights will not be restored.
* If you cancel 60 days or less prior to the check-in day you will still be able to make reservations during that use year, but only to reserve a vacation that is within 60 days of the arrival date.

Using your example, today you can make a reservation at your home resort for Feb 2007 (12 months out). If you really want Nov 2007, hold on to your Feb reservation and try to change it in Nov 2006 (12 months out). You may have to pay a $29 fee. If you want to go to a different resort in Nov 2007 (like Harborside), you would have to request it in March 2007 (8 months out).
Here is a sequence of events that would work in your scenario, assuming availability at each step:

Feb 06: reserve a unit at WKORV for Feb 07
Nov 06: change the reservation to Nov 07 at WKORV ($29 fee)
Mar 07: change the Nov 07 reservation at WKORV to Harborside ($29 fee)

 

[grgs]

Has anyone actually had to pay the $29 fee yet? I did just as Seenett described: I reserved my Platinum Kierland for March 2006 use in March 2005. In October 2005, I cancelled the the Kierland reservation and instead used StarOptions to book Ka'anapali for June 2006. I was not charged a fee to do this, although I assume they had a right to do so. Anyway, I'm just curious if anyone has had this fee charged.

Glorian

 

[TheUnitrep]

Has anyone actually had to pay the $29 fee yet?
Glorian

Glorian --

We were charged the cancellation fee when we changed a reservation this year. The SVN rep advised me that I was being charged since the reservation we were changing wasn't made during the 8-12 month period.

Jerry

 

[luv_maui]

Thank you for that explanation. As a follow-up, when is the last chance you can utilize star options? When we looked into WKORV back in 2002 you had to decide by 12/31 before the use year. I know it has changed, but just not sure exactly how.

Also, once you make a reservation using star options you lose home preference period rights (cancelling the first Feb reservation in Nov doesn't lose the home preference reservation right?), but the example given below is OK because two home preference reservations (both 12 months in advance) were made first followed by the star options switch at 8 months prior to arrival. Once the star option reservation is made I couldn't theoretically make a reservation at the home resort for early December (just outside 8 months prior to arrival) since the 12 month home preference is lost and I'd need to make a a reservation at 8 months for the home resort? I realize there are cancellation fees involved. I'm just trying to understand the home resort reservation and star option reservation rules.

Yes, I'm considering making my next purchase a SVN mandatory resort, but we'll just have to see. This thought has been going on since 2002!

Yes - This is the "game" that many owners play while hedging their bets against better future availability. The only catches are:

* Reservations may be cancelled within 24 hours of making the reservation request without incurring a fee ($29) unless the reservation was made less than 30 days prior to the check-in day.
* Cancellations or changes in reservations made more than 60 days prior to the check-in day will result in unrestricted restoration of the related StarOptions to your account for further use during that use year, although your related Home Resort Preference Period rights will not be restored.
* If you cancel 60 days or less prior to the check-in day you will still be able to make reservations during that use year, but only to reserve a vacation that is within 60 days of the arrival date.

Using your example, today you can make a reservation at your home resort for Feb 2007 (12 months out). If you really want Nov 2007, hold on to your Feb reservation and try to change it in Nov 2006 (12 months out). You may have to pay a $29 fee. If you want to go to a different resort in Nov 2007 (like Harborside), you would have to request it in March 2007 (8 months out).
Here is a sequence of events that would work in your scenario, assuming availability at each step:

Feb 06: reserve a unit at WKORV for Feb 07
Nov 06: change the reservation to Nov 07 at WKORV ($29 fee)
Mar 07: change the Nov 07 reservation at WKORV to Harborside ($29 fee)

 

[seenett]

You MUST use your StarOptions by 12/31 of the use year or they just go away. You can convert to StarPoints by 3/31 of the use year. Under the old rules, you had to convert by 12/31 of the previous year.

Although the rules say you will lose your Home Resort Preference preference period if you cancel a reservation, I don't think this always applies if you change the reservation. The "rules" treat cancellations and changes the same, but I don't think it always works that way in real life. This may also be why some people are charged the $29 fee and some are not.