Aggressive DVC Housekeeping Checkout Day

[BillPA]

Just pick up the phone, press housekeeping and let them know you are leaving and the room is ready to be serviced. We do this on every trip. If more would do it, it does take about 30 seconds, but we find time. More rooms would be ready sooner and the knocking on the door would greatly be reduced.

 

[RoseGold]

Just pick up the phone, press housekeeping and let them know you are leaving and the room is ready to be serviced. We do this on every trip. If more would do it, it does take about 30 seconds, but we find time. More rooms would be ready sooner and the knocking on the door would greatly be reduced.

It's on the app now. It gave me an alert check out day.

 

[BillPA]

Good to know, thanks.

 

[CarolMN]

Those of you getting walked in on must not be using the secondary chain/bar lock when you are in the room.

Early morning knocks must be unique to the individual housekeepers. We've never gotten one at any of the DVC resorts. We mostly stay at the BWV. Sounds like we've been lucky.

 

[KPeterso]

Is this just a DVC thing? This has literally NEVER happened to me at any other Disney resort. And I've had a LOT of stays.

I have had it happen at Disneyland multiple times ---- vgc (so DVC), Disneyland Hotel, and Paradise Pier. And usually on a morning, we plan to sleep in a bit. I know at PPH last year it was the morning after we did Merriest Nights and getting in about 12:30 AM, so it was not appreciated first thing in the AM.

I had a problem 2 weeks ago mid trip with Housekeeping at BWV. We normally leave earlier, but we had been watching the Queen's funeral, so got a late start that morning leaving. Housekeeping knocked probably 9:30-10 AM asking if we need service. My mom was in the shower, so was not going to be letting anyone in right then. So I said No, not right now. We had just had full clean with new towels the day before, so I did not need anything right then. They called me twice on my cell in the park later about refusing to let them in and having the Room Occupied sign up and wanting to know what time they could come for the check. First, there was no room occupied sign on the door. And second, the CM asked if I needed service which I did not. If she said she still needed to do the security check, she was welcome to come in. And I told them that both times they called. I am almost positive they did not end up doing the check that day as the garbage was not removed. Was just annoying as I have no problem with the checks, but that is not what the CM was conveying to me.

 

[robinb]

We were just at WDW a couple weeks ago. We ended up with a split stay because of a terrible room allocation I could not live with for 10 days. We stuck around the original room until check-out and were not bothered. On check-out day for the second room we got the phone call before 9:00 and a knock on the door around 10:00. It was annoying.

 

[tjkraz]

They don't ALL have to be ready at 4PM. People get in late and hopefully tell them that when they check in.

They AREN'T always ready at 4pm TODAY and you're promoting operational changes which would only increase the frequency of late room access??

Every single other hotel I've stayed in has managed to be able to know what rooms they can enter early, except the one that has its tech strapped to me.

The difference with hotels is they don't need to turn-over every room, every night. When a 200 room Hampton Inn is operating at 75% occupancy (which is actually high for a hotel), they could leave 50 rooms completely uncleaned when the staff leaves for the day--or have them working late into the night--and still have enough capacity to accommodate all new arrivals.

A hotel and a timeshare are two different animals. Especially a Disney timeshare. We both know that Poly and Grand Floridian rent out every single room virtually every night of the year. That does not happen with a run-of-the-mill Hilton, Marriott or any other chain.

In the past, after Magical Express was eliminated, there was no way to tell DVC you were leaving for the 6AM flight except actually talking to a human in the lobby. It looks like the app fixed that, as I could actually check out online. If that problem has been fixed, why are they still barging into my room early?

The reasonable conclusion is that they are first cleaning rooms from early departures who used the app, and then looking for additional work.

Disney has the cameras of Vegas and their tech strapped to my wrist. It knows where I am all the time and let me know exactly my room status when I got on property in an Uber. And somehow they can't do this in reverse and have to enter my VGF room at 9AM?

You cannot honestly believe this is a thing. That Disney has cameras lining the hallways and uses facial recognition software to ID every guest and track their comings-and-goings? Or that housekeeping staff is outfitted with portable RFID readers which are capable of telling when/who is in a particular guest room?

(BTW, most people have multiple MagicBands these days, plus the app installed in their phone, smartwatch, etc. Only certain devices have a battery-powered active sensor which allows their presence to be detected from a distance. Most only function when physically tapped on a reader.

In other words, there's no useful way to tell which guest is attached to which device. Especially not in a hotel with 1000 rooms, 5000 guests and 20,000 RFID enabled devices.)

 

[RoseGold]

You cannot honestly believe this is a thing. That Disney has cameras lining the hallways and uses facial recognition software to ID every guest and track their comings-and-goings? Or that housekeeping staff is outfitted with portable RFID readers which are capable of telling when/who is in a particular guest room?

I literally got an alert about my room status while I was in an Uber at the guard gate at the GF. So, yea, Disney knows exactly where you are. Between the WDW app and the bands of course they know where you are.

And yes, Disney has a whole lot of cameras and they know a whole lot.

Not that it should matter, because that room is mine until 11. Bust on in at 11, like the rule says.

 

[jo-jo]

I do not object to staff simply doing their jobs. Housekeepers start working well before 11am. And a big part of having every single room cleaned by 4pm is being able to start that work as early as possible.

But they don't clean every single room every day. I don't know the make up, but I would guess very few stays are one night. Yes, turning over a room takes more time, but that balances out with the room that just gets trash emptied.

 

[RoseGold]

They AREN'T always ready at 4pm TODAY and you're promoting operational changes which would only increase the frequency of late room access??

