# On Megarenters - and why hasn't Worldmark fixed this...



## chemteach

I purchased Worldmark recently, and from the short experience I have had with the online system, it's pretty clear that whatever Worldmark has done with housekeeping fees and guest certificate fees - it may have impacted the bottom line of megarenters, but they are just as active now (concluded based on my studying the availability of Hawaii Xmas weeks for 2019) as they ever were.  Every morning for the last 5 days, I tried to get a good unit at a good time.  But what happens is that between the hours of 6 and 7am, the current date's availability disappears (as expected), but if only one unit was available today, within a half hour, availability for the following 3 days slowly goes from >5 to 0 units available for many unit types - sometimes just for the following day, sometimes for the next 2 days, sometimes for 5 days.  If people are only allowed to book from today to 13 months from today, then the availability of units for the following 6 days should only decrease by the number of units that could be booked 13 months from today.  It seems Worldmark has some serious glitches in its system.  I have not seen anything like this in Vistana.  I have read a lot about people doing strange things with waitlists.  

It doesn't seem like the problem with the system is megarenters - Worldmark has nothing in its bylaws against renting units out.  The problem is with the 13 month rule not being applied equally to all Worldmark owners.  Worldmark really needs to fix the situation with 13 month reservation workarounds.  Owners are blaming megarenters for the problem - but any owner can do whatever it is a megarenter is doing as soon as an owner figures out how to "beat" the system.


If Worldmark wants to fix the real problem, they need to do something about the reservation rules (and the computer programming - their online system is very glitchy) and the waitlist rules.  A small subset of Worldmark owners have the know-how to get reservations booked in advance of 13 months - that's pretty clear.  This morning was crazy to watch how the availability for high demand Xmas weeks suddenly disappeared completely - even checking in on a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday.  Worldmark has to know what is happening - and the fix seems pretty easy - if two accounts appear to be working together in a fixed pattern - where one cancels, and the other account continuously gets the cancelled units off the waitlist - there is clearly a link between the two accounts, and a problem in the system.  If someone at Worldmark took 3 hours to look at the history of waitlist placements and cancellations for Kihei units, they could likely identify a number of people who are using some type of workaround.  Worldmark could contact any owners doing this and tell them to stop. 

There should at least be a rule in place that says if accounts are found to be connected to create workarounds for creating reservations greater than 13 months in advance for more than "x" units per year, those accounts will lose their current reservations.  There could be an additional rule that if those accounts continue to use workarounds, they will no longer be allowed to borrow credits into their account, and not be allowed to make reservations until the 12 (or 11) month window - or... make up a consequence...

I find it difficult to understand why this has gone on for so long.  (Based on prior posts - it appears this is something owners have known about for a good number of years.) The average owner should have the same access to high demand weeks as any other owner - and not have to watch availability for checkin dates 13 months +1,2,3 days out disappear between the hours of 6-6:30am.  It's crazy!!


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> If someone at Worldmark took 3 hours to look at the history of waitlist placements and cancellations for Kihei units, they could likely identify a number of people who are using some type of workaround.  Worldmark could contact any owners doing this and tell them to stop.



Imagine for a second that you are in charge of reaching out to the owners that are using the waitlist to manipulate the reservation process. What do you cite as your authority to "tell them to stop"? The technique they are using is permitted under the current guidelines - because the activity occurs in different accounts. And when they tell you to go pound sand, what is the next step?

After the recent BoD meeting I had a conversation with BoD member Robert Hartsock on this topic. He told me that when he first got on the BoD he thought it could be handled like you suggest - "just send them a cease and desist" letter was his recommendation. But the issues I mention above are the stumbling blocks there.

Attend a BoD meeting and talk to a few BoD members. They are very focused on ending the "internal virus" that plagues Club. The challenge is trying to strike the balance and that any rule/guideline you might come up with has to apply to all members.

The sad part is that waitlist manipulation is likely cause for the Wyndham killing the waitlist system in the future.

ps. Dont get me wrong. I am in agreement with your intent. But the challenge is coming up with a rule. I even suggested something to the BoD - but it would be unlikely to survive a challenge.


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## ronparise

Be assured they are working on a solution and have been for some time. 

But understand renting is specifically allowed by the declaration. So a flat prohibition of rentals is not something that can happen. What they have been doing is closing loopholes and changing rules so that every owner has an equal chance at every reservation. Ie leveling the playing field. Manipulation of the waitlist was never a thing because there were other ways to get a jump on the rest of the owners to make multiple high value reservations. Now that those loopholes are closed the waitlist was exploited. Change the waitlist and they will find something else. It’s been a game of wack a mole 

Wyndham knows who the mega renters are so that’s not an issue, and they know what they are doing to get more than their fair share of high value reservations. The problem has been crafting new rules to level the playing field that are fair to the entire ownership

You are,  i think on the right track when you say they should just tell the megarenters to stop what they are doing

That’s what they did to us club Wyndham megarenters. They suspended our accounts for “unusual activity” and did audits that lasted forever. We were effectively  shut down. I had a choice, I could sign my entire ownership back to Wyndham, or fight them in court. We had a little heart to heart talk and ultimately they made me an offer I couldn’t refuse. and they did the same with all of us. I’m out and I’ve signed an agreement that I’ll never own a wyndham timeshare again 

They then changed the rules to make it really difficult for new megarenter wannabes to get started 

I’m guessing they have something similar in mind for the Worldmark megarenters  There are only about 20 of them. My prediction is that they will contact each one and just suspend their accounts and then dare the owners to challenge them in court. As big as some of the megarenters are,  none of them have the resources to outlast Wyndham in court and all of them have a hot button that when pushed will get them to agree to give up their ownerships 

So be patient, you are gonna get what you want


Just know this, it won’t be any easier to get the reservations you want. You will have a chance at that special reservation  but your chances won’t be much better than they are now


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## ecwinch

As much as I would like to have faith in Ron's prediction, I believe he is comparing an apple to an orange. 

In Club Wyndham, the account suspensions were supported by a credit imbalance in their account, giving Wyndham probable cause to justify the actions taken.

In WM, suspending their accounts without some similar proof would make for a fairly easy court case. Ron's situation was different in that regard and would have undermined his challenge of the actions taken.


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## CO skier

ronparise said:


> Be assured they are working on a solution and have been for some time.
> 
> But understand renting is specifically allowed by the declaration. So a flat prohibition of rentals is not something that can happen.






ronparise said:


> My prediction is that they will contact each one and just suspend their accounts and then dare the owners to challenge them in court.



Therein lies the difference between WorldMark and Club Wyndham.  The WorldMark declaration specifically allows rentals.



ronparise said:


> Just know this, it won’t be any easier to get the reservations you want. You will have a chance at that special reservation  but your chances won’t be much better than they are now


​It is not easy to reserve the Hawaii resorts, for example, but the 13-month availability is definitely better now than it was before the change to grouped reservations and the limitation on transferred credits and housekeeping.  If more owners are staying in popular resorts as a result of these changes, that is a plus for those lucky owners.


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## chemteach

But there is still some kind of workaround that people are using to get reservations at more than 13 months out.  If all owners know how to do this, then there is a fair playing field. The problem is that not all owners know how to do this, so the ability to get a reservation is not up to chance at the same probability for all owners.  It seems to me that the problem is not megarenters - the problem is that people have found ways to play the system.  Worldmark has no rules against renting, but it does have a rule about units being available for rent only at 13 months out.  The BoD should come up with some way to ensure that no one can use a workaround to get reservations guaranteed for a date by starting a reservation 13 months in advance that will guarantee them a reservation 13 months and 2 weeks out.  The changes I saw happening between 6am and 7am this morning (described in the original post) gave fairly clear evidence that something is rotten in Denmark.


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## ecwinch

The work-around they are using requires multiple accounts and large amounts of credits - so it is not something that most owners could do - even if they had the knowledge.

Effectively they first control a block of inventory, then they use the waitlist to chop that inventory up into desirable "rentable" reservations.

The easiest solution is to end the waitlist program. Something Wyndham would love to do IMHO. It is just a question of does the patient survive the cure.

And as bad as it seems now, it was far worse a few years back before they closed the grouped reservation loophole. Back then it was commonplace to rarely see certain resorts available to book 13 months out during prime season.


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## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> The work-around they are using requires multiple accounts and large amounts of credits - so it is not something that most owners could do - even if they had the knowledge.
> 
> Effectively they first control a block of inventory, then they use the waitlist to chop that inventory up into desirable "rentable" reservations.
> 
> The easiest solution is to end the waitlist program. Something Wyndham would love to do IMHO. It is just a question of does the patient survive the cure.
> 
> And as bad as it seems now, it was far worse a few years back before they closed the grouped reservation loophole. Back then it was commonplace to rarely see certain resorts available to book 13 months out during prime season.


Couldn't they make the waitlist work in a way that it couldn't be abused - or create a set of rules that make this workaround no longer work (such as - if 2 or more accounts are found to be working together to aid any owner in securing reservations for a time more than 13 months in advance, those reservations will be cancelled.)  Some older posts I read discussed people doing this at Yellowstone - did Worldmark do anything about that?  Maybe there could be a rule that no owner could have more than 3 units at the same resort in the same timeframe during high demand weeks - or some reasonable number of units that would allow a person to perhaps do a small family reunion but no more than some maximum number.   Or even that only 2 units could be reserved for high demand weeks at any particular resort - some owners would be upset because they may want to do a family reunion - but based on my short experience with online reservations - if everyone truly has equal access to the inventory, no one would even be able to get 2 units at the same resort for the same week because (if everyone had equal access) the units would be gone before a second reservation could go through.  And for resorts like Kihei - they could limit usage to a maximum of (pick a number) weeks per year total in order to provide access to all owners.  

The waitlist rules could certainly be changed to keep someone from controlling a block of inventory.  It doesn't seem like rocket science to figure out how to keep people from abusing the system.  It sounds like Worldmark/Wyndham knows who is doing this, and perhaps there are regular owners who have figured out loopholes to the system. (Maybe Worldmark should just publicize how it's being done so that all owners could know what is needed to allow anyone to have the same access - total sarcasm there...)  It sounds like Worldmark needs to fix the waitlist and reservation system to ensure that all owners have equal access.  It actually sounds like it could be a lawsuit against the BoD and/or the management company because they are not giving every owner equal access to 13 month reservations.  Since the BoD and management company know a problem exists, it is their responsibility to find a solution.  Is anyone on TUG on the BoD?  It sounds from past posts that the BoD is trying to deal with the problem - is anyone from TUG on the Worldmark BoD? Maybe they could really push the issue.


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## chemteach

ronparise said:


> Be assured they are working on a solution and have been for some time.
> 
> But understand renting is specifically allowed by the declaration. So a flat prohibition of rentals is not something that can happen. What they have been doing is closing loopholes and changing rules so that every owner has an equal chance at every reservation. Ie leveling the playing field. Manipulation of the waitlist was never a thing because there were other ways to get a jump on the rest of the owners to make multiple high value reservations. Now that those loopholes are closed the waitlist was exploited. Change the waitlist and they will find something else. It’s been a game of wack a mole
> 
> Wyndham knows who the mega renters are so that’s not an issue, and they know what they are doing to get more than their fair share of high value reservations. The problem has been crafting new rules to level the playing field that are fair to the entire ownership
> 
> 
> I’m guessing they have something similar in mind for the Worldmark megarenters  There are only about 20 of them. My prediction is that they will contact each one and just suspend their accounts and then dare the owners to challenge them in court. As big as some of the megarenters are,  none of them have the resources to outlast Wyndham in court and all of them have a hot button that when pushed will get them to agree to give up their ownerships
> 
> So be patient, you are gonna get what you want
> 
> 
> Just know this, it won’t be any easier to get the reservations you want. You will have a chance at that special reservation  but your chances won’t be much better than they are now



I don't mind having a very small chance to get a reservation - I just hope that any owner trying to get a reservation has equal access.  I get that people may find loopholes - but Worldmark could do something to ensure that units for 13 months +1 to 5 days don't disappear throughout the day at 13 months out.  That's a clear manipulation of something...  Maybe from 13 to 11 months - waitlists can only fill if full weeks are being requested - and whenever two or more accounts are working together (Worldmark can define that) - the accounts should be put on warning and the reservations cancelled (if Worldmark created a rule against such actions.)  

In the meantime - it seems the only way to get the most difficult reservations is for two+ accounts to work the system - that's a sad situation and suggests that Wyndham is selling a product that they know is not what they describe as far as 13 month reservations since they specifically know that people are manipulating the system to ensure at 14+ months out, that they will get the reservation they want.  Marriott explicitly states 50% of inventory can be reserved at 13 months out if 2+ weeks are owned and the reservations are joined together.  Vistana doesn't have this issue.  It's very difficult to get prime weeks at the most desired locations - but it's possible, and it seems everyone has equal access.  I don't know about HGVC/HIVC/Club Wyndham.  The issue to me isn't about whether people are renting - that is clearly allowed by the bylaws, so the BoD and management really have no legal recourse to stop people from doing it.  But the BoD has the responsibility to create rules wherein all owners have equal access, and that no owner can ensure they get a specific reservation earlier than 13 months out (unless they are willing to pay the points for the extra weeks before the reservation they want - and they lose the reservation if they cancel and try to rebook.)


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## bizaro86

The worldmark board is hand picked by Wyndham. WMowners have been trying to get someone else elected for years.

I get that you're disappointed you can't get a reservation for Kihei at Christmas, but some of those suggestions would make the club much less flexible for everyone all the time, which is a bad trade, imo.


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## chemteach

One last suggestion/question - is it possible for Worldmark to list the 3 - 5% most demanded reservations, and create a bylaw that says no more than (pick a number - say 6) weeks per year can be made at 13 months out for these most demanded weeks by any one owner?  This would have little to no effect on any owner with 15,000 or fewer credits in their account.  The problem with that sort of rule is that if someone wanted to spend 3 months straight at a high demand resort, they would no longer have that ability.  

I'm just throwing ideas out there - but ultimately, perhaps the problem could just be fixed by doing something about the waitlist loophole that currently exists.


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## tschwa2

chemteach said:


> One last suggestion/question - is it possible for Worldmark to list the 3 - 5% most demanded reservations, and create a bylaw that says no more than (pick a number - say 6) weeks per year can be made at 13 months out for these most demanded weeks by any one owner?  This would have little to no effect on any owner with 15,000 or fewer credits in their account.  The problem with that sort of rule is that if someone wanted to spend 3 months straight at a high demand resort, they would no longer have that ability.
> 
> I'm just throwing ideas out there - but ultimately, perhaps the problem could just be fixed by doing something about the waitlist loophole that currently exists.


I could be wrong but changing bylaws usually takes a supermajority.  If owners can't meet the quorum and get a single independent board member elected the chance of getting a super majority would be slim to none.


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> One last suggestion/question - is it possible for Worldmark to list the 3 - 5% most demanded reservations, and create a bylaw that says no more than (pick a number - say 6) weeks per year can be made at 13 months out for these most demanded weeks by any one owner?  This would have little to no effect on any owner with 15,000 or fewer credits in their account.  The problem with that sort of rule is that if someone wanted to spend 3 months straight at a high demand resort, they would no longer have that ability.
> 
> I'm just throwing ideas out there - but ultimately, perhaps the problem could just be fixed by doing something about the waitlist loophole that currently exists.



Any booking rule that explicitly targets/discriminates against large account holders would be unlikely to survive a legal challenge. A rule like that is also easily defeated by using multiple accounts.

The BoD recently approved a new guideline that caps reservation length at 30 days, so that should help a little.

They could implement a lottery system for high demand reservations like some other resorts in Hawaii have.

To defeat the megarenters there is an easy solution that the BoD is considering - a rule that for reservations made more than 12 months in advance, a guest certificate cannot be added/changed after the reservation is made. Rental operations rarely know the name of the guest that far out, so it would have some impact on those reservations.


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## ronparise

ecwinch said:


> As much as I would like to have faith in Ron's prediction, I believe he is comparing an apple to an orange.
> 
> In Club Wyndham, the account suspensions were supported by a credit imbalance in their account, giving Wyndham probable cause to justify the actions taken.
> 
> In WM, suspending their accounts without some similar proof would make for a fairly easy court case. Ron's situation was different in that regard and would have undermined his challenge of the actions taken.


There was no points imbalance in my account... It looked like I had more points in reservations than my ownership justified so they suspended my accounts pending an audit...but the audit never happened.  I was able  account for every point. They should have lifted the suspension at that point. But they didnt... so after that, the suspension was kept in place for no reason except that they wanted me (and others) out..  I asked that they give me a number...How many points did they think I wasnt entitled to.  and we could talk about that.. They didnt come up with a number, and they wouldnt talk.   Bottom line is that they wouldnt pursue any course of action that let me continue renting.  You are right, I could have pursued a fairly easy court case but that would take time and money, that I didnt have, and wouldnt have been willing to spend even if I did. Wyndham  has fairly deep pockets.  I pursued a settlement instead

I think there is probably something in the worldmark docs that wyndham could cite to justify an audit,, and then they could negotiate settlements like they did with us


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## ecwinch

tschwa2 said:


> I could be wrong but changing bylaws usually takes a supermajority.  If owners can't meet the quorum and get a single independent board member elected the chance of getting a super majority would be slim to none.



The by-laws can be changed by an affirmative vote by 25% of the membership. The Declaration (where the Rental clause is) requires an affirmative vote by 50% of the total voting power. None of our documents require a super-majority.

