[ 2012 ] Huge change in wyndham fiscal year policy!!

[rcollinsny]

Has anyone else received an email from Wyndham stating that they are forcing all of your contracts to have the same fiscal year ending date? We got one today and I called the Presidential Reserve hotline to see what was going on. They confirmed that as of November 19, 2012, all 19 of our contracts will have the same fiscal year ending date!!

That will kill our ability to roll cancel points from one fiscal year to another. As it is now we never have to worry about losing cancel points. The new scheme means we will have to use all cancel points in the year issued or they will be lost.

This was a benefit promoted by the Wyndham sales staff to encourage people to buy additional contracts so their cancel points would never expire. (we did not buy from Wyndham for this but did buy resale contracts to achieve the same goal)

Between this and the Club Access feature which killed the advantage of owning at a specific resort for ARP privileges for existing owners prior to Club Access, we are quickly losing all of the benefits previously provided by Wyndham.

 

[Rent_Share]

(we did not buy from Wyndham for this but did buy resale contracts to achieve the same goal)

So your cash loss is minimal

 

[scootr5]

No, I haven't received anything like that.

If it somehow turns out to be true, FWIW owner care offered to adjust a year's end date for me on a contract, but said they couldn't do it if I had any pooled points......

 

[rcollinsny]

Game plan has changed!!

So your cash loss is minimal

David,

It is not the cash lost from the purchase but the effect on our ability to effectively manage our points. Currently we are not concerned about how many cancel points we generate because we can always roll them over to the next fiscal year. Going forward if we end up with unused cancel points at the end of the year, we lose them. We rent a lot of our points so this dramatically changes the game plan!!

 

[vckempson]

That really stinks. I haven't gotten anythig yet. Mabye I'm so small as to fly under the radar screen. Being able to perpetially roll points forward is a big benefit to lose.

 

[pacodemountainside]

Yes, it is ipso facto.

Actually, they are switching everyone from FISCAL year TO a calendar year!

Like transferring points between owners accounts, history on the 19th.

Could you elaborate on comment that CWA has had a material impact on ARP reservations? I have yet to see a post documenting.

Since this is within VOI Trust it really does not provide any cash for Wyndham sales.

As the Triumvirate running Trust will say, it is to make things more gooder for the majority.

The more points in the Trust at 60 days, the more for EH to legally steal and rent out.

Has anyone other than lying salesperson said "You Are In Good Hands With Wyndham"?

 

[bogey21]

That really stinks. I haven't gotten anythig yet. Mabye I'm so small as to fly under the radar screen. Being able to perpetially roll points forward is a big benefit to lose.

Just like Marriott. Get you to buy based on one set of benefits then change the rules when it suits them. Why are we surprised?

George

 

[csxjohn]

If you have a contract with a specific time period, how do they unilaterally change it?

I understand them changing VIP benefits because that is not contractual but I really don't understand this.

After 6 months of trying to understand W points, I think I know less now than when I started.

 

[scootr5]

If you have a contract with a specific time period, how do they unilaterally change it?

I understand them changing VIP benefits because that is not contractual but I really don't understand this.

After 6 months of trying to understand W points, I think I know less now than when I started.

Yes, I would think that both sides would need to agree.

 

[rcollinsny]

Yes, it is ipso facto.

Could you elaborate on comment that CWA has had a material impact on ARP reservations? I have yet to see a post documenting.

"?

The main advantage at buying points at a specific resort was to get ARP benefits at that resort. In the past ONLY owners at that resort could book a reservation at the 13 month window. Now all CWA owners can book at the same 13 month window. So owning advantages at a specific resort has been dramatically reduced based on CWA. It used to be limited based on the number of owners that the home resort was allowed to have based on deeded proportions but not any longer. We have already not been able to book prime seasonal activities that we were always able to book before CWA came into effect and it will only get worse since there is NO limit on the number of CWA owners!!

 

[rcollinsny]

Stone Walled by Wyndham

Yes, I would think that both sides would need to agree.

Apparently not, we have 10 contracts with fiscal year dates that they are forcing to have calendar year dates. Believe me, it fell on deaf ears when I called Wyndham and complained!!

 

[lcml11]

David,

It is not the cash lost from the purchase but the effect on our ability to effectively manage our points. Currently we are not concerned about how many cancel points we generate because we can always roll them over to the next fiscal year. Going forward if we end up with unused cancel points at the end of the year, we lose them. We rent a lot of our points so this dramatically changes the game plan!!

