Got bullied by II into cancelling my search

Called II this morning, within 9 hours of an auto-confirmation of a search I had going. Got matched to New Orleans for President's Day week, but it's only a studio and I would rather hold out for the slim hope of getting Mardi Gras or Jazz Festival, given that my 2016 vacation weeks are getting booked up.

Very nice rep on the phone, who sternly told me that I've reached the limit of cancelling exchanges. That I've cancelled four times previously (this would be the fifth time, and five is the limit) and even though my cancellations were done within 24 hours each time, that five is the limit and I won't be able to cancel this fifth time, even though cancelling within 24 hours. I politely told her that I haven't seen that "five time" limit anywhere in the rules, and that I'm cancelling within 24 hours, and that I wanted her to go ahead and return my search to a pending search, and that I would tweak the dates to what I want now.

She put me on hold and told me that she did some research and the best she could do for me is cancel the search totally. She said I would be refunded my exchange fee, but the only way she can handle this is to cancel this search since I'm cancelling after matching to weeks that I've requested.

Honestly, after that long, I ran out of patience and out of time. And meekly agreed to cancel the search (which is so unlike me, the meek part). if the rep had been offensive or rude in any way, I would have taken the time to argue about it.

Has this happened to anyone else? I feel silly now for cancelling the search when I didn't really have to and I've lost the priority date for when the search was started, plus I have to take the time to set up a new search, and I have to track that the refund actually did go through.

Please clarify - why have you cancelled it so many times?

Maybe she just changed her mind. Maybe it was within twenty years. What difference does it make? Either II has a rule like this, or it doesn't. Either you can cancel during the first 24 hours without penalty or you can't.

I honestly don't know, or I'd be helping her.

Fern

I know I had cancelled the one previous to this because I had put in New Orleans for jazz week and got matched up to Hotel de leau Vive, which Tripadvisor said was worse than a Homeless shelter. previously some dates didn't match up exactly to what I needed. Or I had planned a trip with friends and they had changed their plans and I forgot to change the search. And since I started the search, I've gotten more picky, as I've had less vacation time left to play with. and France is probably off the list now for anytime in the near future. The search was started about a year back.

Does it really matter though how many times I cancelled? Life happens, plans change...

It doesn't matter to me how many times you have cancelled - I was asking about your reasons for canceling, to see if I could help you change your technique, so you can get the exchanges you want.

Suggestion: Instead of requesting a whole region, only request SPECIFIC properties that you know you want, and that will help you reduce the number of exchanges that you have to cancel when you get an undesirable property.

There really is no priority line in II. If you were to place the exact same search now as you had previously, you would be in exactly the same place in the order for a match. II matches OGS based on trade power, not when you opened a request. If someone opens the exact same request months after you but the unit they are offering up carries more trade power, they will get the match first if something comes along.

So no worries about the cancelled search, unless of course the perfect unit you were looking for drops in to II before you can start the search again.

I assume II is trying to curb what it feels is abuse of their policy. They may have an internal unpublished policy that after 5 cancellations, the member is becoming a nuisance, so just cancel their search. Problem is that as dioxide alludes to, you could just place the same search again, unless I suppose II manually looked for it and cancelled it, which I would find dubious. Going forward though, it might be a better use of your time (and II's) to refine your search parameters up front or as they change instead of repeatedly cancelling them after the fact.

Agree that I definitely have a better use for my time instead of spending 20-30 minutes on the phone with II. 5 cancellations seems an arbitrary number though especially since this was over the period of one year. And II didn't cancel without asking me but the rep told me this was the only I could cancel.

What if I was a nonTUGGER though and didn't know II's rules inside out (because of TUG) and I accepted their first statement that I can't cancel at all now because I've cancelled five times.

I don't know New Orleans at all. Give me Lake Tahoe and I have a very short list of what resorts I will search with. Guess it's time to dig through the TUG reviews.

Thanks for the suggestions.

melissy123 said:

Agree that I definitely have a better use for my time instead of spending 20-30 minutes on the phone with II. 5 cancellations seems an arbitrary number though especially since this was over the period of one year. And II didn't cancel without asking me but the rep told me this was the only I could cancel.

What if I was a nonTUGGER though and didn't know II's rules inside out (because of TUG) and I accepted their first statement that I can't cancel at all now because I've cancelled five times.

I don't know New Orleans at all. Give me Lake Tahoe and I have a very short list of what resorts I will search with. Guess it's time to dig through the TUG reviews.

Thanks for the suggestions.

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RCI lets you put a 24 hour hold on an exchange. II does not they only give you a short time to decide am I right?
Silentg

silentg said:

RCI lets you put a 24 hour hold on an exchange. II does not they only give you a short time to decide am I right?
Silentg

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That's pretty much right, but II doesn't put a hold on matches. They automatically confirm it and send you an exchange confirmation. You have 24 hours to call them to cancel it if you don't want it. That is a problem for some if they don't get their confirmation email within the 24 hours.

melissy123 said:

Agree that I definitely have a better use for my time instead of spending 20-30 minutes on the phone with II. 5 cancellations seems an arbitrary number though especially since this was over the period of one year. And II didn't cancel without asking me but the rep told me this was the only I could cancel.