The declaration has not been modified since the first few years of the Club. The by-laws have been modified a number of times over the years - most recently in 2016.


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## ecwinch

ronparise said:


> There was no points imbalance in my account...
> 
> I think there is probably something in the worldmark docs that wyndham could cite to justify an audit,, and then they could negotiate settlements like they did with us



I think the court would likely disagree that there was not a point imbalance. You might argue that the imbalance was permitted, but at equity, pulling points from future years when you have not paid maintenance on those points would be one hurdle to overcome. I fully understand your position that the rules allowed that practice of credit pooling and dumping the contract, but I dont think it is as strong as you might think. You could be right, but it would be a dice roll IMHO.

But the broader point is that they had "probable cause" to suspend your account. The analogy I would make is that they had enough evidence to charge you with a "crime" and lock you up without bail. And you took the plea deal to get out of jail.

I think it would be a little tougher to do something on the WM side.


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## ronparise

ecwinch said:


> The by-laws can be changed by an affirmative vote by 25% of the membership. The Declaration (where the Rental clause is) requires an affirmative vote by 50% of the total voting power. None of our documents require a super-majority.
> 
> The declaration has not been modified since the first few years of the Club. The by-laws have been modified a number of times over the years - most recently in 2016.



The guidelines can be modified by the board without a vote by membership and that has been the approach taken to control megarenting, one loophole at a time.  They do not say a rule change is to control renting, what they say is that a rule change is being done to make sure every owner has an equal chance at  every reservation

It is my belief that Wyndham has become frustrated with that approach and that they have been emboldened by their success in club Wyndham 

It’s not easy or cheap to make money with Worldmark rentals. The cost of entry is quite high and the profit margin on each reservation not that great (at least not as good as it was with club Wyndham. 

I think if they can force out the current big players, it will be a long time before anyone else can get a business going


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> Couldn't they make the waitlist work in a way that it couldn't be abused - or create a set of rules that make this workaround no longer work (such as - if 2 or more accounts are found to be working together to aid any owner in securing reservations for a time more than 13 months in advance, those reservations will be cancelled.)  Some older posts I read discussed people doing this at Yellowstone - did Worldmark do anything about that?  Maybe there could be a rule that no owner could have more than 3 units at the same resort in the same timeframe during high demand weeks - or some reasonable number of units that would allow a person to perhaps do a small family reunion but no more than some maximum number.   Or even that only 2 units could be reserved for high demand weeks at any particular resort - some owners would be upset because they may want to do a family reunion - but based on my short experience with online reservations - if everyone truly has equal access to the inventory, no one would even be able to get 2 units at the same resort for the same week because (if everyone had equal access) the units would be gone before a second reservation could go through.  And for resorts like Kihei - they could limit usage to a maximum of (pick a number) weeks per year total in order to provide access to all owners.
> 
> The waitlist rules could certainly be changed to keep someone from controlling a block of inventory.  It doesn't seem like rocket science to figure out how to keep people from abusing the system.  It sounds like Worldmark/Wyndham knows who is doing this, and perhaps there are regular owners who have figured out loopholes to the system. (Maybe Worldmark should just publicize how it's being done so that all owners could know what is needed to allow anyone to have the same access - total sarcasm there...)  It sounds like Worldmark needs to fix the waitlist and reservation system to ensure that all owners have equal access.  It actually sounds like it could be a lawsuit against the BoD and/or the management company because they are not giving every owner equal access to 13 month reservations.  Since the BoD and management company know a problem exists, it is their responsibility to find a solution.  Is anyone on TUG on the BoD?  It sounds from past posts that the BoD is trying to deal with the problem - is anyone from TUG on the Worldmark BoD? Maybe they could really push the issue.



It seems like a simple issue - but when you consider all the variables - it becomes more challenging as you note with some of your suggestions.

The core issue is that any rule has to apply equally to all members. And each and every rule impacts someone other than renters.

So the challenge for the BoD is how do you implement rules that curb renting and have minimal impact on the average owner?  And by large that is what the BoD has been doing - coming up with rules that attempt to curb the growth of renting by making it more difficult to operate profitably or to get into the business. But the argument can be made that cumulative impact of all the recent rule changes is starting to impact more and more regular owners.

There is no member of TUG that is currently on the BoD.


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## sue1947

ecwinch said:


> To defeat the megarenters there is an easy solution that the BoD is considering - a rule that for reservations made more than 12 months in advance, a guest certificate cannot be added/changed after the reservation is made. *Rental operations rarely know the name of the guest that far out*, so it would have some impact on those reservations.



And neither do most family/friends gatherings.  This is a good example of how a rule to impact mega-renters would hit 'regular' owners as well.  If you book a Christmas/Thanksgiving/summer family get together, you will need to book at 13 months to get availability.  Most non-timeshare owners don't plan that far out and somebody in the family will cancel; guaranteed.   Somebody's job or health changes and you need to put another family member down as checking in.  Currently, you can keep all reservations in the owners name and add guest names at the last minute when you know who will be coming.  This proposed rule would mean that unit would have to be cancelled without much hope of replacing it.  This goes to Geist's point about WM being less family friendly. 

The real issue for the OP is that you bought a point based timeshare when you really needed a fixed week.  Point timeshares are more flexible, but you need to be flexible in when and where. You are not.  Get rid of the big renter operations and you still have 220000 owners competing for limited space.  You want a larger unit (actually multiple units) at a ski area during the week between Christmas and New Years.  What percent of that 220,000 wants the same thing?   The result is hundreds, if not thousands, of owners all trying to get online and get that same unit.  Even if you eliminate the manipulations, you will be lucky to get one unit.  You want multiple units.  It's just not realistic.  

The sales people do a good job of convincing people that they can book whatever you want whenever you want.  The reality is quite different.  Example:  Every sales location has a photo of Depoe Bay on the wall.  Midweek in the low season is now booking up at 13 months and that's not the mega renters; it's baby boomers.  For the first time this year, I wasn't able to get what I wanted and had to book a day later.   The reality is that the number of owners wanting those high demand times is going up and you just have to deal with the changes. 
Sue


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## ecwinch

sue1947 said:


> And neither do most family/friends gatherings.  This is a good example of how a rule to impact mega-renters would hit 'regular' owners as well.  If you book a Christmas/Thanksgiving/summer family get together, you will need to book at 13 months to get availability.  Most non-timeshare owners don't plan that far out and somebody in the family will cancel; guaranteed.   Somebody's job or health changes and you need to put another family member down as checking in.



I think that most families can easily identify at least the 2+ family members that will be there, and if those members can't be there then the vacation is equally likely to be cancelled. 

So while there is an edge case where owners would be impacted, the benefits outweigh the impact. And there are multiple strategies that be used to mitigate the impact. As I pointed out, there is no rule that is kryptonite to renting and has no impact to regular members. It is the classic "Perfect is the enemy of the good". No need to spin our wheels searching for perfect when good will suffice.


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## ronparise

ecwinch said:


> I think the court would likely disagree that there was not a point imbalance. You might argue that the imbalance was permitted, but at equity, pulling points from future years when you have not paid maintenance on those points would be one hurdle to overcome. I fully understand your position that the rules allowed that practice of credit pooling and dumping the contract, but I dont think it is as strong as you might think. You could be right, but it would be a dice roll IMHO.
> 
> But the broader point is that they had "probable cause" to suspend your account. The analogy I would make is that they had enough evidence to charge you with a "crime" and lock you up without bail. And you took the plea deal to get out of jail.
> 
> I think it would be a little tougher to do something on the WM side.


 
You are absolutely right. I showed where the points came from,  it all added up , but I didn’t pay maintenance fees for them.  I had sold the underlying contracts and the new owner should have been paying the fees.

I get it that they could have taken those points from my account and re attached them to the contracts I sold. Or they could have demanded the fees from me. But they werent interested in that kind of resolution. Because I would have still been in busines. 

What I’m telling you is that I offered to give back whatever points they thought I wasn’t entitled to or pay for them.  We wouldn’t have needed a court case for that. I was ready to give them whatever they wanted to “balance my accounts” All I wanted was a number

Our discussions were going nowhere until I asked this question:  what are we talking about; are we trying to determine the number of points I’m not entitled to. Or are we discussing my exit from all things wyndham

To their credit they answered honestly. They wanted both. They wanted compensated for what I wasn’t entitled to and they wanted me out

They got both 


What I’m suggesting is that there is something in the Worldmark docs that they can hang their hat on to get the megarenters to the table. actually I don’t thing they need anything except a willingness to be sued.  And they will then “make them an offer they can’t refuse” 

I may be completely wrong about this. But I think wyndham is tired of the “one loophole at a time approach” that they have been doing for years. 

All I’m really trying to say here is that I believe Wyndham and the board feel the same as the op. it’s past time to do something about the megarenter problem. They tried the “one rule change after another”  approach  and I think they are ready to do something bold. My thinking about what they might do is colored by my experience and what I learned about the Wyndham folks I was dealing with.  So let’s forget my experience and assume that they will do something completely different.  

My point is that they will do something other than just another rule change and I think they will do it sooner rather than later


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## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> I think that most families can easily identify at least the 2+ family members that will be there, and if those members can't be there then the vacation is equally likely to be cancelled.
> 
> So while there is an edge case where owners would be impacted, the benefits outweigh the impact. And there are multiple strategies that be used to mitigate the impact. As I pointed out, there is no rule that is kryptonite to renting and has no impact to regular members. It is the classic "Perfect is the enemy of the good". No need to spin our wheels searching for perfect when good will suffice.


Actually, I often don't know who will be traveling with us. I invite my friends and family, but most people can't commit 13 months in advance.  I don't think I'm unusual in that regard. I think the guest certificate rule about not changing the name would be problematic for many owners. I still don't understand why worldmark can't figure out how to close the waitlist loophole. If Worldmark knows what people are doing, they should be able to come up with a way to stop it. Perhaps they need a waitlist rule that involves only the top 5 percent of highly demanded units. Maybe allowing only one or two waitist requests to be filled for any of those high demand units per year. The current rule about 4 requests at a time doesn't impact a megarenter very much because as soon as they have filled their request they can put in another. If owners were only allowed to have a set number of waitlistf fulfillments for high demand units per year, it would counteract the problem. I imagine the megatenters might then try to own a very large number of ownerships, but then worldmark could have a rule about number of waitlist requests per name. It is a whack a mole problem, but it seems fixable. And it is quite easy to identify if a problem exists. One need only watch availability changes throughout the day this coming week.


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## chemteach

ronparise said:


> My point is that they will do something other than just another rule change and I think they will do it sooner rather than later



I hope you are correct. Watching the availability at 13 months plus 1 to 5 days change throughout the day after a unit became unavailable at exactly 13 months was a clear indication that the current system isn't working. Some owners have figured out how to play the system. The system still needs to be fixed so that if all units of a particular type become unavailable at exactly 13 months out, the availability at 13 months plus any number of days does not change in the 23.9999 hours following the event.  (Aside from someone cancelling the ending days of a reservation, which ought to create more, not less availability...)


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> Actually, I often don't know who will be traveling with us. I invite my friends and family, but most people can't commit 13 months in advance.  I don't think I'm unusual in that regard. I think the guest certificate rule about not changing the name would be problematic for many owners. I still don't understand why worldmark can't figure out how to close the waitlist loophole. If Worldmark knows what people are doing, they should be able to come up with a way to stop it. Perhaps they need a waitlist rule that involves only the top 5 percent of highly demanded units. Maybe allowing only one or two waitist requests to be filled for any of those high demand units per year. The current rule about 4 requests at a time doesn't impact a megarenter very much because as soon as they have filled their request they can put in another. If owners were only allowed to have a set number of waitlistf fulfillments for high demand units per year, it would counteract the problem. I imagine the megatenters might then try to own a very large number of ownerships, but then worldmark could have a rule about number of waitlist requests per name. It is a whack a mole problem, but it seems fixable. And it is quite easy to identify if a problem exists. One need only watch availability changes throughout the day this coming week.



There is another variable you are not considering... mega-renters who are account managers - i.e. they effectively "rent" the account from another member. 

There are any number of rules they could implement. IMHO - any rule that is based on some account limit will easily be defeated.


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## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> There is another variable you are not considering... mega-renters who are account managers - i.e. they effectively "rent" the account from another member.
> 
> There are any number of rules they could implement. IMHO - any rule that is based on some account limit will easily be defeated.


Other than the guest certificate rule you mentioned earlier - there really isn't any way to stop someone who is "renting" other people's account and managing them.  But it would be really difficult to catch someone if they are managing 20 or more accounts - that seems crazy!  But I suppose some people can figure out how to work any system.  Still - if there were a waitlist implementation that no account could have more than 2 high demand waitlist fulfillments per year, any "megarenter" would have to manage 2.5% of all the ownership points to be able to reserve the 5% highest demand weeks (assuming the waitlist is what is being used as a loophole to the 13 month reservation rule.)  Maybe Worldmark could also put out a statement that using loopholes to beat the 13 month reservation can result in reservations getting cancelled.  Vistana has a great way to keep people from going against their rules.  Whenever a guest certificate is asked for, they remind owners of the rules.  So if you are actively going against one of their rules, you are at least constantly told there are consequences.  While the megarenters managing people's accounts may not care about the ethics of it, perhaps the people whose accounts they are managing would feel worse about it, and perhaps stop.  (Wishful thinking, I realize - but it could possibly work for some people.)


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## chemteach

I just looked at Kihei againi.  This morning at 6:03 there were no units left for the 2 BR queen for 12/23 check-in. No surprise there. 2-4 units showed availability for 12/24&12/25.  Three hours later no units show availability for those dates.  Oly 1 unit is available for 12/26 and 5 or more are available for 12/27. So on 11/26, the units for 12/27 should go down by 1. But likely what will happen is that owners who had a waitlist game going will get a reservation off the wait list that will use up the other 12/27 units. It's becoming very predictable.  I have watched this happen with all the 2 and 3 bedroom units for Kihei over the last week. 

If worldmark only allowed waitlist requests at 11 months in advance, perhaps that would solve the issue. The owners abusing the system are taking advantage of dropping off a few dates at the end of a reservation which appears to kick in the ability of a waitlist request to use those days to begin a new reservation that uses up the dates 13 months plus one or two days. Cut off that workaround and the playing field should be more level. 

It's not getting rid of a waitlist ability. Just disconnecting the waitlist from the reservation system. Everyone would have the same ability to make requests for the waitist at the same time. 

Worldmark could also decrease the maximum number of reservation days below 30 for the top 5% of requested units. From what I have read, these problems have been going on for years. The other points systems seem to have figured it out. Worldmark really needs to figure something out because they are selling a faulty product if they know the issue exists and don't fix it.


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## ecwinch

In the absence of the waitlist 11-13 months out, what is prevent them from doing a cancel/rebook inside 13 months?

But keep working on it. The BoD has proven they are very receptive to well-designed solutions that solve this problem. If you come up with something that will work - they certainly would consider it.

For instance you might consider a rule that a match from the waitlist cannot be extended past the 13 month window.  But then people will use it to circumvent the 7 night red season rule.

Remember when you thought it was a simple problem to solve? 

And underlying deeded ownership, home resorts, lotteries, and semi-enforceable bans on commercial rental activity are some of the differences between WM and other systems. And to that list - transaction fees, cancellation fees, etc.


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## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> In the absence of the waitlist 11-13 months out, what is prevent them from doing a cancel/rebook inside 13 months?



Isn't there a rule that if you cancel a reservation, you can't rebook the same unit within 48 hours?  I guess you can get around that if someone owns two accounts. Yes-it is more difficult than I originally thought!  Many nuances I don't understand.  Maybe worldmark could have a sit-down with 5-10 savvy owners who create scenarios and try to find loopholes to any solutions- and keep working until a solution is found. Naive thinking I realize. But wishful thinking...  I am an optimist.[/QUOTE]


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> Maybe worldmark could have a sit-down with 5-10 savvy owners who create scenarios and try to find loopholes to any solutions- and keep working until a solution is found. Naive thinking I realize. But wishful thinking...  I am an optimist.



That is exactly what they are doing.


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## chemteach

It seems that perhaps people are looking at the problem from the wrong viewpoint.  The problem is not megarenters (regular owners have also figured out how to use loopholes - and they also probably don't want the system changed - it's working for them); the problem is that the system has loopholes.  If every owner had the same probability of getting a high demand week, the system would be working properly.  Right now, megarenters and regular owners are using the loophole. Not all owners know about the loopholes - so these owners are disadvantaged and don't even know it.  They just know that they can't get a prime week. Just to be clear - I could certainly use the same system that the megarenters use - but I'm not interested in using loopholes. I could stop posting - and that would benefit me because I would ultimately be one of the owners who has figured out how to get prime weeks.  But I'd rather be an owner of a system that works the same way for everyone - where we all wake up at 5:55am PST, log on, and try to get the week we want. 

So - a different idea (I will keep coming up with ideas that have holes in them, and then hopefully something will stick.)

New idea - for the units that disappear before 13 months out - change the rules around - it might hurt the average owner who IS gaming the system - but it would help all the owners who are NOT gaming the system.  (It's pretty clear from what I see each morning for the 13 month availability of Xmas and New Years weeks at about 5 resorts that MOST of the people getting reservations for those weeks are gaming the system - the only way to get 95% of those weeks is to game the system.)