I have received no letter at this point. However, I agree, this changes the game, my three observations:

1st: if this means that the ability to use the book and cancel with the cancelled points rolling over into a future use year is now a thing of the past, this will place increasing weight on the use of the credit pool.

2nd: if the above happens and if the 1st point is true, then, the ability to use the book, cancel, rebook at under 60 days will be greatly curtailed. Cancelled and re-booked high cost summer weeks would create a significant number of points that would then presumably need to be used by December 31. This, in turn, would probably result in even less availabilty for bookings in the August to December time frame due to points becoming a use or loss situation.

3rd: If the above points all occur, it will make mandatory an aggressive use of the cancelled points before regular points (the borrowed points situation).

 

[pacodemountainside]

The main advantage at buying points at a specific resort was to get ARP benefits at that resort. In the past ONLY owners at that resort could book a reservation at the 13 month window. Now all CWA owners can book at the same 13 month window. So owning advantages at a specific resort has been dramatically reduced based on CWA. It used to be limited based on the number of owners that the home resort was allowed to have based on deeded proportions but not any longer. We have already not been able to book prime seasonal activities that we were always able to book before CWA came into effect and it will only get worse since there is NO limit on the number of CWA owners!!

You are sadly mistaken on how CWA operates and your woes not due to it. Each resort has so many units converted to symbolic points.

If I buy say a 154 point CWA contract and Wyndham deposits with CWA then there are 154K points at that resort available to all CWA owners on first comes, first gets. Sure, any ONE owing 154K CWA points at one of around 56 resorts can book there at 13 month point. Once my 154K points are gone CWA owners are SOL.

Also, CWA points are spread over year to prevent CWA owners from all booking prime or special event week.

As a CWA owner I can guarantee if I call red hot resort at say 12 month mark they will say no availability while plenty of ARP.

Yes, CWA does allow owner at Branson, MO where ARP is worthless to pay a ransom and convert to CWA and at 7:00AM grab one unit at red hot resort that some one there has deposited with CWA and gets a reservation somewhere else.

 

[ronparise]

The main advantage at buying points at a specific resort was to get ARP benefits at that resort. In the past ONLY owners at that resort could book a reservation at the 13 month window. Now all CWA owners can book at the same 13 month window. So owning advantages at a specific resort has been dramatically reduced based on CWA. It used to be limited based on the number of owners that the home resort was allowed to have based on deeded proportions but not any longer. We have already not been able to book prime seasonal activities that we were always able to book before CWA came into effect and it will only get worse since there is NO limit on the number of CWA owners!!

I understood that CWA inventory and UDI inventory were in separate buckets for ARP

So, if at a hypothetical 150 unit resort, 50 units are sold into CWA and 100 UDI, the 5000 UDI owners can ARP into the 100 units. And the universe of CWA owners can ARP into 50 units

...To be sure, its as if he owns at a smaller resort but the odds that a UDI owner will get the reservation he wants doesnt change because some of the units are in CWA

If Im right about the separate buckets, I dont see how the number of CWA owners changes anything regarding ARP

 

[rickandcindy23]

Dear Valued Club Wyndham Owner:

We are pleased to inform you of an upcoming change to your CLUB WYNDHAM® Plus membership that will simplify your usage in the future and allow us to better serve you.

As you may know, all contracts in the CLUB WYNDHAM Plus program have one of four "Use Years": January 1 to December 31; April 1 to March 31 of the following year; July 1 to June 30 of the following year, or October 1 to September 30 of the following year.

We have identified your membership as having at least two contracts with different Use Years. This means that you currently have points beginning and ending multiple times throughout the year. In an effort to improve your membership experience, we have begun the process of consolidating all your contracts so that they have the same Use Year End Date, 12/31.

Please note that your contract with the latest Use Year End Date will be unchanged. However, any contract(s) that does not have the same Use Year as the one with the latest End Date will be changed to that date. This change will be effective as of November 19, 2012.

We recognize that moving your Use Year End date to a later quarter also results in a delay of the start date of these points. So, we have been authorized to award you a one-time additional allocation of Points for you to use at no cost to you! The amount of points you will be awarded for each contract is based upon how many quarters we move your Use Year. If it is moved one quarter later, you will receive an additional allocation of 25% of your annual points; If it is moved two quarters later, you will receive an additional allocation of 50% of your annual points; and if it is moved three quarters later, you will receive an additional allocation of 75% of your annual points.

For example:
Contract
Number:
Annual
Points:

Current
Use Year: New
Use Year: Additional One-time Point
Allocation:
??-34- 154,000 1/1 to 12/31 1/1 to 12/31 (no change) n/a
??-76- 300,000 7/1 to 6/30 1/1 to 12/31 150,000

This change does not impact points deposited with RCI, II or the Points Credit Pool, as well as Bonus Points, PIC Points and Cancelled Reservation Points.