What if I was a nonTUGGER though and didn't know II's rules inside out (because of TUG) and I accepted their first statement that I can't cancel at all now because I've cancelled five times.

I don't know New Orleans at all. Give me Lake Tahoe and I have a very short list of what resorts I will search with. Guess it's time to dig through the TUG reviews.

Thanks for the suggestions.

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Some TUGgers love New Orleans and have been there many times. If you post in the forum for that part of the country, I think they'll be able to help you narrow down your search to the best properties.

I'm sorry I can't help--I don't know New Orleans well and I make most of my exchanges in RCI. Which, although it is not as good as II in some ways, does have a generous hold policy. The whole "you have to call in to cancel" thing always put me off II completely.

Good luck! It will all be worth it when you're having beignets and chicory coffee.

24 hour cancelation policy should be a 24 hour cancelation policy. Either have it available as an option or don't. If you want to limit cancelations make it known that there is a limit to the number of times you can cancel so that the customers are aware. It seems very unfair to inform someone that they've maxed out not knowing there is a limit.

For example - I don't think it's unreasonable for someone to put in a request for a long shot resort covering an entire year just to see if they will get a match. Provides useful information for the future in terms of learning the extent of your week's trading power. If the exchanger can't use the week, they can call and cancel (but it also means they have to be diligent enough to check II every day to catch the confirmation). Makes extra work for II perhaps, but they still make out better statistically allowing people to do this. They get the exchange fee up front. Even if a match never comes through, I'm sure a member is statistically likely to just pick something else with the balance once the trade has been paid.

I've dug my tinfoil hat out of the bottom drawer for this post.

I really have wondered if Interval makes you call in to cancel so they can try to talk you into or upsell you to something. I can't believe they can't come up with a way to cancel a hold, like what RCI does.

For all the RCI bugs, and it is buggy compared to Interval, this is one huge advantage they have over II.

Oh and I hate II's stupid default to Thursday rule that you AGAIN have to call in to have changed. Not very many people travel on a Thursday, it's a stupid system. Friday, okay. But Thursday is dense.

Okay, I feel better now - LOL.

To steer this back on topic, I think I would have left the exchange and called back to see if I got the same story, as long as you had time within the 24-hour window to do that. THen I would have asked for a manager - no way they should just arbitrarily say on your fifth cancellation, if it was in fact your fifth, that you've reached the end of your rope. Courtesy would have been to have advised you last time so you could have dealt with it then.

BevL said:

I've dug my tinfoil hat out of the bottom drawer for this post.

Oh and I hate II's stupid default to Thursday rule that you AGAIN have to call in to have changed. Not very many people travel on a Thursday, it's a stupid system. Friday, okay. But Thursday is dense.

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I got a Marriott exchange, thru II, into 2-BDRM at the Aruba Surf Club this last May. At first, I wasn't too happy about a Thursday-Thursday exchange, as you noted. I also wan't very happy to find how long it was going to take to fly to Aruba from Las Vegas and that we had to fly the red-eye and half the next day,

Well, we turned the lemon into lemonade. We fly JetBlue non-stop to JFK on Sunday, where we spent Sunday to Thursday morning in NYC at HGVC W57th St and had a great time. Thursday morning we flew down to Aruba. In addition, I read of all the horror stories about 3 hour waits trying to make it thru the Aruba airport to board the plane. Although we got tho the airport at least 2-hours early, because it was Thursday, we brezzed thru customs, security, luggage check-in, etc, in about 20 minutes, with no trouble at all. Granted, I had extra vacation time that I was able to use, but the Thursday check-in did work out for use.

Ron98GT said:

I got a Marriott exchange, thru II, into 2-BDRM at the Aruba Surf Club this last May. At first, I wasn't too happy about a Thursday-Thursday exchange, as you noted. I also wan't very happy to find how long it was going to take to fly to Aruba from Las Vegas and that we had to fly the red-eye and half the next day,

Well, we turned the lemon into lemonade. We fly JetBlue non-stop to JFK on Sunday, where we spent Sunday to Thursday morning in NYC at HGVC W57th St and had a great time. Thursday morning we flew down to Aruba. In addition, I read of all the horror stories about 3 hour waits trying to make it thru the Aruba airport to board the plane. Although we got tho the airport at least 2-hours early, because it was Thursday, we brezzed thru customs, security, luggage check-in, etc, in about 20 minutes, with no trouble at all. Granted, I had extra vacation time that I was able to use, but the Thursday check-in did work out for use.

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Oh, I completely agree that travelling midweek works well - done it ourselves as our schedule is flexible and often FF tickets have worked out better to not fly on a weekend. And just generally less stress, especially to vacation destinations.

But to revert automatically to a Thursday is dense, as it doesn't work for the majority of working people or folks with kids in school. If I wanted to travel midweek, I'd put my search dates in for a midweek match.

And per my new post today, I have to call because my search matched me for a date I didn't want because it backed me up two days from what I had requested. However, I have this one week left to use and then I will not be dealing with Interval exchanges any longer.