Idea:  new rules for the "game the system" weeks (rules applying only to 13 month out reservations, only for ultra prime weeks):

For only those weeks (Worldmark would have to publicize which weeks have the specific rules):

Check-ins allowed only for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and only for 7 days.  1/3 of the units available for Friday, 1/3 for Saturday, 1/3 for Sunday (yes - I realized there are some unit types that have less than 3 available  - Worldmark could create some rule about these weeks - the key is that owners could only reserve weekend check-in days at 13 months for these units - and Worldmark needs to be able to clean the rooms, so they have to spread the check-in days out a bit.)

This would hurt owners who try to stay in the same place for a month at a time - but those owners still have the opportunity to get online at 6am 13 months out for each week of the extended period they want to stay somewhere.  (And really, shouldn't this be how reservations are done for the high prime weeks - why should someone get 4 prime weeks just because they got lucky and got the reservation at 13 months out - everyone should have the same possibility of getting a reservation for each prime week.)

Possible Nuance - extended reservations could be made for up to "x number of" days ("x" being decided by the BoD), but cancellations/changes are not allowed -  if the reservation is cancelled, the points are not returned to  the owners account.  Guest certificates for these extended reservations would have to be made at the time of the reservation.  This would allow people to make extended reservations that could ultimately be a loophole if cancelled, but it would cost the points of the cancelled reservation and the points of the loopholed reservation.  Seems better to just not allow reservations beyond 7 days.  

This would stop anyone from using the waitlist as a loophole.  "Megarenters" and owners would have the same chance of getting the high demand weeks.  The Worldmark bylaws allow owners to rent out their units - that can't be stopped - but at least the playing field is leveled and everyone has the same possibility of getting a 13 month out reservation.  Days wouldn't randomly disappear at 13 months plus 1 to 5 days out.  Monday to Thursday would be gone completely by the previous Sunday, but checkins would not be allowed on those days anyway during the high prime season.  Many systems allow only Friday to Sunday checkins.  This wouldn't affect all of Worldmark - just the super prime weeks, which would then be treated as many timeshare systems are - Friday to Sunday checkins only...

This system seems to be the easiest way to stop owners from gaming the system.  By the time someone has created a reservation all the prime reservations would be gone, and no single owners could somehow access many prime units/weeks for a specific week.  Someone would need to have additional computers and hit the "book it" button at exactly 6am to get additional prime weeks.  But everyone has the same probability from each electronic device to obtain a specific week.  It seems the main owners who would complain about this change would be the ones who know how to game the system.  Currently, only people who know how to circumvent the 13 month rule can get multiple prime weeks - probabity-wise, there is no way to get multiple prime weeks for a single date without circumventing the system because 90% of the weeks are gone before they are even reservable at 13 months out.

ecwinch - have they already considered this idea and decided it was too restrictive for the average owner?


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> That is exactly what they are doing.



NICE!!!


----------



## djpotts50

I do not feel Guest Certificate fees have anything whatsoever to do with mega-renters; for many years, buying to become a TimeShare landlord was on Trendwest, Cendant, & Wyndham's list as a good reason to buy large accounts. Also, the BIGGEST MEGA-RENTER x1000 is Wyndham, not owners themselves. The Guest Certificate Scam is nothing more than an additional money stream. Almost 80% of Wyndham's profits come from new sales of TravelShaft Credits, so this creates another way to generate profits. Wyndham IS NOT EVEN AN OWNER OF WORLDMARK, they are only the Developer & Manger, yet they pay NO GUEST CERTIFICATE FEES when giving away credits or renting out WM units to non-owners, II, RCI, Hotels.com, and on & on. I have been going to WM Updates & Sales Presentations for many years now, and in all those years I have only met two sales people that even owned the minimum 5,000 credit WorldMark account, and you know you talk to at least 2, 3, or even more sales people during each Update/Sales Presentation, and I always ask them if they too are owners. The maintenance fees more than pay for all maintenance costs. Once again, the Guest Certificate Fee Scam is nothing more than another profit stream for Wyndham, if they had to follow that rule themselves, the rule wouldn't exist, because it would cost Wyndham money. haha The money generated by GC Fees do not even go to the WorldMark the Club, they go to WorldMark by Wyndham; if you don't know there is a difference, they you don't know much about WorldMark or Wyndham. That is why they created the GC Fee Scam by use of the Wyndham Controlled WM Board, because the REAL owners of WorldMark would have never voted such a scam into existence. There will likely be a Class Action Lawsuit over this, but Wyndham is bragging that they hire the best & most attorneys that money can buy, so WorldMark owners will lose as usual. I think WM Owners would have a chance at winning ONLY because Wyndham doesn't actually own WorldMark, and the owners never even voted on this BS scam.


----------



## bbodb1

chemteach said:


> Isn't there a rule that if you cancel a reservation, you can't rebook the same unit within 48 hours?  I guess you can get around that if someone owns two accounts. Yes-it is more difficult than I originally thought!  Many nuances I don't understand.  Maybe worldmark could have a sit-down with 5-10 savvy owners who create scenarios and try to find loopholes to any solutions- and keep working until a solution is found. Naive thinking I realize. But wishful thinking...  I am an optimist.





ecwinch said:


> That is exactly what they are doing.



If this is true (and I am NOT saying it is false), three points come to mind:
1) What are the savvy owners getting out of their cooperation?  Why would they willingly give over their secrets?
2) If the savvy owners are getting something for their cooperation, what exactly are they getting?  Full disclosure would be nice...
3) Who is advocating for the small owners?


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> It seems that perhaps people are looking at the problem from the wrong viewpoint.  The problem is not megarenters (regular owners have also figured out how to use loopholes - and they also probably don't want the system changed - it's working for them); the problem is that the system has loopholes.  If every owner had the same probability of getting a high demand week, the system would be working properly.  Right now, megarenters and regular owners are using the loophole. Not all owners know about the loopholes - so these owners are disadvantaged and don't even know it.  They just know that they can't get a prime week. Just to be clear - I could certainly use the same system that the megarenters use - but I'm not interested in using loopholes. I could stop posting - and that would benefit me because I would ultimately be one of the owners who has figured out how to get prime weeks.  But I'd rather be an owner of a system that works the same way for everyone - where we all wake up at 5:55am PST, log on, and try to get the week we want.
> 
> So - a different idea (I will keep coming up with ideas that have holes in them, and then hopefully something will stick.)
> 
> New idea - for the units that disappear before 13 months out - change the rules around - it might hurt the average owner who IS gaming the system - but it would help all the owners who are NOT gaming the system.  (It's pretty clear from what I see each morning for the 13 month availability of Xmas and New Years weeks at about 5 resorts that MOST of the people getting reservations for those weeks are gaming the system - the only way to get 95% of those weeks is to game the system.)
> 
> Idea:  new rules for the "game the system" weeks (rules applying only to 13 month out reservations, only for ultra prime weeks):
> 
> For only those weeks (Worldmark would have to publicize which weeks have the specific rules):
> 
> Check-ins allowed only for Friday, Saturday, and Sunday, and only for 7 days.  1/3 of the units available for Friday, 1/3 for Saturday, 1/3 for Sunday (yes - I realized there are some unit types that have less than 3 available  - Worldmark could create some rule about these weeks - the key is that owners could only reserve weekend check-in days at 13 months for these units - and Worldmark needs to be able to clean the rooms, so they have to spread the check-in days out a bit.)
> 
> This would hurt owners who try to stay in the same place for a month at a time - but those owners still have the opportunity to get online at 6am 13 months out for each week of the extended period they want to stay somewhere.  (And really, shouldn't this be how reservations are done for the high prime weeks - why should someone get 4 prime weeks just because they got lucky and got the reservation at 13 months out - everyone should have the same possibility of getting a reservation for each prime week.)
> 
> Possible Nuance - extended reservations could be made for up to "x number of" days ("x" being decided by the BoD), but cancellations/changes are not allowed -  if the reservation is cancelled, the points are not returned to  the owners account.  Guest certificates for these extended reservations would have to be made at the time of the reservation.  This would allow people to make extended reservations that could ultimately be a loophole if cancelled, but it would cost the points of the cancelled reservation and the points of the loopholed reservation.  Seems better to just not allow reservations beyond 7 days.
> 
> This would stop anyone from using the waitlist as a loophole.  "Megarenters" and owners would have the same chance of getting the high demand weeks.  The Worldmark bylaws allow owners to rent out their units - that can't be stopped - but at least the playing field is leveled and everyone has the same possibility of getting a 13 month out reservation.  Days wouldn't randomly disappear at 13 months plus 1 to 5 days out.  Monday to Thursday would be gone completely by the previous Sunday, but checkins would not be allowed on those days anyway during the high prime season.  Many systems allow only Friday to Sunday checkins.  This wouldn't affect all of Worldmark - just the super prime weeks, which would then be treated as many timeshare systems are - Friday to Sunday checkins only...
> 
> This system seems to be the easiest way to stop owners from gaming the system.  By the time someone has created a reservation all the prime reservations would be gone, and no single owners could somehow access many prime units/weeks for a specific week.  Someone would need to have additional computers and hit the "book it" button at exactly 6am to get additional prime weeks.  But everyone has the same probability from each electronic device to obtain a specific week.  It seems the main owners who would complain about this change would be the ones who know how to game the system.  Currently, only people who know how to circumvent the 13 month rule can get multiple prime weeks - probabity-wise, there is no way to get multiple prime weeks for a single date without circumventing the system because 90% of the weeks are gone before they are even reservable at 13 months out.
> 
> ecwinch - have they already considered this idea and decided it was too restrictive for the average owner?




I once suggested three changes that would level the playing field. These weren’t original thoughts, it’s the way club Wyndham worked and say what you will about club Wyndham, but at least every unit in every resort was available to every owner at the same time 

As it is and was with Worldmark with anyday check in only a few prime weeks open up each day

1) end owner to owner transfer of credits
2) Friday only check in (or Saturday, or Sunday)
3) 7 day reservations

Not only did my ideas fall on deaf ears, club Wyndham has instituted any day check in and up to 14 day reservations

So I would t expect changes like this to be considered.  It seems flexibility trumps fairness 

I’m pretty sure the megarenters would be happy with a fair system where everyone has an equal shot at every reservation. But that wouldn’t satisfy all the regular owners because the problem for them, isn’t that they can’t get a reservation, their problem is that that non owners get to enjoy the resorts without paying for them. And I believe that that’s wyndhams problem too
For the owners it’s pure selfishness but for Wyndham it’s economic.  None of my rental customers were prospects for the sales staff. I mean, why would someone pay Wyndham $20000 for a weeks worth of credits, plus the maintenance fees when they know that they can get a prime week from a megarenter for only a small premium over the maintenance fees

Bottom line in my estimation is that Wyndham will force  out the Worldmark megarenters,


----------



## ecwinch

djpotts50 said:


> I do not feel Guest Certificate fees have anything whatsoever to do with mega-renters; for many years, buying to become a TimeShare landlord was on Trendwest, Cendant, & Wyndham's list as a good reason to buy large accounts. Also, the BIGGEST MEGA-RENTER x1000 is Wyndham, not owners themselves. The Guest Certificate Scam is nothing more than an additional money stream. Almost 80% of Wyndham's profits come from new sales of TravelShaft Credits, so this creates another way to generate profits. Wyndham IS NOT EVEN AN OWNER OF WORLDMARK, they are only the Developer & Manger, yet they pay NO GUEST CERTIFICATE FEES when giving away credits or renting out WM units to non-owners, II, RCI, Hotels.com, and on & on. I have been going to WM Updates & Sales Presentations for many years now, and in all those years I have only met two sales people that even owned the minimum 5,000 credit WorldMark account, and you know you talk to at least 2, 3, or even more sales people during each Update/Sales Presentation, and I always ask them if they too are owners. The maintenance fees more than pay for all maintenance costs. Once again, the Guest Certificate Fee Scam is nothing more than another profit stream for Wyndham, if they had to follow that rule themselves, the rule wouldn't exist, because it would cost Wyndham money. haha The money generated by GC Fees do not even go to the WorldMark the Club, they go to WorldMark by Wyndham; if you don't know there is a difference, they you don't know much about WorldMark or Wyndham. That is why they created the GC Fee Scam by use of the Wyndham Controlled WM Board, because the REAL owners of WorldMark would have never voted such a scam into existence. There will likely be a Class Action Lawsuit over this, but Wyndham is bragging that they hire the best & most attorneys that money can buy, so WorldMark owners will lose as usual. I think WM Owners would have a chance at winning ONLY because Wyndham doesn't actually own WorldMark, and the owners never even voted on this BS scam.



First off, a lawsuit - while possible - faces an uphill climb, since the governing documents explicitly grant the BoD the authority to establish fees. 

Secondly, BoD President John Henley stated over on WMOwners that Wyndham is charged a guest certificate for non-owner usage.

And lastly, the GC is revenue to the Club not Wyndham. 

While I doubt any of the above will alter what you believe, those are the facts as I know them.


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## bbodb1

I can testify to this:



ecwinch said:


> ..Secondly, BoD President John Henley stated over on WMOwners that Wyndham is charged a guest certificate for non-owner usage.....



because when we stayed at WorldMark St. George, we owned only in the RCI and Wyndham systems.  We used some of our Wyndham points to reserve time at WM St. George and had to pay an extra $99 for the privilege of doing so.  

That did drive me to purchase some WorldMark points thereafter as many of our future desired travel locations are in the west.  I am concerned there are places I will NOT be able to go given how few points I have and the current restrictions on my ability to travel due to work.  I hope when we retire, we will be able to hit the resorts like Depoe Bay, Yellowstone, etc since we will be able to travel year round....


----------



## ecwinch

bbodb1 said:


> I am concerned there are places I will NOT be able to go given how few points I have and the current restrictions on my ability to travel due to work.  I hope when we retire, we will be able to hit the resorts like Depoe Bay, Yellowstone, etc since we will be able to travel year round....



I don’t think you have a great deal to worry about... because WM has many cash booking options. We travel year round, and because HK is included - we usual do cash bookings. Saving our credits for flex exchanges and long bookings. 

And off-season you can book with FAX - which does not have the $65 min per night. We had some Utah reservations in Oct at around $40 a night with FAX. And no limit on off-season FAX usage.


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## ecwinch

ronparise said:


> I’m pretty sure the megarenters would be happy with a fair system where everyone has an equal shot at every reservation. But that wouldn’t satisfy all the regular owners because the problem for them, isn’t that they can’t get a reservation, their problem is that that non owners get to enjoy the resorts without paying for them. And I believe that that’s wyndhams problem too
> For the owners it’s pure selfishness but for Wyndham it’s economic.
> 
> Bottom line in my estimation is that Wyndham will force  out the Worldmark megarenters,



Of course Megarenters want a “fair system”... only fair to them means one that ensures that they can continue to reap the profits they enjoy and to outbid owners for rentable inventory. Like most businesses, they know the man on the street is no competition.


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## Marathoner

How many knowledgeable owners on this forum are not able to get the reservation they are looking for at 13 months? I can get the high demand reservations that I am looking for most of the time, even if it's not all the time. So I bet most can too. 

The people who complain are mostly the ones who do not know the booking rules or don't plan exactly at 13 months. 

I too see the 13 month manipulation that occurs but I don't worry about it because - surprise, surprise - there is injustice in life.

If you want to make everything fair at the 13 month mark, implement a random lottery system for those high reservation weeks. 

What Wyndham is doing is implementing policies - in the name of preventing mega renting - that raise much more money from its owner base and have many more restrictions. No HK transfer. GC fees. No throwaway days beyond 13 months. Credit transfer limits. 

So the real question is do you want to have a cheaper and more flexible club with some mega renters or a club with many more restrictions and fees with no mega renters?

I think all the proposals that Eric advocates are against the principles of Worldmark's original founding. 

Be very careful that in advocating change in the club, you can permanently accept the fees and limitations that come with reducing mega renting. 



Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk


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## chemteach

7 day reservations seem fair and reasonable. I wonder why the board wouldn't consider that. The GC fees seem unreasonable. It doesn't cost anything to the management company to make them. But gc fees are a separate issue. Manipulation of the 13 month reservation rule is what seems to be the most problematic issue-particularly since the BoD knows about it. It is their responsibility to come up with a plan that works. I am a little surprised that there has never been a class action lawsuit about the issue.  A 7 day reservation rule with weekend check-ins only ought to level the playing field.


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## chemteach

Marathoner said:


> What Wyndham is doing is implementing policies - in the name of preventing mega renting - that raise much more money from its owner base and have many more restrictions. No HK transfer. GC fees. No throwaway days beyond 13 months. Credit transfer limits.
> 
> So the real question is do you want to have a cheaper and more flexible club with some mega renters or a club with many more restrictions and fees with no mega renters?
> Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk



I think we can agree that the fees have nothing to do with megarenters. That's just smoke and mirrors. Megarenters make a little less money, but the fees won't dissuade them. 

It would be nice to level the playing field without introducing new fees. Fees aren't needed to equalize the ability to get prime weeks.  Workarounds need to be removed to equalize the ability to reserve prime weeks.


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## sue1947

chemteach said:


> A 7 day reservation rule with weekend check-ins only ought to level the playing field.



No, it just takes a very flexible system and turns it into Wyndham.  If you wanted that type of system, you should have purchased that system.  You bought into a system with rules and now are complaining that you can't get what you want because others are using those rules to their advantage.   But mostly, you can't get what you want because there are more owners wanting them than there are units available.  You have unrealistic expectations and are now trying to screw things up for the rest of us.  As somebody new to the WM system, perhaps you should get to know it before proposing all these rules. 