Again, this change is effective as of November 19, 2012. After this date, please feel free to check your account status online at clubwyndham.com to confirm the Use Year changes and the award of the additional Point allocations.

If you have any questions related to this matter, we have established a dedicated toll-free phone number, 855-800-6749. This number will be operational Monday through Friday 8am to 8pm EST through the end of the year. We look forward to assisting you with all of your vacation needs and appreciate the opportunity to be of service.

Sincerely,

CLUB WYNDHAM® Plus

 

[SOS8260456]

Cindy, thanks for posting that. It states that PIC contracts will not be affected by this. This is interesting because the use year for PIC contracts begins when you PIC it, so we frequently have "weird" use years, like 1/16/12 to 1/15/13.

I guess I better pay more attention to our emails. We do have one July 1 contract, but the points are all pooled through 2014.

Well, they want this change bad enough to give up all those bonus points, so that tells us right there that owners are getting the short end of the stick in other areas.

 

[SOS8260456]

If Im right about the separate buckets, I dont see how the number of CWA owners changes anything regarding ARP

I think you are correct about the separate buckets.

The problem comes into play as they convince more and more owners to convert to CWA. This makes less units/points available in the older buckets.

We ran into this problem years ago when Equivest was bought out by Festiva. We were not required to convert to Festiva points, but as more people converted to Festiva or defaulted, less inventory became available to us. I am very grateful we got out of that mess. Of course, Equivest had a limited number of properties to begin with, no where near the number of properties that Wyndham has.

 

[rcollinsny]

Perfect Example

I understood that CWA inventory and UDI inventory were in separate buckets for ARP

So, if at a hypothetical 150 unit resort 50 units are sold into CWA and 100 UDI the 5000 UDI owners can ARP into the 100 units. And the universe of CWA owners can ARP into 50 units

...To be sure, its as if he owns at a smaller resort but the odds that a UDI owner will get the reservation he wants doesnt change because some of the units are in CWA

If Im right about the separate buckets, I dont see how the number of CWA owners changes anything regarding ARP

Ron paints a perfect example of what I am talking about. "if at a hypothetical 150 unit resort 50 units are sold into CWA and 100 UDI the 5000 UDI owners can ARP into the 100 units. And the universe of CWA owners can ARP into 50 units".
To prove my point and say this another way, this means that the original UDI owner had "exclusive" access to those 150 units before CWA and is now fighting for only 100 units. So no matter how you divide it up, the original UDI owner has had his ARP availability to that resort cut by 33%!!!

 

[lcml11]

Dear Valued Club Wyndham Owner:

We are pleased to inform you of an upcoming change to your CLUB WYNDHAM® Plus membership that will simplify your usage in the future and allow us to better serve you.

As you may know, all contracts in the CLUB WYNDHAM Plus program have one of four "Use Years": January 1 to December 31; April 1 to March 31 of the following year; July 1 to June 30 of the following year, or October 1 to September 30 of the following year.

We have identified your membership as having at least two contracts with different Use Years. This means that you currently have points beginning and ending multiple times throughout the year. In an effort to improve your membership experience, we have begun the process of consolidating all your contracts so that they have the same Use Year End Date, 12/31.

Please note that your contract with the latest Use Year End Date will be unchanged. However, any contract(s) that does not have the same Use Year as the one with the latest End Date will be changed to that date. This change will be effective as of November 19, 2012.

We recognize that moving your Use Year End date to a later quarter also results in a delay of the start date of these points. So, we have been authorized to award you a one-time additional allocation of Points for you to use at no cost to you! The amount of points you will be awarded for each contract is based upon how many quarters we move your Use Year. If it is moved one quarter later, you will receive an additional allocation of 25% of your annual points; If it is moved two quarters later, you will receive an additional allocation of 50% of your annual points; and if it is moved three quarters later, you will receive an additional allocation of 75% of your annual points.

For example:
Contract
Number:
Annual
Points:

Current
Use Year: New
Use Year: Additional One-time Point
Allocation:
??-34- 154,000 1/1 to 12/31 1/1 to 12/31 (no change) n/a
??-76- 300,000 7/1 to 6/30 1/1 to 12/31 150,000

This change does not impact points deposited with RCI, II or the Points Credit Pool, as well as Bonus Points, PIC Points and Cancelled Reservation Points.

