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WaPo article about “trip stacking”
Nov. 27th, 2021 02:34 pmI had to read it to understand the term. Once I did, I was like, I’ve been doing that for years. Not every trip! But for about a decade, I was taking the family to visit one of R.’s two sisters for T-weekend or Christmas or both. And they didn’t even want to start talking about what the plan was until September at the earliest. Of course by then, the Residence Inns closest to them / with the nicest rooms / with the 2 bedroom suites were all booked up. So I started booking the Residence Inn we liked in both locations for both T-weekend and Christmas, and then as soon as I found out what the real plan was, I canceled everything that we were not going to use. I didn’t feel bad about it, because I usually canceled by mid-October (end of October was usually the latest, altho I think we went into November for a Christmas stay once), and the whole issue was that they were fully booked by the holidays. Those rooms, once released, would be used.
I’ve also booked a hotel for a DisneyLand stay while waitlisted for Grand Californian. I didn’t ever cancel the hotel, because GCV waitlisting failed. Good thing I stacked!
More recently, I have a speculative trip coming up in the spring, which would definitely involve visiting my sister, but which might involve meeting up with cousins as well. I had booked a hotel near my sister, and also one in DC proper, and I figured I would make adjustments if needed (I might have wanted all or almost all of the rooms, if I was going to also be supplying rooms to the cousins — I really did not know). I recently learned that the cousins are definitively not going, so I canceled all of the hotels, moved the trip to a different location (but still do-able for my sister’s family) and got a VRBO instead. But this is canceling more than 90 days out, so no worries. I also had ground transportation lined up ; I canceled all of that, too. I had carefully made sure that the train tickets were bought at a level that would fully refund.
I did _not_ trip stack for another future trip, when I thought two nights would be in a different location. In the event, the reason for those two nights evaporated, and I didn’t have a stay in the other place I wanted to be. It was difficult to recover from that, but it worked out.
Honestly, “trip stacking” is not that implausible a thing to do, if one’s trip plans are dependent upon the whims of others, who have not yet made up their mind. I know, I could just never travel in a way that would depend upon others’ delayed choices, but also, I live in a Real World, in which the people I actually love don’t necessarily have the ability to plan things as far in advance as would be helpful for my purposes. This way, I don’t need to apply pressure to them.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/tips/trip-stacking-bookings-covid-cancelations/
I’ve also booked a hotel for a DisneyLand stay while waitlisted for Grand Californian. I didn’t ever cancel the hotel, because GCV waitlisting failed. Good thing I stacked!
More recently, I have a speculative trip coming up in the spring, which would definitely involve visiting my sister, but which might involve meeting up with cousins as well. I had booked a hotel near my sister, and also one in DC proper, and I figured I would make adjustments if needed (I might have wanted all or almost all of the rooms, if I was going to also be supplying rooms to the cousins — I really did not know). I recently learned that the cousins are definitively not going, so I canceled all of the hotels, moved the trip to a different location (but still do-able for my sister’s family) and got a VRBO instead. But this is canceling more than 90 days out, so no worries. I also had ground transportation lined up ; I canceled all of that, too. I had carefully made sure that the train tickets were bought at a level that would fully refund.
I did _not_ trip stack for another future trip, when I thought two nights would be in a different location. In the event, the reason for those two nights evaporated, and I didn’t have a stay in the other place I wanted to be. It was difficult to recover from that, but it worked out.
Honestly, “trip stacking” is not that implausible a thing to do, if one’s trip plans are dependent upon the whims of others, who have not yet made up their mind. I know, I could just never travel in a way that would depend upon others’ delayed choices, but also, I live in a Real World, in which the people I actually love don’t necessarily have the ability to plan things as far in advance as would be helpful for my purposes. This way, I don’t need to apply pressure to them.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/tips/trip-stacking-bookings-covid-cancelations/