You missed the main points that Marathoner made:
  People who don't know the rules choose not to know the rules.  They are there for anybody to learn and use.  It doesn't matter how many rules who want to change or implement, those who don't want to take the time to figure it out, won't.  And those that purchased without understanding the competition for holiday weeks should not expect the whole system to be rearranged to accommodate your lack of due diligence before purchasing. 
  Every rule change impacts owners in unexpected ways and makes what used to be a great flexible system less so. Wyndham will impose as many fees as they can to increase their profits.  If there is a fee in the Wyndham system (like the guest certs fee) you can expect to see it show up in WM at some time in the future.  You can also be assured they will use mega-renters as their excuse.



Marathoner said:


> So the real question is do you want to have a cheaper and more flexible club with some mega renters or a club with many more restrictions and fees with no mega renters?



This is the crux of it.  We all purchased based on the rules and flexibility in place at the time.   If you wanted a guarantee of being able to book multiple ski weeks at Christmas, then you should have purchased a fixed week.  Your poor decision is not a reason to change the club we all purchased into something completely different.   Wyndham, the BOD (controlled by Wyndham) and some owners who are also Wyndham owners (like Eric and Ron) seem determined to change WM into Wyndham as much as possible.  Again, if I wanted Wyndham, I'd have purchased that system. 
And again, learn the system before you start trying to change it.  Your unrealistic expectations is not a reason to screw over the rest of us.

Sue


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## am1

chemteach said:


> Isn't there a rule that if you cancel a reservation, you can't rebook the same unit within 48 hours?  I guess you can get around that if someone owns two accounts. Yes-it is more difficult than I originally thought!  Many nuances I don't understand.  Maybe worldmark could have a sit-down with 5-10 savvy owners who create scenarios and try to find loopholes to any solutions- and keep working until a solution is found. Naive thinking I realize. But wishful thinking...  I am an optimist.


[/QUOTE]

Wyndham did not want to pay me before for that info so I doubt they would pay wm owners now.


----------



## am1

ronparise said:


> There was no points imbalance in my account... It looked like I had more points in reservations than my ownership justified so they suspended my accounts pending an audit...but the audit never happened.  I was able  account for every point. They should have lifted the suspension at that point. But they didnt... so after that, the suspension was kept in place for no reason except that they wanted me (and others) out..  I asked that they give me a number...How many points did they think I wasnt entitled to.  and we could talk about that.. They didnt come up with a number, and they wouldnt talk.   Bottom line is that they wouldnt pursue any course of action that let me continue renting.  You are right, I could have pursued a fairly easy court case but that would take time and money, that I didnt have, and wouldnt have been willing to spend even if I did. Wyndham  has fairly deep pockets.  I pursued a settlement instead
> 
> I think there is probably something in the worldmark docs that wyndham could cite to justify an audit,, and then they could negotiate settlements like they did with us



8 months before the account locks I had 40 - 50 million extra points in my accounts.  Unsure as they eventually got mixed into my points but being early December I asked Wyndham about it and people were suppose to look into it but nothing became of it other then the points expiring December 31.  No way to push them forward at that point.  That was not the only reason for point imbalances.  A 200 - 300 million number was thrown out when we were working out a solution but I had very little faith in any number thrown out and at that point the only important number started with a dollar sign.  

I did not do any point stripping.


----------



## tschwa2

It's wyndham who wants to turn worldmark into wyndham because it presumably is more profitable for them.  They were going to find a way to do this regardless of what owners here or other worldmark owners want or do not want.  The moment the BOD opened the door a crack to Wyndham  the old club was gone.  It was just a matter of time.


----------



## bizaro86

bbodb1 said:


> I can testify to this:
> 
> 
> 
> because when we stayed at WorldMark St. George, we owned only in the RCI and Wyndham systems.  We used some of our Wyndham points to reserve time at WM St. George and had to pay an extra $99 for the privilege of doing so.
> 
> That did drive me to purchase some WorldMark points thereafter as many of our future desired travel locations are in the west.  I am concerned there are places I will NOT be able to go given how few points I have and the current restrictions on my ability to travel due to work.  I hope when we retire, we will be able to hit the resorts like Depoe Bay, Yellowstone, etc since we will be able to travel year round....



You paid the club pass booking fee. That is the fee for a Wyndham to Worldmark exchange (or vice versa) it isn't the guest certificate fee and doesn't go to the club.  It really doesn't have anything to do with this issue.


----------



## jpegan

I have been an owner of Trendwest/Worldmark for about thirty years.  When I bought in, we were told our ownership could be transferred by WILL to new owners. Since our ownership makes it a part of our ESTATE, why do we have to buy gift certificates for our children to use our credits???  

If I remember correctly, when Windham took control they were give a very large amount of credits as part of the deal.  I believe, Windham is probably the LARGEST MEGARENTER.  The last two times I was at our resort at Daytona Beach I asked people on elevator and hallways if they were with World Mark or Other.  Less than three out of ten were World Mark.  My 3 visits to Los Vegas are another story. 

Why are the employees at our World Mark resorts not wearing World Mark uniforms?


----------



## chemteach

sue1947 said:


> No, it just takes a very flexible system and turns it into Wyndham.  If you wanted that type of system, you should have purchased that system.  You bought into a system with rules and now are complaining that you can't get what you want because others are using those rules to their advantage.   But mostly, you can't get what you want because there are more owners wanting them than there are units available.  You have unrealistic expectations and are now trying to screw things up for the rest of us.
> 
> You missed the main points that Marathoner made:
> People who don't know the rules choose not to know the rules.  They are there for anybody to learn and use.
> 
> 
> 
> This is the crux of it.  We all purchased based on the rules and flexibility in place at the time.
> And again, learn the system before you start trying to change it.  Your unrealistic expectations is not a reason to screw over the rest of us.
> 
> Sue


Sue - I have no problem learning how to utilize the loopholes Worldmark has in place.  I'm pretty sure I already know how people are doing it - I have tested a few things and can already get what I want if I start the process a week in advance of the week I want.  I have no doubt that I'll be able to get the weeks I want next year if the rules don't change.  However - I don't like the idea that I would be basically using loopholes to ensure that I can get a unit for 13.5 months out.  It is clear that many people can and do use these loopholes.  I just don't think it's right.  It is not fair to the rest of the Worldmark owners.  Worldmark has a rule that units can be booked 13 months in advance.  I knew going in that I'd need to game the system to get what I want.  But now that I can see how rampant the problem is - I believe the problem is large enough that the Worldmark BoD has the fiduciary responsibility to the owners to fix the system to make it more fair for all owners - not just the 1% of owners who know how to work the system to their advantage.  I'm not suggesting that the entire system should change - I'm suggesting that for the highly desired weeks (the weeks for which 13 month availability changes when it shouldn't be possible unless there is a loophole) there should be a subset of rules that keep people from using loopholes for those weeks.  Worldmark knows which weeks those are - they have all the data available to them.  I don't care how they do it - I just think the system is broken and needs a fix.  Maybe they make checkins available all days of the week, and divide the number of available highly desired weeks by 7 and randomly assign check-in days for those.  Everyone could see what is available - the system is still as flexible as it is right now.  The only difference is that all owners would have equal access.  Look - would I personally do better if I didn't make all this fuss?  Quite likely yes - I would just reserve weeks in advance of weeks I want, find someone else to work with me with their account - and we could reserve weeks for each other - cancel, and get each other's units off the waitlist or by coordinating cancelling a reservation and reserving it with the other account just as the week is cancelled.  It's not rocket science.  But I'd much rather not make reservations this way because I don't think it's ethical.  Maybe many people believe there isn't an ethical issue if you work loopholes that don't go against the rules.  I personally think it's a problem.  So rather than use the loopholes to my own advantage, which I could easily do this spring, summer, next year, etc., I'd much rather work in a way that feels ethical to me.  But the only way to do that is if the reservation rules are changed.  Currently, the only way to ensure you get the reservation you want is to do things that are within the rules, but go against the spirit of the rules. 

The BoD is responsible for creating a system that has rules that work equally for all club owners.  That currently is not the situation.  I'm making a fuss because I don't want to use loopholes to get the units I want.  I want to get those units by waking up at 5:50 PST and taking the risk that others may beat me to the great reservations.

TUG members who own Worldmark are not at all representative of the average Worldmark owner.  I'm not concerned about only TUG members getting the weeks they want - I'm concerned about ALL Worldmark members having the same opportunity to get the weeks they want.  TUG is a great place to learn about how to work each timeshare system - and I am happy to help TUG members get the weeks they want - through ethical means.  I've been helped tremendously over the years with my different ownerships - TUG has been wonderful - but one of the things I've learned from TUG is that we should play within the spirit of the rules - and you can get amazing vacations playing within the spirit of the rules.  You have to know some secrets of the game - which systems to buy, which RCI and II resorts can be exchanged into, etc.  But ultimately, most people on TUG want to make timesharing work fairly for all owners.  That's all I'm trying to accomplish here...


----------



## ecwinch

I can see the "intelligentsia" attitude that was pervasive when the BoD last acted to level the playing field (by closing the grouped reservation loophole) is starting to emerge. The inference that those who do not know how to "work" the system are too lazy to learn how to do it. Ignoring that if everyone had the knowledge, then they would be far less likely to get what they want.

But they know that is unlikely, so prefer to resist any change in order to preserve the advantage that enjoy. After all it is a zero-sum game. For every member that snags those two weeks in Hawaii at XMas, there are many more who miss out. But as long you are in the first group, you certainly dont want that to change.

I guess the counter is that if they wanted a system where the rules dont change, they should have bought a fixed week with real property owner rights that cannot be altered .


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> I can see the "intelligentsia" attitude that was pervasive when the BoD acted to level the playing field (by closing the grouped reservation loophole) is starting to emerge. The inference that those who do not know how to "work" the system are too lazy to learn how to do it. Ignoring that if everyone had the knowledge, then they would be far less likely to get what they want.
> 
> But they know that is unlikely, so prefer to resist any change in order to preserve the advantage that enjoy.


Maybe all the BoD needs to do is to publicize how people are using loopholes - which makes the loopholes themselves no longer loopholes - just part of the reservation process.  LOL   TOTAL SARCASM here...  The one thing that really irked me was a post I read about someone offering to get people the reservations they wanted for a $100 charge.  That's INSANE!!!!  I have no doubt there are a LOT of Worldmark members who are paying that person to work the system for them.  And the person is making $100 for doing about 10 minutes of work.  It's crazy!  When that sort of thing is happening, you know there is something broken in the system.


----------



## am1

chemteach said:


> Maybe all the BoD needs to do is to publicize how people are using loopholes - which makes the loopholes themselves no longer loopholes - just part of the reservation process.  LOL   TOTAL SARCASM here...  The one thing that really irked me was a post I read about someone offering to get people the reservations they wanted for a $100 charge.  That's INSANE!!!!  I have no doubt there are a LOT of Worldmark members who are paying that person to work the system for them.  And the person is making $100 for doing about 10 minutes of work.  It's crazy!  When that sort of thing is happening, you know there is something broken in the system.



The $100 is not for the 10 minutes work.  It is for the results. Some may not agree but it beats having point expired.

As a Wyndham owner I never did this as there was more profit renting the units.


----------



## bbodb1

bizaro86 said:


> You paid the club pass booking fee. That is the fee for a Wyndham to Worldmark exchange (or vice versa) it isn't the guest certificate fee and doesn't go to the club.  It really doesn't have anything to do with this issue.


Thanks for clarifying that, Bizaro. I wasn't sure exactly how that fit in here but I am still learning the Worldmark system.


----------



## chemteach

am1 said:


> The $100 is not for the 10 minutes work.  It is for the results. Some may not agree but it beats having point expired.
> 
> As a Wyndham owner I never did this as there was more profit renting the units.



The point I was making is that people are making money off the Worldmark system without even needing to own Worldmark.  There are people who know how to work the system, and there are people willing to pay $100 to have the system worked for them.  The person working the system has figured out how to do it - and uses that knowledge to allow Worldmark owners to have an advantage on the 13 month rule.  If the person charging $100 to do this performs 500 owner reservations a year, that's $50,000 a year tax free that they are earning off of a broken system with loopholes.  I have no idea how many owners use this person's service, or even who this person is.  I just know that this seems like a truly problematic reservation system.  This person doesn't use their own account for the actual reservation - the people paying him/her get the reservation they want in their own account - and the only way Worldmark could track this would be to identify the internet ISP address used for the reservations, and find that they all come from the same ISP address.


----------



## dioxide45

chemteach said:


> that's $50,000 a year tax free


Technically not tax free, just another loophole...


----------



## am1

chemteach said:


> The point I was making is that people are making money off the Worldmark system without even needing to own Worldmark.  There are people who know how to work the system, and there are people willing to pay $100 to have the system worked for them.  The person working the system has figured out how to do it - and uses that knowledge to allow Worldmark owners to have an advantage on the 13 month rule.  If the person charging $100 to do this performs 500 owner reservations a year, that's $50,000 a year tax free that they are earning off of a broken system with loopholes.  I have no idea how many owners use this person's service, or even who this person is.  I just know that this seems like a truly problematic reservation system.  This person doesn't use their own account for the actual reservation - the people paying him/her get the reservation they want in their own account - and the only way Worldmark could track this would be to identify the internet ISP address used for the reservations, and find that they all come from the same ISP address.



$100 seems like good value.


----------



## geist1223

jpegan said:


> I have been an owner of Trendwest/Worldmark for about thirty years.  When I bought in, we were told our ownership could be transferred by WILL to new owners. Since our ownership makes it a part of our ESTATE, why do we have to buy gift certificates for our children to use our credits???
> 
> If I remember correctly, when Windham took control they were give a very large amount of credits as part of the deal.  I believe, Windham is probably the LARGEST MEGARENTER.  The last two times I was at our resort at Daytona Beach I asked people on elevator and hallways if they were with World Mark or Other.  Less than three out of ten were World Mark.  My 3 visits to Los Vegas are another story.
> 
> Why are the employees at our World Mark resorts not wearing World Mark uniforms?



First off Worldmark The Club has zero employees. Worldmark consists of the Resorts (partial or total), Owners, and the BOD. Wyndham besides being our Developer has separately been retained by the WMTC BOD as the day to day managers of the Resorts. So all the employees are employees of Wyndham.

WMTC only owns a small percentage of the Units at Daytona Beach. Wyndham owns the majority of the Units. We have many shared Resorts. Some with Wyndham, some with Raintree, some with Shell, and some with VI.

Your children may become Owners upon your death. They are not now Owners. I am not defending GC's. I hate them. I consider them one more restriction on my use of WMTC.

Wyndham (actually Cedant ) was not given a large number of Points upon their purchase of the Developer Rights. They bought the unsold Points from Trendwest.


----------



## chemteach

This morning it became quite clear what many people are doing to game the system.  I have attached clips of Kihei availability over the last week.

There is a very easy solution to halting the manipulation without making any rule changes.  The Worldmark board could decide to put a message out to all members stating that, "It has come to our attention that some owners are using the current system to give themselves an unfair advantage to obtaining reservations at the 13 month mark.  We know how these owners are doing this. Should any owner show signs of this manipulation, Worldmark will send them a letter to cease and desist.  Should such owner continue to manipulate the system, Worldmark will cancel the reservations obtained in such manner (and freeze the owners account?)."

Of course, this could be bad for Worldmark because publicly admitting they know there is a problem could put them in a difficult legal position.  Alternatively, Worldmark could just directly email owners guilty of reservation manipulation with a statement to cease and desist, including that reservations will be cancelled for reservations obtained in such a manner.

It's very easy to identify accounts that are doing this - Worldmark has all the information they need.  They can look for any account that consistently creates a midweek reservation and cancels such reservation one to five days later.  Any account that does this more than once is working in cahoots with another Worldmark account, and emails could be sent to those accounts.

It's very clear that this is being done with the Kihei 3 bedroom special needs unit.  Whoever is reserving that one is manipulating the system.  The evidence is pretty conclusive.  I've been taking pictures of all the Kihei units over time.  I have attached the prior week for Kihei.  The BoD can easily identify who is doing the manipulation.  I don't really understand why they haven't contacted people about stopping the manipulation.  If the same account continually makes and cancels reservation, and/or an account is somehow continually obtaining reservations off the waitlist in a prescribed manner, those account owners should be warned about their reservations being cancelled.

The BoD shouldn't be worried about megarenters or people who are managing other people's accounts to get them reservations they desire.  The BoD should be worried that the system has loopholes.  The bylaws never said megarenting is not okay.  But there are rules about 13 month, 11 month, 10 month, etc. reservations.


----------



## ronparise

tschwa2 said:


> It's wyndham who wants to turn worldmark into wyndham because it presumably is more profitable for them.  They were going to find a way to do this regardless of what owners here or other worldmark owners want or do not want.  The moment the BOD opened the door a crack to Wyndham  the old club was gone.  It was just a matter of time.



That’s nonsense  a week at a legacy wyndham resort is 154000 points and they start their sales pitch at about $200/1000 points so roughly $30000 a week. A week at a legacy Worldmark resort is 10000 credits and they start with them at about $3 a credit so also $30000. One is not more profitable than the other

As far as operations Wyndham created club Wyndham Access some years ago to be exactly like Worldmark (no deeds, the club holds the deeds.) Owners are members not owners.) 