I'm not sure what "operational changes" I'm proposing except that it's freaking rude to bang on the door and bust in my room I'm not checked out of.

They aren't cleaning it right now whether they knock or not. So go away. Like every other hotel.

 

[tjkraz]

I literally got an alert about my room status while I was in an Uber at the guard gate at the GF. So, yea, Disney knows exactly where you are. Between the WDW app and the bands of course they know where you are.

So when I've got 5 MagicBands in my Owner's Locker at bell services on arrival day and I'm in an airplane, where does Disney think I am?

When I'm at the parks using my Apple Watch to tap in while one magic band is in the hotel room and another is in my wife's backpack, where am I?

Correlation does not imply causation. Just because you happen to get a text when you arrive does not mean that Disney actively knew where you were located. There are a dozen reasons why that doesn't even work as illustrated above. If anything, your text message was probably initiated based upon the arrival time you specified during online check-in.

 

[tjkraz]

But they don't clean every single room every day. I don't know the make up, but I would guess very few stays are one night. Yes, turning over a room takes more time, but that balances out with the room that just gets trash emptied.

I wasn't implying that they needed to clean every single room in the hotel. Rather that every room is occupied every night. That each room being vacated by 11am needs to be clean by 4pm for a newly arriving guest. The fact that most of those rooms have barely been serviced in as many as 7 days certainly complicates matters.

Resorts have a 5 hour window and they try to extend that by getting into vacated rooms as quickly as possible. That doesn't mean blindly knocking on every door at 8am to roust people out of bed. It means first cleaning the rooms that they know are empty and then trying to find others from guests who didn't bother to complete the check-out process.

 

[RoseGold]

So when I've got 5 MagicBands in my Owner's Locker at bell services on arrival day and I'm in an airplane, where does Disney think I am?

When I'm at the parks using my Apple Watch to tap in while one magic band is in the hotel room and another is in my wife's backpack, where am I?

Correlation does not imply causation. Just because you happen to get a text when you arrive does not mean that Disney actively knew where you were located. There are a dozen reasons why that doesn't even work as illustrated above. If anything, your text message was probably initiated based upon the arrival time you specified during online check-in.

The app knows exactly where you are from your location services on your phone. That's how it tells you where to order food and shows you on the map.

The new MB+ plus your phone via Bluetooth know exactly where you are. The games are riding rides and finding the statues by going to specific locations.

 

[tjkraz]

They aren't cleaning it right now whether they knock or not. So go away.

The goal is to locate rooms which have been vacated without guests having checked-out. And it works.

Like every other hotel.

It's not a hotel. Ignore all of the differences if you wish, but housekeeping at timeshares is a different animal with unique challenges.

 

[PollyannaMom]

I get they have to round up overstays, but check out time is 11AM. Why are they still harassing people this early?

There's no excuse for harassing you, but I definitely get that they have to start on the rooms of people who do leave before 11:00 (for flights or breakfast reservations or whatever) in order to finish them all by 4:00. (Plus, I'm sure there are plenty of people who ask for early check-in, and they want to make those customers happy as well.) They really need a system for confirming with the front desk before potentially waking guests up, though.

For now, I guess I would put out the "do not disturb" sign when you go to bed.

Our room wasn't ready for check in until around 5:00 PM. They definitely have housekeeping issues.

That's a good point as well. Like so many other businesses lately, they're probably dealing with a smaller staff than they used to have. So fewer housekeepers are trying to get the same number of rooms cleaned in a short time. (Plus, there were extra cleaning measures were enacted during covid, so they're expected to do more than they used to...with fewer people.) No a reason for repeated knocking after you've answered, barging in, etc. - but it can't be easy. I don't envy them!

 

[tjkraz]

The app knows exactly where you are from your location services on your phone. That's how it tells you where to order food and shows you on the map.

In that case, the phone itself is doing the heavy lifting. It's the phone's GPS feature which tracks your location and allows it to be shared with the Disney app.

Whether or not that location is beamed back to Disney in some meaningful fashion is another matter. The GPS in my car shows where I'm located but that doesn't mean Garmin or Chrysler or the GPS satellite owner has access to realtime data about my location.

In truth, I don't know exactly what data is passed to Disney via the app permissions. But I do know that I would never endorse any process which places that data in the hands of front-line employees. There is massive potential for theft or even stalking of guests if CMs had real-time data on guest locations.

The new MB+ plus your phone via Bluetooth know exactly where you are. The games are riding rides and finding the statues by going to specific locations.

Similarly, all the MagicBand+ does is know when you're within a certain proximity to a sensor. In a hotel room, there's no way to tell if that MagicBand is on someone's wrist.

 

[Genie+]

Is this less common for cash stays?

They’re struggling to hire an adequate amount of staff but still need to be professional. It’s not good hospitality to let it appear guests matter less in their last hours. Because that’s how it looks even if not intentional. Something’s not working right if people are getting inconveniently locked out in the last hours, or made to feel less than welcome before 11am check out.

How would we react to a story where a guest gets forceful trying to check in at 2pm? If that’s wrong it should apply in both directions. Maybe the check out portion of the app should include notes like the checkin part. Then guests can put it right in the system that they’re leaving between 8-9am or sleeping in after a late night and plan to checkout just prior to 11am.

 

[SL6827]

Give it time, the new check in hours will gravitate to 5 pm and check out at 10 am. Just give it time.

 

[RoseGold]

Give it time, the new check in hours will gravitate to 5 pm and check out at 10 am. Just give it time.

Checkout 9AM or pay $75 for 1PM!

 

[SL6827]

Checkout 9AM or pay $75 for 1PM!

Ya buddy.