Guest experiences with daily room checks

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Stayed at AKL Jambo from Nov. 6-10. I saw the gentleman that was checking rooms on day 1 and let him know when we would be out each day. He made comments on his pad and kindly told me it was not a problem. We never saw him again the entire trip.
 
Stayed at POP six days in late October. We declined mousekeeping and I ( for reasons I won’t discuss here) explained to the check - in lady why we were requesting that they CALL OUR ROOM before just walking in. She said “ that won’t be necessary” and I’m not sure what she meant but no one ever came to our room. We were there all different times. Maybe they weren’t checking the week we were there?? Maybe they don’t check all buildings every week? I don’t know.
 
We stayed in Caribbean Beach in mid-October for 10 days. We declined Mousekeeping. A mousekeeper came to our door on the second to the last day and asked if we needed anything. Other then that the only time someone came to our room (to my knowledge) was when they had to change the sheets after my daughter had an accident on the 2nd night. No issues at all for us.
 
We checked out of POFQ this morning after a 7-night stay. We napped every afternoon and took our time this morning packing up. We never once were interrupted or saw anyone doing room checks. Housekeeping came by around 10 this morning as we were packing - we asked for a few more minutes and that was no problem.
 


Stayed 3 nights this weekend at GF, DH & I were out in the AM then back to the room mid afternoon for nap/chill time before heading back out for dinner. Used the RO sign & the latch whenever we were in the room & had no issues whatsoever. Room was always cleaned before we were back in the afternoon. Hopefully our BWI stay next April will go as smoothly!
 
So this new policy annoys me greatly, but it actually hasn't negatively effected me since it has started. I just don't like knowing our stay could be interrupted and think the policy could be handled better. We stayed at the Polynesian for one night and then Grand Floridian Villas for five nights. We weren't in the room much at Poly, but we were at GF. On Sunday housekeeping knocked in the morning and we told them we were getting ready for our wedding and didn't need the room made up this day. People were in the room until 1pm so if a room check happened it was after everyone left after that. The room was not made up while we were out until midnight. Monday we were out of the room early and when we got back at 4pm the room was cleaned. On Tuesday housekeeping came to the room early and we told them we weren't going to the park until later and come back then. When we got back to the room around 4pm they were in the middle of cleaning and we asked for just some towels that we wanted to rest and she left. Wednesday housekeeping knocked early again. We were checking out and I told her we would be out by 11am. She was very apologetic for knocking. Our room occupied sign disappeared after our first night from the door.
 
We were at Yacht Club for 4 nigths at the end of October. I was prepared to be annoyed by the daily room checks, but happy to say we were not. The first day we returned from the parks around 2:30pm. Our room had not been serviced and we wanted to lay down and relax before going back out for dinner, and didn’t need a bed made up this late in the day. We knew we couldn’t nap, because we would no doubt be disturbed. Around 3pm, housekeeping knocked on the door. We said we didn’t need anything (only 2 of us in the room), but we said she could come in and take the trash, hoping that would satisfy the room check requirements. It apparently did. The remainder of our days, our room was made up while we were in the parks, so no problem.
 


I just ended a rather long stay at DVC's Old Key West, which began on October 21, 2018 and ended on November 9, 2018. What I learned from cast members here is sometime in July 2018 a reversal of a portion of the new policy occurred. This occurred again with the same lack of transparency the as it began.... None.

What changed was the cast members are to respect the new "room occupied" sign the same way as the old "Do not disturb" sign was prior to the institution of the new policy. Specifically not to enter a room by any cast member other than housekeeping if that sign is shown on the entry door. In many specific situations I can testify that our privacy was respected. Cast members would not even knock on the door if that sign was present unless it was housekeeping cast members.

I honestly believe this is a good compromise and provides those attending Disney a balance between security and privacy. It is obvious that Disney responded to the many who raised their concerns about this new policy and hopefully learned an important lesson.

Earlier this year I helped document here on Dis Boards, a new policy at Disney which started January 8, 2018 which began the process of putting Disney eyes into every occupied room. I shared a letter I had sent to Disney management detailing my concerns about this new policy. The policy created a rather strict implementation of entering every room no matter the implications to personal privacy.

Even though that thread was active for months, for those who are not familiar with it, here is a link to that open letter to Disney:

An Open Letter to Disney about Mandatory Room Checks.

Another thread recently was created which allowed me to share with the possibility of comments after my own trip under this policy. Here is that link:

Results of Open Letter to Disney

I want to thank all those who shared their concerns while visiting Disney. Our ability to share this with the many who read this forum certainly helped.

Thanks

Rees Roberts

Three60guy
 
We were at All Star Sports for Food and Wine half weekend, so Nov 1-5.