My experience tells me that are trying to make club Wyndham like Worldmark, not the other way around

The subject of this thread however  isn’t how Wyndham profits. Rather it’s wyndhams attitude and approach to megarenters. And in that regard it’s the same 

That  is the one thing where Wyndham is trying to do at Worldmark what they have done at club Wyndham is limit renting 

Sometime ago on another forum, (from which I’m banned) I said that if you want to know what Wyndham is going to do (with renting) at Worldmark, just look at what they have done at Club  Wyndham. 
Their first approach was to attack profits. With Junk  fees, and a limit on owner to owner transfer of points club Wyndham first, followed by similar actions at Worldmark

Most recently at club Wyndham they gave up on the rule changes and got to each megarenter and made them an offer they couldn’t refuse.  I’m betting they do the same at worldmark


----------



## ronparise

Wyndham did not want to pay me before for that info so I doubt they would pay wm owners now.[/QUOTE]

They didn’t pay us for information but the sure got it when they sat down with us one on one. They had no idea how cancel and rebook or how the credit pool worked or that it was possible to be vip without ever buying a point from them until they talked to us

I stripped points. But at first I didn’t sell anything, I only bought more and I continued to pay all my fees when due.  There would be a day coming when I would have to “catch up” but my plan was to die before that happened. Turned out that wasn’t necessary. When ovation came along I could just give the stripped contracts back to wyndham. Seems it was cheaper for them  to take my contracts, pay 2 years fees (total expense about $20/1000) and resell them for $200/1000 than to build new resorts


----------



## ronparise

geist1223 said:


> WMTC only owns a small percentage of the Units at Daytona Beach. Wyndham owns the majority of the Units. We have many shared Resorts. Some with Wyndham, some with Raintree, some with Shell, and some with VI.
> .



You are so wrong here. Worldmark the club owns 28 units at Daytona. Cloud Wyndham owners own some units and a large number of units are not timeshares at all they areowned by individuals 

Where you are so wrong is with your statement that Wyndham owns units here (or anywhere.)   Club Wyndham is no different than Worldmark or most other timeshares in this regard. The owners own the condos.  Wyndham is the developer and manager, at club Wyndham and Worldmark an Shell they not the owners of the condos


----------



## Marathoner

ronparise said:


> That’s nonsense  a week at a legacy wyndham resort is 154000 points and they start their sales pitch at about $200/1000 points so roughly $30000 a week. A week at a legacy Worldmark resort is 10000 credits and they start with them at about $3 a credit so also $30000. One is not more profitable than the other
> 
> As far as operations Wyndham created club Wyndham Access some years ago to be exactly like Worldmark (no deeds, the club holds the deeds.) Owners are members not owners.)
> 
> My experience tells me that are trying to make club Wyndham like Worldmark, not the other way around
> 
> The subject of this thread however  isn’t how Wyndham profits. Rather it’s wyndhams attitude and approach to megarenters. And in that regard it’s the same
> 
> That  is the one thing where Wyndham is trying to do at Worldmark what they have done at club Wyndham is limit renting
> 
> Sometime ago on another forum, (from which I’m banned) I said that if you want to know what Wyndham is going to do (with renting) at Worldmark, just look at what they have done at Club  Wyndham.
> Their first approach was to attack profits. With Junk  fees, and a limit on owner to owner transfer of points club Wyndham first, followed by similar actions at Worldmark
> 
> Most recently at club Wyndham they gave up on the rule changes and got to each megarenter and made them an offer they couldn’t refuse.  I’m betting they do the same at worldmark


Ron, I believe you are right. What level of rentals are you thinking constitutes a mega renter for Worldmark in the minds of Wyndham? 

Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk


----------



## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> This morning it became quite clear what many people are doing to game the system.  I have attached clips of Kihei availability over the last week.
> 
> There is a very easy solution to halting the manipulation without making any rule changes.  The Worldmark board could decide to put a message out to all members stating that, "It has come to our attention that some owners are using the current system to give themselves an unfair advantage to obtaining reservations at the 13 month mark.  We know how these owners are doing this. Should any owner show signs of this manipulation, Worldmark will send them a letter to cease and desist.  Should such owner continue to manipulate the system, Worldmark will cancel the reservations obtained in such manner (and freeze the owners account?)."
> 
> Of course, this could be bad for Worldmark because publicly admitting they know there is a problem could put them in a difficult legal position.  Alternatively, Worldmark could just directly email owners guilty of reservation manipulation with a statement to cease and desist, including that reservations will be cancelled for reservations obtained in such a manner.
> 
> It's very easy to identify accounts that are doing this - Worldmark has all the information they need.  They can look for any account that consistently creates a midweek reservation and cancels such reservation one to five days later.  Any account that does this more than once is working in cahoots with another Worldmark account, and emails could be sent to those accounts.
> 
> It's very clear that this is being done with the Kihei 3 bedroom special needs unit.  Whoever is reserving that one is manipulating the system.  The evidence is pretty conclusive.  I've been taking pictures of all the Kihei units over time.  I have attached the prior week for Kihei.  The BoD can easily identify who is doing the manipulation.  I don't really understand why they haven't contacted people about stopping the manipulation.  If the same account continually makes and cancels reservation, and/or an account is somehow continually obtaining reservations off the waitlist in a prescribed manner, those account owners should be warned about their reservations being cancelled.
> 
> The BoD shouldn't be worried about megarenters or people who are managing other people's accounts to get them reservations they desire.  The BoD should be worried that the system has loopholes.  The bylaws never said megarenting is not okay.  But there are rules about 13 month, 11 month, 10 month, etc. reservations.



I think we pretty much have come full circle.

That is a great statement - and it might even encourage some of them to stop. But what by-law or guideline do you cite to to justify a suspension?

Because the BoD still needs to follow due process if they are going to deprive a member of their rights. You know.... that pesky clause from the 5th amendment of the United States Constitution. 

As a footnote - be aware that about five years ago the BoD created a guideline that stated that commercial renting was not allowed. It failed upon being challenged. Your suggestion is not much different.


----------



## geist1223

ronparise said:


> You are so wrong here. Worldmark the club owns 28 units at Daytona. Cloud Wyndham owners own some units and a large number of units are not timeshares at all they areowned by individuals
> 
> Where you are so wrong is with your statement that Wyndham owns units here (or anywhere.)   Club Wyndham is no different than Worldmark or most other timeshares in this regard. The owners own the condos.  Wyndham is the developer and manager, at club Wyndham and Worldmark an Shell they not the owners of the condos



Excuse me for not being more precise. Boy why the hostility from someone that has no skin in the Game and was only involved for a couple years. 

The poster seemed to under the impression that Daytona Beach was primarily if not solely a WMTC Resort. As you point out WMTC only owns 28 of the Units. No wonder I felt like a second class citizen when we stayed there. Trying to get things fixed in the Unit was an exercise in futility. 

I guess to be precise you would have to say No Owner of Worldmark owns a single Condo in the Worldmark System. The Deeds for the Condos are held by WMTC. The Members of WMTC have a limited right to use for eternity depending on how many Points they have.

Would you agree that Wyndham or Members of Wyndham in one form or another have control of most of the Units at Daytona Beach? However you want to phrase it.


----------



## geist1223

As for any Constituion Protection such as "due process" they do normally apply to private business. They apply to Governmental Organizations. Many of the protections that apply to private businesses are the result of federal legislation.


----------



## ecwinch

geist1223 said:


> As for any Constituion Protection such as "due process" they do normally apply to private business. They apply to Governmental Organizations. Many of the protections that apply to private businesses are the result of federal legislation.



Tom - do you mean that to say "they do not"...

If so it is disappointing to think you believe that....as many courts have ruled that HOA's are quasi-governmental bodies since they have the ability to levy owners and deprive them of their property. You might advance the argument that the Club is not an HOA, but portions of the Davis-Stirling Common Interest Development Act still apply to the Club. And the due process provisions of the Club are outlined in the Discipline section of the by-laws.

Discipline. The Board shall establish uniform fines and temporary suspensions
which shall be imposed for violation of the Articles, Declaration, Bylaws or Rules.
Determination of responsibility, such as for maintenance or repairs of damage, or determination
of what constitutes a nuisance, shall be only by the following procedures, or by a court or
arbitration proceeding. Violations may be determined and penalties imposed only after thirty
(30) days' written notice to the offending Member served personally or by mail, first class
postage prepaid, return receipt requested, mailed to the latest address for such Member shown on
the Club records, specifying the possible action and the alleged reasons therefore, and an
opportunity for the Member to be heard before a quorum of the Board at least five (5) days
before the effective date of any possible action.


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> I think we pretty much have come full circle.
> 
> That is a great statement - and it might even encourage some of them to stop. But what by-law or guideline do you cite to to justify a suspension?
> 
> Because the BoD still needs to follow due process if they are going to deprive a member of their rights. You know.... that pesky clause from the 5th amendment of the United States Constitution.
> 
> As a footnote - be aware that about five years ago the BoD created a guideline that stated that commercial renting was not allowed. It failed upon being challenged. Your suggestion is not much different.



Can't they create a rule that if owners found to be obtaining reservations outside of the 13 month rule by playing games with the system will have their account frozen and/or reservations obtained through nefarious means cancelled?

Alternatively, could they create a rule that each owner can only cancel x number of reservations per year? 

The issue seems to be with 13 month reservations - so any new rules would only have to apply to 13 month reservations.  If the restrictions mentioned would not be allowed by bylaws, the board could switch to 7 day only reservations for 13 months out. 

How did they stop the person who had been playing the system with the summer Yellowstone reservations last year or the year before?  (Or is that person still working the system...?) 

Whatever it is, the BoD needs to do something.  All the information is out there showing that Worldmark TC BoD and management know that a problem exists.  It is their responsibility to deal with the problem so that the reservation system works fairly for all Worldmark owners, not just those in the know.


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> Because the BoD still needs to follow due process if they are going to deprive a member of their rights.



There are clear rules that reservations are not allowed more than 13 months in advance.  A member is not being deprived of their rights if they are told they can no longer use a loophole to guarantee themselves or others reservations outside the 13 month window.  

Worldmark TC can send out a message describing exactly what is not allowed.  I believe they have the authority to cancel reservations created through loopholes if they have sent out a message of what is not allowed.  People using the loopholes would have to always worry that their "non-allowed but nevertheless created" reservations could be cancelled at any time.  That should give megarenters concern about their rentals getting cancelled.  Should such a reservation get rented and then cancelled, the "landlord" would likely be responsible for expenses caused by rental cancellations, which in turn would cause megarenters to end their use of loopholes.  It won't stop people from renting their units out.  There isn't a problem with people being megarenters per se.  There is a problem with any owner using loopholes to ensure a reservation for 13+ any number of days out.  

Am I missing something?  I don't see how a member is being deprived of their rights if they are using the system in a that is not allowed.  (Yes, I understand people are using the system to their advantage in the way the system works - but if there is a clear rule that gaming the system will result in cancelled reservations, then the member is not losing a right.)  The bylaws say that a letter would need to be mailed to the owner - that can be done.  

The reservations would be cancelled 30 days after a letter was sent to the owner (quoting ecwinch below):

Discipline. The Board shall establish uniform fines and temporary suspensions
which shall be imposed for violation of the Articles, Declaration, Bylaws or Rules.
Determination of responsibility, such as for maintenance or repairs of damage, or determination
of what constitutes a nuisance, shall be only by the following procedures, or by a court or
arbitration proceeding. Violations may be determined and penalties imposed only after thirty
(30) days' written notice to the offending Member served personally or by mail, first class
postage prepaid, return receipt requested, mailed to the latest address for such Member shown on
the Club records, specifying the possible action and the alleged reasons therefore, and an
opportunity for the Member to be heard before a quorum of the Board at least five (5) days
before the effective date of any possible action.

So all is needed is a rule that clarifies what constitutes enabling a reservation for greater than 13 months out.  The "fine" could include cancelling such reservations.  

If some subset of owners figures out a new loophole, the board can add that loophole to "enabling a reservation for greater than 13 months out" clause.  Based on what I have read, people have concluded that Wyndham cares about megarenters.  Owners should care that some owners work the system to their advantage.

When Interval International and RCI heard enough complaints about people renting their exchanges, both companies added a clause to their resort confirmations about units not being rentable.  I don't know if that changed the habits of people who were renting their II / RCI exchanges, but it certainly forced people to worry at least a bit each time they rented out an exchange.

Worldmark could add a clause stating that, "If this reservation was obtained through nefarious (definition of nefarious to be created by the BoD) means, the reservation is subject to cancellation."  That statement should go far to get people to use the reservation system in the spirit in which it is meant to be used.


----------



## ecwinch

For me there is a lot of irony in this discussion, because I actually drafted a rule along the lines you are suggesting. But I don't think it is workable:

*Multiple Accounts. *The booking guidelines contained herein are binding upon the individual members, regardless of the number of separate accounts the individual member controls. Use of multiple accounts to gain an unfair advantage is prohibited. Members found to be circumventing these guidelines by using multiple accounts are subject to having their member privileges restricted. Such restrictions may include, but are not limited to, refusal to provide services and/or access to owner service center, reservation center, front desk, website, and any telephone communications with Manager’s employees. The Club’s Manager may enforce such restriction for such periods of time as it determines in its sole and reasonable discretion. The Manager shall exercise its discretion under this Section consistent with applicable provisions of the Club's Bylaws, Communication Policy, and any other applicable statutes, policies, or guidelines.


----------



## bizaro86

I'd be pretty opposed to giving Wyndham the right to shut off people's accounts for an indefinite period of time based on their own judgement.

Based on how things went with the audits in the Club Wyndham side I don't think they deserve that level of trust.


----------



## ecwinch

bizaro86 said:


> I'd be pretty opposed to giving Wyndham the right to shut off people's accounts for an indefinite period of time based on their own judgement.
> 
> Based on how things went with the audits in the Club Wyndham side I don't think they deserve that level of trust.



Well they already have that power, since the part you are disagreeing with is already in our guidelines.


----------



## am1

ronparise said:


> Wyndham did not want to pay me before for that info so I doubt they would pay wm owners now.



They didn’t pay us for information but the sure got it when they sat down with us one on one. They had no idea how cancel and rebook or how the credit pool worked or that it was possible to be vip without ever buying a point from them until they talked to us

I stripped points. But at first I didn’t sell anything, I only bought more and I continued to pay all my fees when due.  There would be a day coming when I would have to “catch up” but my plan was to die before that happened. Turned out that wasn’t necessary. When ovation came along I could just give the stripped contracts back to wyndham. Seems it was cheaper for them  to take my contracts, pay 2 years fees (total expense about $20/1000) and resell them for $200/1000 than to build new resorts[/QUOTE]

It actually never came up.  A whole bunch of tricks, loopholes, etc.  El Cid points were great but my guess is any el cid points that Wyndham converted or sold are going to expire within 5- 10 years.  Still a lifetime.  If they still work the same way (not just the cheap mfs).  

In that sense I stripped points as well but always paid the fees.  Just had to keep stripping to get started.

As for the one wanting to close loopholes.  I cancelled tens of thousands Wyndham reservations a year for years.  I would book inventory to just get rid of it so I could click the rest away to get rid of it so I could upgrade from a 1 bedroom suite to 4 bedroom presidential.  I would book at 13 months then cancel a few days after to get the dates I wanted without any waste.  Wyndham let it go for years.  

None of that was directly against their policy.


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> For me there is a lot of irony in this discussion, because I actually drafted a rule along the lines you are suggesting. But I don't think it is workable:
> 
> *Multiple Accounts. *The booking guidelines contained herein are binding upon the individual members, regardless of the number of separate accounts the individual member controls. Use of multiple accounts to gain an unfair advantage is prohibited. Members found to be circumventing these guidelines by using multiple accounts are subject to having their member privileges restricted. Such restrictions may include, but are not limited to, refusal to provide services and/or access to owner service center, reservation center, front desk, website, and any telephone communications with Manager’s employees. The Club’s Manager may enforce such restriction for such periods of time as it determines in its sole and reasonable discretion. The Manager shall exercise its discretion under this Section consistent with applicable provisions of the Club's Bylaws, Communication Policy, and any other applicable statutes, policies, or guidelines.



This would be easy to work around - just have one account in your name and an account in a relative's or friend's name.   Worldmark TC needs a rule that closes loopholes.  Right now, people can reserve 10 days, waitlist for the last three of the ten days plus 4 days, get rid of the units for the last four days by additional reservations, then cancel the last 3 days of the first reservation and cancel an additional reservation so the waitlist comes through for the new reservation that begins a week past the original 10 day reservation. If an account shows this sort of activity in cahoots with any other account, and it happens like this more than once, then there is reason to send that member a notice that they appear to be using a workaround to enable a reservation at greater than 13 months, and that they have 30 days to prove they are not doing such activity, at which time, fines/temporary suspensions would occur if the member could not disprove the claim



ecwinch said:


> Discipline. The Board shall establish uniform fines and temporary suspensions
> which shall be imposed for violation of the Articles, Declaration, Bylaws or Rules.



This part of the bylaws seems to give the BoD the ability to cancel reservations and temporarily shut down an account that is using a workaround for 13+ month advantage in reservations.  (I believe) the rules clearly state that reservations are not allowed to be made more than 13 months in advance.  With that particular rule in place (or if the board passes a rule that workarounds to the 13 month rule will have specific consequences), then workarounds to the 13 month rule go against the rules, and anyone doing this is causing "harm" to other owners, in which case, "uniform fines and temporary suspensions" can be imposed. 

