Direct-to-Room, room charges, and resort hoping questions

I am not sure, but let me do some research today and see what I can find out for you

I've always gotten two three bills from each when we switch resorts. Most are by email now. Trip last June was three resorts...no issues.

But I never checked in direct to room yet. That will be in 62 days for us!

Good questions! With the direct-to-room being so new, I'm not sure of all of the answers.

All of the information I'm reading says that you either have to have paid in full, OR set-up a credit card and pin. So, you should be good. I don't think I'd want to take a chance of this was really important to me, and I'd pay it off a couple of days in advance.

The folios have been emailed, at least on my last trip. I got "two" ... the one with everything on it at check-out, and then one with the additional charges. It was actually kinda depressing waking up with an email from Disney reminding me I was leaving in a few hours.

In terms of the charging, this seems to be a bit of a grey area. I think that the charges would go to your "old" room until you check-in to your "new" room, which may be when your room is ready.

I'm sorry, these are good questions. I'm sure someone with first-hand experience over the past month or so will be along soon. Also, you'll have to let us know how it went, so we can learn from you too.

Goofy4TheWorld;2451287 wrote: I have some questions about the new Direct-To-Room check-in option at Disney resorts.

First, I have read that you have to have your room paid in full, which would always be the case for a package reservation, but what about a room-only reservation? I would already have a credit card and PIN established on my MDE account for Magic Band charging in the parks, but would that be used for Disney to charge the room in full the day of arrival for a room-only? I am trying to figure out if I should initiate a room-only payoff a week before my arrival.

Updating my own post, I just initiated a full payoff of my room-only about 7 days prior to my arrival, so I am not sure what would have happened had I still had a balance due on my check-in day. But my "second resort" charging privileges worked like a charm, so I guess I did something right.

Goofy4TheWorld;2451287 wrote: I have some questions about the new Direct-To-Room check-in option at Disney resorts.

Second, I am resort hoping mid-trip. How does the MDE system know when to stop posting Magic Band charges to room #1 and start charging them to room #2 on the day I move resorts? In the old days you had separate KTTK cards for each room folio, but now they all share one MDE account with all of your Magic Bands combined. Both resort reservations are linked in my MDE account, but I can't figure out how this would work exactly. I ALWAYS use my room account folio to track and save trip costs and would really like to keep charging active throughout all days of my trip.

My experience was as follows (for reference, my first resort was POP, my second resort was CBR.

As Disney has always done, my Pop folio balance was charged to my Visa card in the early morning hours (around 3am) of my departure date. My wife charged some breakfast items at 6am and those charges were posted to my CBR folio. So my guestimation is that if you have a "second resort" on your MDE account, they will begin posting all of your "resort-hopping-day" purchases to your second resort as soon as they "zero-out" your first folio.

Goofy4TheWorld;2451287 wrote: I have some questions about the new Direct-To-Room check-in option at Disney resorts.

Third, how is Disney delivering your room folio detail now? It used to be hung on the door the morning of your checkout, but of course that always left anything you charged on your departure day to be settled to your credit card without a final detailed bill unless you went to get a final copy at the check-in desk. Does Disney now email those folios, or can you see stuff online now?

My experience was that my first resort, which was a package reservation, was delivered via email. My second resort, which was a room-only reservation, was hung on my door on my departure day.

There was something not quiet right about my CBR folio, the printout had a lot of data fields blank that my Pop folio did not, I am not sure what happened, but all of my account-related stuff at CBR was riddled with technical issues. So because CBR did not have my email address on my folio, I did not receive a detailed statement for the charges made on my departure day. It wasn't a big deal (since I keep all receipts) but it was still puzzling why Pop went so smoothly and CBR did not.

But the best part was, as posted above, at no point during my trip was I cut off from room charges, which has been a problem that has plagued me for every trip I had taken for the 5 years prior to now.

One final note....

I had read on Intercot that parking passes were being given at the security gate in order to facilitate the direct-to-room option. However, at both Pop and CBR the security guards looked at me like I was crazy and said that I had to go to the front desk to get a parking pass. Doing so kind of defeats the purpose of the direct-to-room option, but it was what I had to do at both resorts.

Goofy4TheWorld;2463600 wrote: One final note....

I had read on Intercot that parking passes were being given at the security gate in order to facilitate the direct-to-room option. However, at both Pop and CBR the security guards looked at me like I was crazy and said that I had to go to the front desk to get a parking pass. Doing so kind of defeats the purpose of the direct-to-room option, but it was what I had to do at both resorts.

Excellent point. I guess they still have a few bugs to work out with the direct-to-room checkin.

Do you use the parking pass because you drive to the parks?