I have absolutely no faith in using Waitlist

huskerfanatic7

Mouseketeer
Joined
Jan 20, 2014
So I have had a waitlist in for about a month and half for a Lakeview Studio at BLT. The waitlist was just for one night for 12/11 (I had a standard view booked) but wanted a lake view so I didn't have to switch rooms for one night. Anyways. A couple weeks ago as I stalked online and that night popped up as available so I rushed to book it but somebody grabbed just before I could. Fast forward to today that night popped up again and luckily I was able to grab it. So why does the waitlist not function properly all of the time?
 
The waitlist program is not "real time". It only runs periodically, (i.e., not after every cancellation). That's why you can sometimes catch a night in between the times the waitlist match program runs. No one here knows how often (or if there's a set schedule) for the waitlist program runs.

Glad you got your night.
 
I had 2 nights waitlisted for VGF in the fall, I stalked everyday, waitlist won on both. The dates never popped up, we were never notified when we got the first day, but we received an email for the second.
 


The waitlist program is not "real time". It only runs periodically, (i.e., not after every cancellation). That's why you can sometimes catch a night in between the times the waitlist match program runs. No one here knows how often (or if there's a set schedule) for the waitlist program runs.

Glad you got your night.

I change things with our reservations often enough and almost always check to see if something I dropped sits there or not. And unless I have incredible timing to when they run the waitlist some/all disappear immediately if it was sold out prior. I’ve had excellent luck with the waitlist. We can’t see when it’s matched anymore so unless someone calls in they wouldn’t even know it had matched. Ie - my observation is that it’s far more real time than not.
 
Same thing happened to me. I happened to be online and booked the days I had waitlisted. It’s frustrating that they would throw our waitlisted nights out for other members to grab before honoring our waitlist. Lesson learned!
 
I had a waitlist for a Boardwalk view 2BR in October for 3 nights. I checked for myself and it was showing available, but since I was using transferred points, I had to call to grab it. I'd also noticed that my waitlist had disappeared from my dashboard, but my confirmed reservation was still showing that I had a pool/garden 2BR, which is what I had originally booked. I called MS and the CM said that my waitlist had indeed been filled...but they filled it with a POOL/GARDEN 2BR! Someone filled my waitlist with the EXACT same room I already had booked! This effectively erased my Boardwalk view waitlist, which would have never came through, had I not been looking. Luckily, I saw the availability and the CM grabbed it for me. It happened to be the LAST ONE! You can add me to the list of those who don't trust the waitlist either.
 


We've had good luck using with waitlist. We have always gotten what we put in for. There have been other times that I will have 2-3 nights in row on the waitlist and one pops up with availability, I grab it and reset the waitlist for the remaining nights. I am glad to have the option of waitlisting rooms, it seems to work pretty well for us. I mean trying to waitlist 7 nights at the BWV during food and wine is likely to never come through, but if you're realistic in your requests, it seems to work. The mystery of how and when they actually fill them is well, still a mystery however!
 
I put in a waitlist about two months ago for two separate nights in Dec to bookend the one night I had already. Got an email yesterday around 7pm welcoming me to WDW for Dec. The first night came through. Now just waiting for the last night.
 
I've had great luck waitlisting- to date, I haven't seen any nights that I had waitlisted show up as available online.
 
I asked MS about waitlists, and this is what they said:

When setting up a waitlist, it is actively searching and waiting for those members who have existing reservations to cancel their own travel plans. Given that there will be other members who have their own waitlists of varying lengths of time, there is no way to predict placement or advise when a particular waitlist may match.

Should a member cancel their reservation and all the nights of their reservation match to your waitlist, only at that time will the waitlist match occur. It is not based on existing inventory combined with members cancelling their reservations for waitlists to match. Once your waitlist does match and is officially confirmed, you would receive a confirmation letter via email to let you know you have a confirmed room reservation.
 
We have had great success with the waitlist... for various resorts and lengths of stay. I’ve probably waitlisted about 10 times and it came through all but once, including AKL Club Level And Poly Lake View on July 4th. Our latest success was a night at VGF (request placed about 70 days out). I stalked every day with no luck, then received a surprise e-mail last Saturday. Very happy!
 
Seems waitlists are covered via a batch process. Easiest way (not best) to fix that for cheap would be to hold all cancellations until that same batch period and then cover the waitlists + release the cancellations. Probably wouldn't even cost them that much to do so but there really is no benefit to Disney here so doubt any change is made.

With that said, we were just in a situation where we had 1 night in a BWV P/G and 4 nights in a BWV BW view. Waitlist finally came through on the 1 night and I was shocked to find that Disney IT was smart enough to combine the two reservations into a single automatically. Of course this is likely a benefit to them as it means I now don't have to call and take up a CSR's time to do something that should be done automatically.
 
Seems waitlists are covered via a batch process. Easiest way (not best) to fix that for cheap would be to hold all cancellations until that same batch period and then cover the waitlists + release the cancellations. Probably wouldn't even cost them that much to do so but there really is no benefit to Disney here so doubt any change is made.

With that said, we were just in a situation where we had 1 night in a BWV P/G and 4 nights in a BWV BW view. Waitlist finally came through on the 1 night and I was shocked to find that Disney IT was smart enough to combine the two reservations into a single automatically. Of course this is likely a benefit to them as it means I now don't have to call and take up a CSR's time to do something that should be done automatically.

To end your shock - the waitlists are finalized by a human CM.:D The software holds the room and then a CM finishes the match. They do not always see the reservations to be combined together but usually they do.
 
Well, I’ve not had success w/ waitlisting, last year I had a waitlist to switch from a Jambo 1 br. to a 2 br. for 2 nights in early Dec. for months, they released inventory and people were grabbing AKV Jambo villas, but my waitlist never matched & I wasn’t quick enough with stalking to grab a 2 br., so we stayed in our 1 br. for 2 days, checked out and then checked back in - to the same 1br. + the studio next door - for the remaining 6 nights.
 
Had a single night waitlisted at CC and BWV in the middle Of a split stay for the past 11 days. A mistake on my end goofed the original booking. Lost one night meaning we had to move twice

Fast forward to today and there was my garden view 1br at bwv. Waitlist did not fill it but I booked it..

Now to get it back to one reservation of 4 nights vs 1-3.

Happy but bummed it didn’t auto fill
 
My waitlist just came through for us for December. I got a phone call from member services to confirm that we wanted to cancel our backup reservation, and replace it with our waitlist request. Everything was updated on my dashboard within 10 minutes of the call.
 
My waitlist just came through for us for December. I got a phone call from member services to confirm that we wanted to cancel our backup reservation, and replace it with our waitlist request. Everything was updated on my dashboard within 10 minutes of the call.


Which resorts and room size? I'm keeping my fingers crossed for early Dec.
 

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