There are statistical models that can be used to prove that an account is following something for which the probability is small, such that if two such events occur within a short period of time, the confidence interval for the two events happening is statistically small enough thus showing that the events are not random, and the accounts are actively engaged in obtaining reservations in advance of 13 months.  The BoD can use the statistical models and data on reservations, cancellations, and waitlist fullfillment to identify any accounts showing such activity.  In the near term, those owners could be sent a letter letting them know Worldmark TC can see what is happening, and tell the account owner to stop what they are doing, or face consequencs.  In the longer term, the board doesn't need to change any rules - they could go back to having 8 waitlists at a time and stop charging extra fees for GCs.  (That is still a separate issue - something that is also important - but right now it seems this 13 month reservation thing is the largest problem Worldmark has.)  They just need to explicitly state that attempted and successful workarounds to the 13 month rule are not permitted.  (This isn't a new rule at all - they just have never enforced this - perhaps because they are concerned about legal consequences.  By stating this as an explicit rule, the BoD should be in safe legal space.) 

None of this directly deals with megarenters - if the BoD and/or owners and/or Wyndham wants to get rid of megarenters, they have no grounds for doing so since the bylaws clearly state renting is allowed, and when the board tried to stop commercial renting, they were shot down.  But at least the 13 month rule would be a rule for all, not just the 99% of owners who don't use workarounds.  This would put a huge damper in the megarenter business. 


I also think that Worldmark Owners who know all the loopholes should actively publicize what they do so that no one has an advantage over anyone else.  (Well - that's not really the case - the people with super large accounts have an advantage because they can tie up far more units than anyone else with the "reserve x days, drop off the last 3 days so that a waitlist request from another account they are managing picks up the reservation when the first account cancels off the last 3 days.")  If all the secret ways of getting around the rules were out, the BoD would be forced to deal with the situation sooner rather than later.


----------



## ecwinch

They are not making reservations more than 13 months in advance. What you outline in your last paragraph is what they are doing.


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> This would be easy to work around - just have one account in your name and an account in a relative's or friend's name.   Worldmark TC needs a rule that closes loopholes.  Right now, people can reserve 10 days, waitlist for the last three of the ten days plus 4 days, get rid of the units for the last four days by additional reservations, then cancel the last 3 days of the first reservation and cancel an additional reservation so the waitlist comes through for the new reservation that begins a week past the original 10 day reservation. If an account shows this sort of activity in cahoots with any other account, and it happens like this more than once, then there is reason to send that member a notice that they appear to be using a workaround to enable a reservation at greater than 13 months, and that they have 30 days to prove they are not doing such activity, at which time, fines/temporary suspensions would occur if the member could not disprove the claim
> 
> 
> 
> This part of the bylaws seems to give the BoD the ability to cancel reservations and temporarily shut down an account that is using a workaround for 13+ month advantage in reservations.  (I believe) the rules clearly state that reservations are not allowed to be made more than 13 months in advance.  With that particular rule in place (or if the board passes a rule that workarounds to the 13 month rule will have specific consequences), then workarounds to the 13 month rule go against the rules, and anyone doing this is causing "harm" to other owners, in which case, "uniform fines and temporary suspensions" can be imposed.
> 
> There are statistical models that can be used to prove that an account is following something for which the probability is small, such that if two such events occur within a short period of time, the confidence interval for the two events happening is statistically small enough thus showing that the events are not random, and the accounts are actively engaged in obtaining reservations in advance of 13 months.  The BoD can use the statistical models and data on reservations, cancellations, and waitlist fullfillment to identify any accounts showing such activity.  In the near term, those owners could be sent a letter letting them know Worldmark TC can see what is happening, and tell the account owner to stop what they are doing, or face consequencs.  In the longer term, the board doesn't need to change any rules - they could go back to having 8 waitlists at a time and stop charging extra fees for GCs.  (That is still a separate issue - something that is also important - but right now it seems this 13 month reservation thing is the largest problem Worldmark has.)  They just need to explicitly state that attempted and successful workarounds to the 13 month rule are not permitted.  (This isn't a new rule at all - they just have never enforced this - perhaps because they are concerned about legal consequences.  By stating this as an explicit rule, the BoD should be in safe legal space.)
> 
> None of this directly deals with megarenters - if the BoD and/or owners and/or Wyndham wants to get rid of megarenters, they have no grounds for doing so since the bylaws clearly state renting is allowed, and when the board tried to stop commercial renting, they were shot down.  But at least the 13 month rule would be a rule for all, not just the 99% of owners who don't use workarounds.  This would put a huge damper in the megarenter business.
> 
> 
> I also think that Worldmark Owners who know all the loopholes should actively publicize what they do so that no one has an advantage over anyone else.  (Well - that's not really the case - the people with super large accounts have an advantage because they can tie up far more units than anyone else with the "reserve x days, drop off the last 3 days so that a waitlist request from another account they are managing picks up the reservation when the first account cancels off the last 3 days.")  If all the secret ways of getting around the rules were out, the BoD would be forced to deal with the situation sooner rather than later.



The board and wyndham have been unwilling to do anything if there was the possibility of an owner or owner suing them because of it 
Thats the attitude that i think is cganging.. I believe that they are now willing to risk it
Why.. because thats what they did with us at and Club Wyndham   and they got away with it


----------



## ronparise

ecwinch said:


> They are not making reservations more than 13 months in advance. What you outline in your last paragraph is what they are doing.


They may not be making reservations 13 months in advance, but they are using the ability to make long reservations and the wait list to beat the 13 month rule

No different than when we used  grouped reservations to do the same thing

It took two tries but they got it done with grouped reservations,, I think they can with the wait list too... but I dont think they are,,, They have known about this loophole for a long time.. I think that they have other plans


----------



## ecwinch

ronparise said:


> They may not be making reservations 13 months in advance, but they are using the ability to make long reservations and the wait list to beat the 13 month rule
> 
> No different than when we used  grouped reservations to do the same thing
> 
> It took two tries but they got it done with grouped reservations,, I think they can with the wait list too... but I dont think they are,,, They have known about this loophole for a long time.. I think that they have other plans



I dont disagree. They want the waitlist to go away - in it's current iteration it requires too much manual labor and they dont want to build the functionality into the next version of the system. Geoff came pretty close to saying as much during the last BoD meeting.

So any hue and cry to end the manipulation is just as likely to be the pretense they need to make that happen.


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> Maybe all the BoD needs to do is to publicize how people are using loopholes - which makes the loopholes themselves no longer loopholes - just part of the reservation process.  LOL   TOTAL SARCASM here...  The one thing that really irked me was a post I read about someone offering to get people the reservations they wanted for a $100 charge.  That's INSANE!!!!  I have no doubt there are a LOT of Worldmark members who are paying that person to work the system for them.  And the person is making $100 for doing about 10 minutes of work.  It's crazy!  When that sort of thing is happening, you know there is something broken in the system.




I was offered money to do make reservations for other owners... My answer was that Id be happy to make their reservation and then rent it to them at fair market prices.

I used to make 40-50 mardi gras reservations each year: some at La Belle Maison with Wyndham points some at Avenue Plaza with Wyndham points and Worldmark credits and some with fixed weeks at Avenue Plaza.  I had 20 regulars each Mardi Gra  and some of my customers were wyndham and worldmark owners.


----------



## ronparise

ecwinch said:


> I dont disagree. They want the waitlist to go away - in it's current iteration it requires too much manual labor and they dont want to build the functionality into the next version of the system. Geoff came pretty close to saying as much during the last BoD meeting.
> 
> So any hue and cry to end the manipulation is just as likely to be the pretense they need to make that happen.


and what Geoff wants Geoff gets


----------



## chemteach

ronparise said:


> They may not be making reservations 13 months in advance, but they are using the ability to make long reservations and the wait list to beat the 13 month rule



Exactly!  If the BoD doesn't think evidence of beating the 13 month rule is enough to cancel a reservation, then they can make a rule that says, "Workarounds to beat the 13 month rule will not be permitted.  Any reservations created in such a manner can be cancelled and owner accounts associated with this practice may be temporarily shut down."  

It doesn't change any rules for how people can use the waitlist - as long as the waitlist is used in a way that gives all owners an equal opportunity to get a 13 month reservation.  

The 7 day reservation limit for 13 month reservations seems to also be the most fair system for all owners.  Why should any owner get to have 2 to 4 weeks in a prime location just because they "won the lottery" for the first week of the reservation?  All owners should have an equal opportunity to get those weeks.

If the BoD isn't willing to make the rule at the top, "Workarounds to beat..." They could allow only 10 (pick a reasonable number) cancellations/changes per year for weeks that were reserved at exactly 13 months.  That would minimize the workarounds...


----------



## ecwinch

Court cases where their are vague rules with artibitary enforcement are a little difficult to defend.

And how do you defend yourself if you are caught up in their detection scheme? How do you "prove" you are not circumventing the rules?

Wyndham is far more likely to just say - this is expensive problem to fix, but we have to do something. Let's kill waitlists.


----------



## ronparise

djpotts50 said:


> I do not feel Guest Certificate fees have anything whatsoever to do with mega-renters; for many years, buying to become a TimeShare landlord was on Trendwest, Cendant, & Wyndham's list as a good reason to buy large accounts. Also, the BIGGEST MEGA-RENTER x1000 is Wyndham, not owners themselves. The Guest Certificate Scam is nothing more than an additional money stream. Almost 80% of Wyndham's profits come from new sales of TravelShaft Credits, so this creates another way to generate profits. Wyndham IS NOT EVEN AN OWNER OF WORLDMARK, they are only the Developer & Manger, yet they pay NO GUEST CERTIFICATE FEES when giving away credits or renting out WM units to non-owners, II, RCI, Hotels.com, and on & on. I have been going to WM Updates & Sales Presentations for many years now, and in all those years I have only met two sales people that even owned the minimum 5,000 credit WorldMark account, and you know you talk to at least 2, 3, or even more sales people during each Update/Sales Presentation, and I always ask them if they too are owners. The maintenance fees more than pay for all maintenance costs. Once again, the Guest Certificate Fee Scam is nothing more than another profit stream for Wyndham, if they had to follow that rule themselves, the rule wouldn't exist, because it would cost Wyndham money. haha The money generated by GC Fees do not even go to the WorldMark the Club, they go to WorldMark by Wyndham; if you don't know there is a difference, they you don't know much about WorldMark or Wyndham. That is why they created the GC Fee Scam by use of the Wyndham Controlled WM Board, because the REAL owners of WorldMark would have never voted such a scam into existence. There will likely be a Class Action Lawsuit over this, but Wyndham is bragging that they hire the best & most attorneys that money can buy, so WorldMark owners will lose as usual. I think WM Owners would have a chance at winning ONLY because Wyndham doesn't actually own WorldMark, and the owners never even voted on this BS scam.



You need to know that the guest fees do not go to wyndham,, they are income to the club


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> This morning it became quite clear what many people are doing to game the system.  I have attached clips of Kihei availability over the last week.
> 
> There is a very easy solution to halting the manipulation without making any rule changes.  The Worldmark board could decide to put a message out to all members stating that, "It has come to our attention that some owners are using the current system to give themselves an unfair advantage to obtaining reservations at the 13 month mark.  We know how these owners are doing this. Should any owner show signs of this manipulation, Worldmark will send them a letter to cease and desist.  Should such owner continue to manipulate the system, Worldmark will cancel the reservations obtained in such manner (and freeze the owners account?)."
> 
> Of course, this could be bad for Worldmark because publicly admitting they know there is a problem could put them in a difficult legal position.  Alternatively, Worldmark could just directly email owners guilty of reservation manipulation with a statement to cease and desist, including that reservations will be cancelled for reservations obtained in such a manner.
> 
> It's very easy to identify accounts that are doing this - Worldmark has all the information they need.  They can look for any account that consistently creates a midweek reservation and cancels such reservation one to five days later.  Any account that does this more than once is working in cahoots with another Worldmark account, and emails could be sent to those accounts.
> 
> It's very clear that this is being done with the Kihei 3 bedroom special needs unit.  Whoever is reserving that one is manipulating the system.  The evidence is pretty conclusive.  I've been taking pictures of all the Kihei units over time.  I have attached the prior week for Kihei.  The BoD can easily identify who is doing the manipulation.  I don't really understand why they haven't contacted people about stopping the manipulation.  If the same account continually makes and cancels reservation, and/or an account is somehow continually obtaining reservations off the waitlist in a prescribed manner, those account owners should be warned about their reservations being cancelled.
> 
> The BoD shouldn't be worried about megarenters or people who are managing other people's accounts to get them reservations they desire.  The BoD should be worried that the system has loopholes.  The bylaws never said megarenting is not okay.  But there are rules about 13 month, 11 month, 10 month, etc. reservations.


you are a master of the obvious  
of course Wyndham knows whats happening

as Ive said in another post, wyndham knows whats going on, but they havent been willing to create a rule that would only be enforced against certain big owners

However thats exactly what they did with Club Wyndham megarenters


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> Exactly!  If the BoD doesn't think evidence of beating the 13 month rule is enough to cancel a reservation, then they can make a rule that says, "Workarounds to beat the 13 month rule will not be permitted.  Any reservations created in such a manner can be cancelled and owner accounts associated with this practice may be temporarily shut down."
> 
> It doesn't change any rules for how people can use the waitlist - as long as the waitlist is used in a way that gives all owners an equal opportunity to get a 13 month reservation.
> 
> The 7 day reservation limit for 13 month reservations seems to also be the most fair system for all owners.  Why should any owner get to have 2 to 4 weeks in a prime location just because they "won the lottery" for the first week of the reservation?  All owners should have an equal opportunity to get those weeks.
> 
> If the BoD isn't willing to make the rule at the top, "Workarounds to beat..." They could allow only 10 (pick a reasonable number) cancellations/changes per year for weeks that were reserved at exactly 13 months.  That would minimize the workarounds...




No, what they have to do is either modify the rule or create a new one to close tie loophole.  "workarounds to beat"  doesn't cut it. The problem is that these owners will still control millions of credits and they will still get them all placed into reservations to rent

and all owners do have the opportunity to make any reservation.. when I was making mardi gras reservations all I wanted was the 7 nights (wednesday to wednesday) but Id make 10 day reservations to make sure I got wanted.. The year after I got out someone else stepped in and started making much longer reservations and playing the waitlist game...but you could probably make a 30 day reservation to include Mardi Gras if you wanted it bad enough

The  reason Worldmark works for rentals is that the maintenance fees are so low and the fees for high value weeks.  You can remove all the loopholes to prevent guys like me from reserving multiple reservations for the same high value week  and the megarenters will adapt.  they will get all their credits paced in reservations and get them all rented.....maybe for less than they would like, but since fees are so low there will still be a profit...

just do more of them


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## geist1223

ecwinch said:


> Tom - do you mean that to say "they do not"...
> 
> If so it is disappointing to think you believe that....as many courts have ruled that HOA's are quasi-governmental bodies since they have the ability to levy owners and deprive them of their property. You might advance the argument that the Club is not an HOA, but portions of the Davis-Stirling Common Interest Development Act still apply to the Club. And the due process provisions of the Club are outlined in the Discipline section of the by-laws.
> 
> Discipline. The Board shall establish uniform fines and temporary suspensions
> which shall be imposed for violation of the Articles, Declaration, Bylaws or Rules.
> Determination of responsibility, such as for maintenance or repairs of damage, or determination
> of what constitutes a nuisance, shall be only by the following procedures, or by a court or
> arbitration proceeding. Violations may be determined and penalties imposed only after thirty
> (30) days' written notice to the offending Member served personally or by mail, first class
> postage prepaid, return receipt requested, mailed to the latest address for such Member shown on
> the Club records, specifying the possible action and the alleged reasons therefore, and an
> opportunity for the Member to be heard before a quorum of the Board at least five (5) days
> before the effective date of any possible action.



Yes I meant to say "do not." Due process rights established by Legislation or Contract are not Constitutional Rights. Being a quasi governmental type organization does not turn them in a City, County, State, or USA. The "CONSTITUTION" and it due process rights do not apply to Timeshares and HOA's. The "Due Process" Rights as established by the 5th Amendment apply only to the US Federal Government. It is the 14th Amendment that applies to the States and their political subdivisions. I do not believe that a Timeshare or HOA has ever been legally found to be a political subdivision of a State. So there are no "Constitutional Due Process" that apply to Timeshares or HOAs. Depending on the Contracts, State Legislation there maybe some due process procedures established. So there is no "pesky" 5th Amendment to worry about.


----------



## ecwinch

geist1223 said:


> Excuse me for not being more precise.



Here is what one court said:

By his acceptance, the purchaser automatically becomes a member of the association created by the declaration and submits to the authority of the association and to the restrictions upon the use and enjoyment of the property contained in the declaration. Because each owner automatically becomes a member of the association upon taking title and because the association is empowered to levy and to collect assessments, to make and to enforce rules, and to permit or to deny certain uses of the property, the association has the power, and in many cases the obligation, to exert tremendous influence on the bundle of rights normally enjoyed as a concomitant part of fee simple ownership of property.

With power, of course, comes the potential for abuse. Therefore, the Association must be held to a high standard of responsibility: The business and governmental aspects of the association and the association's relationship to its members clearly give rise to a special sense of responsibility upon the officers and directors.... This special responsibility is manifested in the requirements of fiduciary duties and the *requirements of due process*, equal protection, and fair dealing. (Id at p. 921.) (See Raven's Cove Townhomes, Inc. v. Knuppe Development Co., supra, 114 Cal.App.3d 783, 792-799.) *[142 Cal.App.3d 652]*


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## geist1223

No cite to the 5th or 14th Amendment. For good reason. I do not think you find fair dealing or fiduciary duties anywhere in the US Constitution.