Again, this change is effective as of November 19, 2012. After this date, please feel free to check your account status online at clubwyndham.com to confirm the Use Year changes and the award of the additional Point allocations.

If you have any questions related to this matter, we have established a dedicated toll-free phone number, 855-800-6749. This number will be operational Monday through Friday 8am to 8pm EST through the end of the year. We look forward to assisting you with all of your vacation needs and appreciate the opportunity to be of service.

Sincerely,

CLUB WYNDHAM® Plus

Availabilty for next year may get real brutal. Image the number of points that are being dumped in next year, in essence, as bonus points. I guess that means if you do not want to loss points, it might be wise to start booking before the extra points hit the system.

 

[capital city]

That is only is 1/3 of the owners switch over to CWA (if thats possible) or default on the contracts and Wyndham places them in the CWA. I don't see how the odds would change.

Seems like all can be fixed by paying $39 to credit pool your points and have access to them for 3 years. That also seems much easier then cancelling at certain times and hoping the move to the right time period.

So does this mean that since I just bought a deed with a july1 to june 30th use that if I buy a jan-dec they will automatically move it to july 1 and give me a 50% point bonus?

 

[lcml11]

That is only is 1/3 of the owners switch over to CWA (if thats possible) or default on the contracts and Wyndham places them in the CWA. I don't see how the odds would change.

Seems like all can be fixed by paying $39 to credit pool your points and have access to them for 3 years. That also seems much easier then cancelling at certain times and hoping the move to the right time period.

So does this mean that since I just bought a deed with a july1 to june 30th use that if I buy a jan-dec they will automatically move it to july 1 and give me a 50% point bonus?

I guess that means if you do not want to loss points, it might be wise to start booking before the extra points hit the system. Or, in the alternative, get the points into the credit pool before January 1st arrives, unless you have VIP status. Then it would in accordance with your number of months that apply for the credit pool.

To answer your question, it appears so.

 

[csxjohn]

wrong post, sorry.

 

[am1]

How will converted fixed weeks get treated?

 

[Sandy VDH]

I suspect that is it a technology restriction that is driving the changes to align all of a single members contract to the same end date. It is harder to create a system with multiple business rules that have various end dates.

I do understand that you have been able to make use of a shortcoming in the current system by rolling over canceled points from one use year to the other. But is that really a lack of enforcement of an existing policy vs a change in business rules. Obviously the current system is that way, which is why you have been able to roll over canceled points beyond their intended expiration date.

Wyndham's rules, as described, never intended to allow you to roll cancelled points ahead in perpetuity, however the current system can not keep straight what the source date is of the points used, so therefore it does not know what use year to put those points back into. It puts them into the latest cancelled use year, not necessarily the use year to the points actually came from. If the system could figure use years out it could enforce it.

Logically it is much more complicated to write a system that has variable expiration dates per membership. So it seems after many years Wyndham has finally realized this and are changing contracts to align all contracts in a membership to the same calendar year. Thus making systems easier to code and enforce. The current system has no issues enforcing this rule for all contracts ending on the same use year.

It is not a change for me as all my contracts have the same use year end date. So this shortcoming of the Wyndham system is not a shortcoming I have been utilizing. However I see it as a shortcoming and not a right.

I can see getting annoyed about losing a loophole that has been in place for sometime, but it is indeed a loophole, and not an new business rule change.

I have had other loopholes that I have used from time to time, but I see them as loopholes I can exploit. Not a rule that has been changed or privilege that has taken away. There has been many of those VIP perks that have been adjusted, but Wyndham's rules do allow them to change things. So I can not like it but I have no choice. The change they are asking for is more of an enforcement of stated rules.

You can be annoyed, but I am not sure you really can force Wyndham into letting you to keep the perpetuity of rolling forward cancelled points. Clearly that was not what they intended.

They did change the rules to allow you to deposit cancelled points into RCI, but cancelled points must be used or deposited.

I don't really see the points being given out as adjustments as bonus points. But rather prorating you assignment of points over the length of time they are adjusting your use year. If they change your use year and move it back 6 months, you are basically getting 18 months use, so therefore 150% of your annual allotment. They call it a bonus, but what's in a name. Bonus should better, but you are not getting anything more or less then you were contractually obligated to. If you took your annual years points and figured out what you earn a quarter they are just allocating that per quarter over the extension of your use year to get to the same calendar end date. Not really a bonus in my eyes.

JMHO

 

[am1]

The problem will be for next year and possibly the year after that there will not be enough reservations available. That will hurt everyone.

This will be even more of a problem as wyndham is going to be giving out bonus points.