On Friday we came back from the 5K around 11 (stopped at AK for FOP and the food court for a late breakfast) and the room had not been serviced. We took about two hours to shower, nap and get dressed before heading back out. The room was made up when we got back.

Saturday we stayed at Epcot after the race until after lunch for character photos, getting back around 1PM. The room was not serviced. We didn’t have a RO sign in our room so I wrote a note that we were napping and to please not disturb since the housekeeper was only 2 doors away. About 3:30PM the room checking gentleman knocked and I explained that we were just waking up and to please come back later. He asked if 6PM would work and we said that would be fine. The room wasn’t serviced that day, but it wasn’t important to us that day.
 
We just finished up a 1-night cash stay at AKL followed by a 4-night DVC rental at BRV. We were never disturbed when we were in the room and our trash was removed daily at BRV.
 
Just stayed 6 nights at SRR (DVC) never saw a soul and we loved the daily trash pickup.
 
Just finished a 1 week stay at Poly, and were not disturbed at all by room check. We had housekeeping, and used the RO sign and latch when in the room. Left the room by about 9:30 am each day and arrived back about 6 pm, room was always made up. Thankfully peaceful stay! :yay:
 
We did 2 days at AKL and 7 days at Grand Floridian and did not see security once. Our garbage was emptied each day and the last day housekeeping did knock around 830 am. We were all packed and leaving anyway. The lady was very nice and said she would come back. I know it was really strict at the beginning and honestly I was worried about it a bit, but it was fine for us.
 
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Stayed at OKW in the beginning of November, and trash was removed each day with no disturbance except for our first full day (we left the room each day at 8:30 and returned between 1-2 and then left again for dinner etc.).
One our first full day, we returned early afternoon, and I left for the pool around 2pm. With the sign on the door, DH was napping, but was woken by knocking for the trash removal. He explained that he was napping and could they wait for a moment, but by the time he got to the door, the person was gone.
He went back to sleep, but received a call about 15 minutes later saying that "we were due for a trash removal". He asked if they could come back later, and they did.
 
Stayed CL at BWI for Thanksgiving week. Never saw security on the floor, only housekeeping, maintenance staff, lounge attendants and the desk concierges. Room was cleaned every day except when once again somebody left the "Room Occupied" sign outside for the day. I despise walking into an unkempt room and plan to hide the demndable sign the minute we check in next trip; semi-rant over. One day DGD needed to stay in and do some research for a school project. She spent her time between the room and lounge and sat on the balcony when the room attendant came to do the room. The security check was a nonevent for us at least as far as distrubance when napping or showering.
 
We just finished a 6 night stay at CSR, declined mousekeeping at check-in for the GC, kept the room occupied sign up and we experienced a check from Security every single day. We didn't leave the room until about noon each day because we like to take our time in the morning and stay at the parks until close. Almost like clockwork, security knocked on the door around 10:30-11:00am and wanted to come into the room and look around. I'm pretty easy going about these things, but after the first few times it got annoying. Especially because one of us was usually in the shower and it feels pretty invasive to have somebody looking around your room like that.
 
I was at POR from 11/30 through 12/4. There was no "Room Occupied" sign in our room so I was worried about the room checks more than on previous trips this year but we were never disturbed. The only knock we were present for was on our last morning when housekeeping knocked around 9:30 am, we told them we were packing up and would be out by 10:30 and that was it. We did rope drop one morning and then came back to the room around 11:00 and we were in there until just after 1:00 and I figured we'd get a knock since our room had not yet been made up but we did not see anyone. Our room was made up when we got back later that night.
 
We were at Pop Century 12/6-12/9 and declined housekeeping. We were never bothered by people doing security checks and never saw any sign that anyone had been in our room. Other than for sleeping, we were briefly in the room on 12/10 in the early afternoon and we were in the room for a couple of hours on 12/11. We did not have a Room Occupied sign, so we just kept the latch on while we were there. The only time anyone knocked on our door was our departure day, when housekeeping knocked at about 8:30. My sister-in-law told her we had a late checkout and wouldn't be out of the room until 1, and the housekeeper said she would check back later, but no one knocked again before we left at 12:15.
 
We are at BCV’s and for the first 4 days they never even came to empty the trash. I called downstairs as I was confused with what the new policy was. They sent someone up immediately. Next day trash gone when we came back. Then knock at door at 945 am today. We were all in Pjs and sign on door. No system seems in place here. Going into occupied rooms makes no sense. To top it off we didn’t even get into our room till 4:45 pm checkin day and we had checked in online and went to main desk at 10:30 am that day. They need a better system with housekeeping here. I didn’t expect my room to be ready at 1030 but 445 is unacceptable. They better not wake us up tomorrow or I’ll hang my own sign that we are sleeping.
 
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