----------



## CO skier

ronparise said:


> you are a master of the obvious
> of course Wyndham knows whats happening
> 
> as Ive said in another post, wyndham knows whats going on, but they havent been willing to create a rule that would only be enforced against certain big owners
> 
> However thats exactly what they did with Club Wyndham megarenters


The points deposit feature in Club Wyndham eliminating stripping points from future years applies to all CW owners.

The auto-upgrade feature severely restricting the cancel/rebook scheme applies to all VIP owners who could take advantage of this.

What was/is the new rule created in Club Wyndham that was only enforced against certain megarenters?


----------



## ecwinch

CO skier said:


> The points deposit feature in Club Wyndham eliminating stripping points from future years applies to all CW owners.
> 
> The auto-upgrade feature severely restricting the cancel/rebook scheme applies to all VIP owners who could take advantage of this.
> 
> What was/is the new rule created in Club Wyndham that was only enforced against certain megarenters?



Having inventory go into a black hole to defeat cancel/rebook is the new rule targeting mega-renters.... but it applies to everyone.


----------



## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> Having inventory go into a black hole to defeat cancel/rebook is the new rule targeting mega-renters.... but it applies to everyone.


That is why I think only the megarenters and mini-megarenters would think it was directed only at them.  It was/is a rule directed at the abuse itself, not any particular cohort.


----------



## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> .... but it applies to everyone.


and that is my point.  And that will be the effect of any rule changes in WorldMark.

The key is to affect as few owners as possible with any rule change, while affecting as many megarenter reservations as possible, which is what the Guest Certificate fee is all about.  (And what the auto-upgrade, cancel/rebook change in Club Wyndham was all about).


----------



## bizaro86

I really hope if they change the waitlist it won't be to take it away entirely. I'd be completely fine with a "waitlists will be accepted starting at 12 months" rule. Or 11 or whatever.

That would curtail the abuse but still leave the waitlist functionality mostly intact for regular owners.

I use the waitlist all the time. Mostly for stuff I could probably get by checking every day for cancellations. The waitlist is so much more convenient...


----------



## CO skier

chemteach said:


> Isn't there a rule that if you cancel a reservation, you can't rebook the same unit within 48 hours?  I guess you can get around that if someone owns two accounts. Yes-it is more difficult than I originally thought!  Many nuances I don't understand.  Maybe worldmark could have a sit-down with 5-10 savvy owners who create scenarios and try to find loopholes to any solutions- and keep working until a solution is found. Naive thinking I realize. But wishful thinking...  I am an optimist.





ecwinch said:


> That is exactly what they are doing.





bbodb1 said:


> If this is true (and I am NOT saying it is false), three points come to mind:





bbodb1 said:


> 1) What are the savvy owners getting out of their cooperation?  Why would they willingly give over their secrets?
> 2) If the savvy owners are getting something for their cooperation, what exactly are they getting?  Full disclosure would be nice...
> 3) Who is advocating for the small owners?


The WorldMark guideline change in 2016 eliminating advance booking using grouped reservations benefited small account owners by eliminating the practice of throw-away days to lead into premium reservations.  The Board acted on the 13-month grouped reservation abuse as a result of owner input, and this was mentioned in the recent annual WorldMark meeting at about the 45:20 minute mark in the broadcast.

https://veconnect.us/ev/g/T8naGs0Ml2j-795/e/Wyndham_Annual_Meeting/k/0

This webcast will be available to WorldMark owners for a limited time through the owner website.  For anyone who cannot access the webcast, this is the relevant transcript:

*"As we (the WorldMark Board of Directors) started to do that (satellite Board of Directors meetings outside of the Pacific Northwest) more and more, we actually started to get solutions brought forward by the membership.  We had a solution on the 13-month issue out of Colorado Springs … it was a regular member of the organization, an owner.  He identified the actual problem and brought the solution.*

*Staff analyzed it; it was implemented within six months.  It was a great success."*

Savvy owners who recognize the problems in WorldMark are, apparently, presenting "solutions" to these problems at WorldMark Board meetings of their own accord, and presumably with no remuneration.  (Posting solutions on TUG leads to thoughtful posts and counter-posts, but that is about it).  imo, "solutions" from owners who know and use WorldMark and go to the trouble of presenting their "solutions" to the WM Board are a good thing.


----------



## chemteach

A few comments and a question...

1) Getting rid of waitlists will not solve the problem at all.  There are easier workarounds if the waitlist is removed.  If Worldmark TC uses this issue as a reason to remove waitlists, owners can post how easy it would be to manipulate the system without a waitlist.

2) 7 day maximum at 13 month reservations are the only way to stop manipulation.  Anything beyond 7 days allows people to game the system.  If more than 7 days are allowed, owners can cancel the reservation, use a separate account to pick up the original 7 days, and start a new 7 day reservation with the extra day(s) lopped off of the original reservation.  (This is assuming the waitlist is removed from the system - if the waitlist is intact, people will just continue to use the current workarounds.)

3) It's crazy that Worldmark TC hasn't fixed the problem.  It has existed for over a decade, and it still exists.  That's a system where the BoD is not doing their job.

4) I understand that a lot of people would like me to be quiet and stop posting.  Sorry - I believe in systems that give everyone equal access.  If my postings are making people upset that their workarounds might be in jeopardy, so be it.  I also understand that everyone wants the current flexibility of the current system.  That flexibility does not need to be removed completely for the system to have equity.  It just needs to be less flexible at the 13 month mark for high demand reservations.

5) Worldmark TC could keep the waitlist intact if they created a new rule that reservations at 13 months were only allowable for 7 days with Friday, Saturday, Sunday checkins.  That solves the loophole problem.  The BoD has the data for how many reservations end up as 7 day reservations for the prime reservations.  I would bet that it's greater than 95% of those reservations - so this change would benefit 95%+ of owners.  People who want longer reservations could get online at 6am PST the following week to try to add to their reservation.

6) This isn't about me wanting multiple reservations at Xmas / New years at specific resorts - while that would be nice, I can use RCI and II for those trips.  It's about equity for all Worldmark members, not just those in the know.  (At this point, if the rules don't change, I could easily get those prime reservations for multiple units by working the system for Xmas/ New Years 2020 by gaming the system.)

7) When is the next board meeting, and is it possible to be present at the meeting via internet without being physically present?


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## geist1223

ronparise said:


> and what Geoff wants Geoff gets



What Wyndham wants Wyndham gets.


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## geist1223

We have never rented in or out Points. We have never transferred points in or out. We have never charged anyone for a Reservation other than than the TOT. Yet we oppose almost all of the recent changes (last 2 or 3 years).

End all Transfer of Credits/Points. If they are not your Credits/Points you should not be able to use them to stay at a Worldmark Resort. This is no different from us using our Credits/Points for my kids. By limiting your number of Credits/Points you have limited your ownership and should not be allowed to stay for more time. For that time period you are a non-owners staying on someone else's Ownership.

Cancel Monday Madness, FAX Time, and Inventory Specials. Rather than have these cash options make them reduced Point Times. For Monday Madness and Inventory Specials offer them at 1/2 the normal Point Rate.


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## tschwa2

CO skier said:


> and that is my point.  And that will be the effect of any rule changes in WorldMark.
> 
> The key is to affect as few owners as possible with any rule change, while affecting as many megarenter reservations as possible, which is what the Guest Certificate fee is all about.  (And what the auto-upgrade, cancel/rebook change in Club Wyndham was all about).



Another way would be to let all owners have the first 10 extra guest certificates be at something fairly nominal like $30 each.  The second extra 10 guest certificates could be $99 each and then the third and subsequent extra guest certificates could be $300 each or simply limit the additional guest certificates to 20 beyond the included "free" ones with each account.


----------



## rickandcindy23

My question is why would anyone even want to stay at WorldMark in Kihei?   It's not oceanfront.  There are many nicer resorts in Kihei, beach and oceanfront.  I don't get it.  

I read this entire thread and don't really get WHO is doing this?  Are you saying Wyndham owners are taking WorldMark inventory at 13 months because they bought Wyndham with the 13 month window for Hawaii?


----------



## tschwa2

ecwinch said:


> Having inventory go into a black hole to defeat cancel/rebook is the new rule targeting mega-renters.... but it applies to everyone.


Which I think is fine.  The cancel/rebook was a strategy used widely by a lot of VIP members who where just regular 500,000-2 million points type owners who might have rented out a couple of reservations a year or not, but all together they added to millions and millions of points of  the inventory manipulation.  It doesn't matter if you were renting for profit or using it yourself.  With Wyndam the discount and upgrade window was never meant for vip's to get a 3 br for half the points of a studio in prime time by holding and cancelling multiple units.  It was meant to give vip's a discount on inventory that wasn't popular enough to get booked at full points.


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## chemteach

rickandcindy23 said:


> My question is why would anyone even want to stay at WorldMark in Kihei?   It's not oceanfront.  There are many nicer resorts in Kihei, beach and oceanfront.  I don't get it.
> 
> I read this entire thread and don't really get WHO is doing this?  Are you saying Wyndham owners are taking WorldMark inventory at 13 months because they bought Wyndham with the 13 month window for Hawaii?



It appears megarenters are reserving most of the Kihei units and renting them out.  These are Worldmark TC owners doing it, not Wyndham owners (at least I think that is the case - do Wyndham owners have access to all the Worldmark TC inventory??  I have never heard that).


----------



## ronparise

rickandcindy23 said:


> My question is why would anyone even want to stay at WorldMark in Kihei?   It's not oceanfront.  There are many nicer resorts in Kihei, beach and oceanfront.  I don't get it.
> 
> I read this entire thread and don't really get WHO is doing this?  Are you saying Wyndham owners are taking WorldMark inventory at 13 months because they bought Wyndham with the 13 month window for Hawaii?



I dont know why anyone would want to go to Hawaii at all, but thats me... Im sure that there are lots of folks that disagree.  And Im sure there are lots of folks that want to visit Hawaii that dont have or dont want to spend the big bucks for ocean front property.  Mf for a week at this resort is less than $1000  The resort my not be on the beach, but its across the road from a public beach   Take a walk

as to who is reserving this place  Im guessing that almost any week here can be rented for $1500 a  So thats a $500 profit each rental, (Do it 200 times for $100000)... I would think anyone that owns enough credits to rent would be reserving this property  and any worldmark owner would want to reserve here


----------



## ronparise

CO skier said:


> The points deposit feature in Club Wyndham eliminating stripping points from future years applies to all CW owners.
> 
> The auto-upgrade feature severely restricting the cancel/rebook scheme applies to all VIP owners who could take advantage of this.
> 
> What was/is the new rule created in Club Wyndham that was only enforced against certain megarenters?



The "give us back all your points and we wont sue you" rule

what Ive been saying here is that wyndham identified a number of us that they wanted out and they forced us out
The new rules that you mention make it difficult for megarenter wanna bees to get started


----------



## clifffaith

rickandcindy23 said:


> My question is why would anyone even want to stay at WorldMark in Kihei?   It's not oceanfront.  There are many nicer resorts in Kihei, beach and oceanfront.  I don't get it.
> 
> I read this entire thread and don't really get WHO is doing this?  Are you saying Wyndham owners are taking WorldMark inventory at 13 months because they bought Wyndham with the 13 month window for Hawaii?



I've said more than once that I'd stay home before booking Kihei. But we own Diamond too and Kaanapali has spoiled me. Now that I'm mobility impaired ocean view is all the more important. I'd be willing to go with no wait list until 12 months out if that would put a kink in the mega renters plans.


----------



## chemteach

If the waitlist is moved to 12 months, people can still game the system by making 10 day reservations, canceling, rebooking the first 7 days on a different account, and creating a new reservation using the last 3 days of the first reservation to start a new 10 day reservation.  The only way to stop the loopholes is to only allow 7 day reservations at 13 months out, with checkins only Friday, Saturday, Sunday.  If checkins are allowed any day of the week, you can still work the system.  Alternatively, Worldmark could start charging for cancellations after 10 or so cancellations have been made on an account.  But that would be really bad for all the owners.


----------



## am1

tschwa2 said:


> Which I think is fine.  The cancel/rebook was a strategy used widely by a lot of VIP members who where just regular 500,000-2 million points type owners who might have rented out a couple of reservations a year or not, but all together they added to millions and millions of points of  the inventory manipulation.  It doesn't matter if you were renting for profit or using it yourself.  With Wyndam the discount and upgrade window was never meant for vip's to get a 3 br for half the points of a studio in prime time by holding and cancelling multiple units.  It was meant to give vip's a discount on inventory that wasn't popular enough to get booked at full points.



Suggest that to the Wyndham sales people who sold the points that way.


----------



## bizaro86

chemteach said:


> If the waitlist is moved to 12 months, people can still game the system by making 10 day reservations, canceling, rebooking the first 7 days on a different account, and creating a new reservation using the last 3 days of the first reservation to start a new 10 day reservation.  The only way to stop the loopholes is to only allow 7 day reservations at 13 months out, with checkins only Friday, Saturday, Sunday.  If checkins are allowed any day of the week, you can still work the system.  Alternatively, Worldmark could start charging for cancellations after 10 or so cancellations have been made on an account.  But that would be really bad for all the owners.



Not if reservations don't come right back when cancelled, which is what they did with wyndham.


----------



## am1

bizaro86 said:


> Not if reservations don't come right back when cancelled, which is what they did with wyndham.



I would have enjoyed the challenge.


----------



## geist1223

Wyndham Owners can not reserve WMTC properties until the time limits of Wyndham Pass apply, which is I believe is 9 months.


----------



## ronparise

chemteach said:


> If the waitlist is moved to 12 months, people can still game the system by making 10 day reservations, canceling, rebooking the first 7 days on a different account, and creating a new reservation using the last 3 days of the first reservation to start a new 10 day reservation.  The only way to stop the loopholes is to only allow 7 day reservations at 13 months out, with checkins only Friday, Saturday, Sunday.  If checkins are allowed any day of the week, you can still work the system.  Alternatively, Worldmark could start charging for cancellations after 10 or so cancellations have been made on an account.  But that would be really bad for all the owners.


 I agree that 7 day reservations and a weekend only check in policy would go a long way to leveling the playing field and giving everyone an equal shot at every reservation

Club Wyndham used to work a lot like that and they recently changed their rules to allow any day check in

I think the movement is to more flexibility, not less

And if I’m right the goal is no longer just a level playing field. I think the goal is to drive out the megarenters all together

I didn’t just pull this idea out of the air. I think I was the only guy that had large ownerships in both systems. I really wasn’t in the megarenter category with only 500000 credits but I was still growing.  they forced me out of both clubs.    I think my experience can be looked at as a preview of coming attractions.


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## am1

My 35000 worldmark account was boot strapped.  Never made a WM reservation in my 6 years of ownership.


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## chemteach

I'm quoting Bizaro86 from the wmowners forum.  This idea could work:
"I think a combination of two changes would suffice. Randomize the time until cancelled reservations come back.

Make the waitlist of no effect until 12 months, but let owners submit waitlists between 12-13 months, and then put the list in random order.


That would kill cancel and re-book, because people wouldn't know when to look for their bookings to pop back up, and couldn't be sure they were first on the waitlist."

This should stop megarenters and people managing other people's accounts.  It doesn't change the flexibity of the system for owners - they can still waitlist, they can still make the reservations they currently are allowed to make.  People could still make long reservations.  The "black hole of cancelled reservations" helps, but I think people who have working the reservation system as a full time job would figure something out...  They could check online continually for their cancelled reservations to show back up, and grab them as they reappear.  It would be much more work than is currently needed, but still possible.  It would get rid of "reserve 10 days, cancel the last three, rebook a new 10 day reservation."

The rebooking issue is what irks me most.  It's frustrating watching the units for the day(s) just past 13 months disappear throughout the day at 13 months.


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## bizaro86

am1 said:


> My 35000 worldmark account was boot strapped.  Never made a WM reservation in my 6 years of ownership.



What did you do with them? That's a decent sized account...


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## am1

bizaro86 said:


> What did you do with them? That's a decent sized account...



Transferred to another owner for cash.


----------



## ecwinch

Here is an interesting story that might provide some insight to what is happening.

A few weeks ago, I was doing some testing of waitlists. From the reservation calendar, I looked like someone was using the waitlist to walk a reservation forward at the Seattle Camlin 2BR Penthouse. There is only one unit of that type, so the manipulation was fairly easy to spot. So on Dec 17th I put in a waitlist request for that unit - check-in of Dec 17th for up to 14 days (max allowed).

Yesterday I got a match - offering me the 19th to the 31st (14 days). When I checked the on-line calendar, I saw that the 31st was the first available date in the calendar.

So today I called in and reserved a Dec 27.2019 check-in, for one week. Picking up just the last two nights of my waitlist match, and adding the remaining days from beyond the 13th booking window.

Isn't WM a great system!


----------



## bizaro86

ecwinch said:


> Here is an interesting story that might provide some insight to what is happening.
> 
> A few weeks ago, I was doing some testing of waitlists. From the reservation calendar, I looked like someone was using the waitlist to walk a reservation forward at the Seattle Camlin 2BR Penthouse. There is only one unit of that type, so the manipulation was fairly easy to spot. So on Dec 17th I put in a waitlist request for that unit - check-in of Dec 16th for up to 14 days (max allowed).
> 
> Yesterday I got a match - offering me the 19th to the 31st (14 days). When I checked the on-line calendar, I saw that the 31st was the first available date in the calendar.
> 
> So today I called in and reserved a Dec 27.2019 check-in, for one week. Picking up just the last two nights of my waitlist match, and adding the remaining days from beyond the 13th booking window.
> 
> Isn't WM a great system!



Nice!  That'll be a great stay.


----------



## Marathoner

ecwinch said:


> Here is an interesting story that might provide some insight to what is happening.
> 
> A few weeks ago, I was doing some testing of waitlists. From the reservation calendar, I looked like someone was using the waitlist to walk a reservation forward at the Seattle Camlin 2BR Penthouse. There is only one unit of that type, so the manipulation was fairly easy to spot. So on Dec 17th I put in a waitlist request for that unit - check-in of Dec 17th for up to 14 days (max allowed).
> 
> Yesterday I got a match - offering me the 19th to the 31st (14 days). When I checked the on-line calendar, I saw that the 31st was the first available date in the calendar.
> 
> So today I called in and reserved a Dec 27.2019 check-in, for one week. Picking up just the last two nights of my waitlist match, and adding the remaining days from beyond the 13th booking window.
> 
> Isn't WM a great system!



To the original poster, this is looking like it's walking the reservation. I mention this because I could already deduce some of what was happening despite his continuing claims of wait list manipulation. Back to my post above, don't give up on the flexibility of Worldmark when it helps us all! Especially when the antagonist is the megarenter bogeyman! 

Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk


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## ecwinch

Marathoner said:


> To the original poster, this is looking like it's walking the reservation. I mention this because I could already deduce some of what was happening despite his continuing claims of wait list manipulation. Back to my post above, don't give up on the flexibility of Worldmark when it helps us all! *Especially when the antagonist is the megarenter bogeyman!*
> 
> Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk



That is not very well reasoned. The bogeyman is a mythical creature, with only anecdotal evidence of his existence.

Is that the same here? I dont think so.


----------



## CO skier

ronparise said:


> The "give us back all your points and we wont sue you" rule


Seems like more of an administrative policy than a rule.  It is certainly not a published rule.

Either way, it would apply to very, very few owners.


----------



## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> Here is an interesting story that might provide some insight to what is happening.
> 
> A few weeks ago, I was doing some testing of waitlists. From the reservation calendar, I looked like someone was using the waitlist to walk a reservation forward at the Seattle Camlin 2BR Penthouse. There is only one unit of that type, so the manipulation was fairly easy to spot. So on Dec 17th I put in a waitlist request for that unit - check-in of Dec 17th for up to 14 days (max allowed).
> 
> Yesterday I got a match - offering me the 19th to the 31st (14 days). When I checked the on-line calendar, I saw that the 31st was the first available date in the calendar.
> 
> So today I called in and reserved a Dec 27.2019 check-in, for one week. Picking up just the last two nights of my waitlist match, and adding the remaining days from beyond the 13th booking window.
> 
> Isn't WM a great system!


There is no question the waitlist needs some work.  "All waitlist days offered must be reserved as a single reservation or combined as a grouped reservation and the resulting reservation may not be modified (including adding or changing guest names).  Waitlist reservations may not extend beyond 13 months. "

This does not close every waitlist loophole, but it would rein-in your example of the possible abuses and some other abuses.


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## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> Here is an interesting story that might provide some insight to what is happening.
> 
> A few weeks ago, I was doing some testing of waitlists. From the reservation calendar, I looked like someone was using the waitlist to walk a reservation forward at the Seattle Camlin 2BR Penthouse. There is only one unit of that type, so the manipulation was fairly easy to spot. So on Dec 17th I put in a waitlist request for that unit - check-in of Dec 17th for up to 14 days (max allowed).
> 
> Yesterday I got a match - offering me the 19th to the 31st (14 days). When I checked the on-line calendar, I saw that the 31st was the first available date in the calendar.
> 
> So today I called in and reserved a Dec 27.2019 check-in, for one week. Picking up just the last two nights of my waitlist match, and adding the remaining days from beyond the 13th booking window.
> 
> Isn't WM a great system!


This example shows there is a problem.  There are many prime units that today show no availability until 12/31/19.  On a side note - the person who thought they had the system figured out must have had an "Oh S**t" moment when the unit didn't come back to them for the dates they had expected.  Nice for you!!


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## Marathoner

ecwinch said:


> That is not very well reasoned. The bogeyman is a mythical creature, with only anecdotal evidence of his existence.
> 
> Is that the same here? I dont think so.


I don't like the megarenter effects either. However, their presence is a byproduct of a flexible and high value timeshare system. So I believe we should tolerate their existence.

You believe their existence is not tolerable and advocate for ways to reduce flexibility and value of the club to do so.

My point is that changing the club to get rid of megarenters will destroy large value to the owners of the club even if the changes have its intended affect. 

Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk


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## chemteach

For those who really like the system the way it is, why not post all your secrets for obtaining the prime reservation weeks so that the system at least has equity.  Maybe if all owners knew how to do what megarenters do, and how to get around the megarenter's tactics, the system would at least have more equity.  There could be a sticky on the Worldmark forum describing how to get prime reservations with the system the way it is now.    (I realize this won't likely happen - I just think it would be the right thing to do for the timeshare community on TUG.)


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## chemteach

duplicate post...


----------



## Marathoner

chemteach said:


> For those who really like the system the way it is, why not post all your secrets for obtaining the prime reservation weeks so that the system at least has equity.  Maybe if all owners knew how to do what megarenters do, and how to get around the megarenter's tactics, the system would at least have more equity.  There could be a sticky on the Worldmark forum describing how to get prime reservations with the system the way it is now.    (I realize this won't likely happen - I just think it would be the right thing to do for the timeshare community on TUG.)


The secret has already been explained several times.

Use the wait list at exactly 13 months to get the week you're looking for. This works.  People cancel their weeks with relative frequency, even for prime dates.



Sent from my LG-H932 using Tapatalk


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## am1

chemteach said:


> For those who really like the system the way it is, why not post all your secrets for obtaining the prime reservation weeks so that the system at least has equity.  Maybe if all owners knew how to do what megarenters do, and how to get around the megarenter's tactics, the system would at least have more equity.  There could be a sticky on the Worldmark forum describing how to get prime reservations with the system the way it is now.    (I realize this won't likely happen - I just think it would be the right thing to do for the timeshare community on TUG.)



And kill the business?  Or owners can trial and error theories.  Do some leg work instead of being spoon fed.  For awhile one mega renter enjoyed revealing knowledge for everyone.


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## chemteach

am1 said:


> And kill the business?  Or owners can trial and error theories.  Do some leg work instead of being spoon fed.  For awhile one mega renter enjoyed revealing knowledge for everyone.



My point is that the Worldmark system should have equity for as many owners as possible.  If it doesn't, the BoD should figure out a way to create equity.   I have already figured out a few things that I've posted here.  Others have been mentioned.  I'm suggesting there could be a sticky that puts this in one place so that the playing field is leveled for everyone.  Isn't that a big part of what TUG is about - trying to inform the public of timeshare industry's scams, ways to best use timeshare systems, etc.?  A sticky where all the information that you can find by doing research would benefit the TUG community.


----------



## am1

chemteach said:


> My point is that the Worldmark system should have equity for as many owners as possible.  If it doesn't, the BoD should figure out a way to create equity.   I have already figured out a few things that I've posted here.  Others have been mentioned.  I'm suggesting there could be a sticky that puts this in one place so that the playing field is leveled for everyone.  Isn't that a big part of what TUG is about - trying to inform the public of timeshare industry's scams, ways to best use timeshare systems, etc.?  A sticky where all the information that you can find by doing research would benefit the TUG community.



A utopia.  And who do you think would volunteer this info?  Like I said earlier mega renters will always fine ways to be profitable even if it is at the expense of other owners.

Anyone can do what mega renters do.  Just takes capital, hard work and knowledge.  

Maybe you would prefer a fixed week program?


----------



## ecwinch

Marathoner said:


> I don't like the megarenter effects either. However, their presence is a byproduct of a flexible and high value timeshare system. So I believe we should tolerate their existence.
> 
> *You believe their existence is not tolerable and advocate for ways to reduce flexibility and value of the club to do so.*
> 
> My point is that changing the club to get rid of megarenters will destroy large value to the owners of the club even if the changes have its intended affect.



First off, your assumptions about what I believe are wrong. The right to rent is explicit and it is important right for some owners for cost recovery.

What I do believe is that owner usage should have priority over non-owner usage at our best resorts for the long-term health of the Club. I do believe that the advent of AirBnb is the game changer, and without some priority period for owner usage the growth of commercial renting will kill the Club. Because that "flexibility" does not matter to the average owner when they cant make reservations.

And likewise rolling out the "destroy large value" is such a trope. The usage statistics - even if off by 100% - do not support the position that the average owner has been impacted any of the BoD's changes, and most of what has been discussed here is no different. The quarterly mgt report tells us that 87% of all reservations are booked within 10 months, and 46% of all reservations are booked within 60 days. So the average owner is unlikely to be impacted by most of what is being discussed.

The problem is the 6.26% of the reservations that are booked 366+ days out, in particular the portion booked for non-owners whose identity is not known at the time of booking. You can argue that 7% of reservations is a small count, but those 38,111 reservations represents around a third of our prime season inventory (12 weeks of summer+2 weeks xmas * 7000 units).

If those reservations follow the standard rate of guest usage (~33%), preserving that inventory for owners would roughly be the same as building a 898 room resort that only operated during prime season. Or almost 13,000 more owners able to book a prime season vacation. I think that outweighs the cost.


----------



## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> My point is that the Worldmark system should have equity for as many owners as possible.  If it doesn't, the BoD should figure out a way to create equity.   I have already figured out a few things that I've posted here.  Others have been mentioned.  I'm suggesting there could be a sticky that puts this in one place so that the playing field is leveled for everyone.  Isn't that a big part of what TUG is about - trying to inform the public of timeshare industry's scams, ways to best use timeshare systems, etc.?  A sticky where all the information that you can find by doing research would benefit the TUG community.



So at equity you want a practice to end, but you want us to publicize it so that more people will know how to use it? Because that message will never reach everyone, and given that it requires multiple accounts - not even everyone can take advantage of it. I personally have talked about it on all the available forums, so I certainly am not suppressing discussion of the technique, but neither do I want to actively promote it's growth.

That will just place a large group of owners at a disadvantage to others. That would seem to run contrary to "equity".


----------



## allenke

Haven’t frequented TUG forums much in th last 15 yrs or so. Interesting thread. 

Eric, thanks for your last two posts.  Appreciated the stats and also agree we don’t need to advertise how to get around the 13 month rule. 

I do hope that Ron is right in his thinking that Wyndham will come after the Megarenters in the Worldmark system. It was good they were put out of business in club Wyndham.  I am all in favor of them doing the same in the Worldmark club. 

Ken


----------



## ecwinch

Going back to the Camlin. Now that I have it, how hard to you think it would be to control that inventory for the entire summer of 2020? Breaking it up into rentable week-long segments.


----------



## chemteach

ecwinch said:


> Going back to the Camlin. Now that I have it, how hard to you think it would be to control that inventory for the entire summer of 2020? Breaking it up into rentable week-long segments.


It seems it would be easy - until someone got to the waitlist before you and took it back - but then you could do the same...


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## chemteach

I apologise for starting this hullabaloo. I was pretty shocked at units disappearing at 13 months plus throughout the day at 13 months . It seems this is just part of the system, and owners need to plan accordingly. It would be nice if that were not the case, but in order to keep the system flexible, that appears to be a reality..


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## T-Dot-Traveller

chemteach said:


> . I was pretty shocked at units disappearing at 13 months .......It would be nice if that were not the case, but in order to keep the system flexible, that appears to be a reality..



TUG is a good place to learn - from the "collected wisdom "  -

I have read  this thread , (as a non- Worldmark owner) and learned
 (not that I understand all the nuances).

IMO -it was a thread worth starting - 11 days ago  ; if only for the debate of issues & ideas .


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## ecwinch

chemteach said:


> I apologise for starting this hullabaloo. I was pretty shocked at units disappearing at 13 months plus throughout the day at 13 months . It seems this is just part of the system, and owners need to plan accordingly. It would be nice if that were not the case, but in order to keep the system flexible, that appears to be a reality..



I dont feel there is anything to apologize. We dont - at least I dont - live in a society where we cannot openly discuss ideas/concepts/changes. After all, it is just talk. 

Yes, some people get riled up when topics they disagree with are discussed. But that is on them and not you.


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## ecwinch

Here is an interesting availability calendar for that 2BR Penthouse Queen at the Camlin. It was too much work to try and walk the reservation forward, so I did not do anything.

But checked it today, and Jan 3-5,2020 are unavailable in the reservation calendar. Which would seem to be impossible for a reservation, as you cannot book just three days that far out. And I still have Dec 27 to Jan 3 (checkout). 

Any theories? Bogeyman or something else?


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## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> Here is an interesting availability calendar for that 2BR Penthouse Queen at the Camlin. It was too much work to try and walk the reservation forward, so I did not do anything.
> 
> But checked it today, and Jan 3-5,2020 are unavailable in the reservation calendar. Which would seem to be impossible for a reservation, as you cannot book just three days that far out. And I still have Dec 27 to Jan 3 (checkout).
> 
> Any theories? Bogeyman or something else?


One explanation is those three days are part of a grouped reservation.  Today is 13 months before Jan. 4, 2020.  Someone could have booked those 3 days yesterday or today with at least 4 nights prior in another WM resort to meet the 7 nights minimum 10-13 months in advance.


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## ecwinch

CO skier said:


> One explanation is those three days are part of a grouped reservation.  Today is 13 months before Jan. 4, 2020.  Someone could have booked those 3 days yesterday or today with at least 4 nights prior in another WM resort to meet the 7 nights minimum 10-13 months in advance.



Interesting theory. But I think it is off by a couple of days. As the booking window for any reservation starting after Jan 4th is not open yet.

And since they could not yet book a reservation starting at 5th or 6th at another resort - how could they join anything to it to conform to the 7 night min?

They could have booked the 3rd for a week starting yesterday. And they could call in today and drop off six nights - picking up those nights somewhere else to create a grouped reservation. But in that scenario, the 4th and the 5th would show as available.

NOTE: The rule on grouped reservation does not allow you to change the check-in date on any segments you are joining - only the check-out. So to create the grouped reservation as you describe, they need a reservation starting Jan 6th - which cannot be booked yet.

NVM: I finally got your point. They are joining it to the end. Good point.


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## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> NVM: I finally got your point. They are joining it to the end. Good point.


Yes, just one more example of how the grouped reservation rule change did not change the flexibility of grouped reservations; it just closed the loophole.

The new rule requires just the first day of all segments be within 13 months when the reservation is made.  The last segment (at any given time; e.g., on Dec. 6th the owner could add on another segment in another resort beginning Jan. 6th) may extend beyond 13 months just like a non-grouped reservation.

Accessing the same grouped reservation flexibility as before just takes thinking about grouped reservations a little differently -- something the owner staying in the Camlin 2 BR Penthouse has figured out, imo.

It should also be noted that the change to grouped reservations did nothing to affect Wyndham's bottom line plus or minus, and if Wyndham intends WorldMark to become just like Club Wyndham, as some erroneously suggest, why didn't the BOD just eliminate grouped reservations altogether?  Club Wyndham, indeed no other timeshare that I know of, has anything like grouped reservations.


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## CO skier

ecwinch said:


> The bogeyman is a mythical creature,


Not when I am on the golf course ...


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## JudyS

Wow, this is a fascinating thread! I have yet to digest it all.

I hope I won't re-open any pointed debates, but I have something I want to add. I think the biggest problem with Worldmark availability is that smaller units and off-season dates are not discounted enough. I own in several systems, including Worldmark and Disney Vacation Club. At Disney's Boardwalk Villas, where I own, the most expensive night of the year, preferred view, in a 3-bedroom is 145 DVC points. The least expensive night of the year in a studio, standard view, is 10 DVC points. Worldmark's system is shut down for the night, so I can't check credit values. But, I'm sure the discount for a smaller unit, lower season and lesser view is nowhere near as big.

In my experience, points systems work best if there is a big discount for off-season (maybe half or more, depending on how seasonal the location is). Also, point size should be almost proportional to square footage, with, say, a suite that is three times as big as a studio (and sleeps twice as many people) costing maybe 2.5 times as many points as a studio.

Disney has done several point reallocations to equalize demand. They can only redistribute points within a single suite (same resort, size, and view), but they can change the ratio for different seasons or for different nights of the week. Disney also has five seasons instead of three.

Does Worldmark have any ability to reallocate credits?

Of course, it would also help if Worldmark stopped selling resorts in the Midwest, and telling owners they could use the credits from these resorts to book the West Coast and Hawaii. But, I think the failure to offer a large enough discount on lower seasons and smaller units is the biggest reason why availability is so low for large units in peak season. Small units actually seem to have OK availability. Studios for July at Seaside are sometimes just sitting there online, after the 13-month window has passed.


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## ecwinch

JudyS said:


> Wow, this is a fascinating thread! I have yet to digest it all.
> 
> I hope I won't re-open any pointed debates, but I have something I want to add. I think the biggest problem with Worldmark availability is that smaller units and off-season dates are not discounted enough. I own in several systems, including Worldmark and Disney Vacation Club. At Disney's Boardwalk Villas, where I own, the most expensive night of the year, preferred view, in a 3-bedroom is 145 DVC points. The least expensive night of the year in a studio, standard view, is 10 DVC points. Worldmark's system is shut down for the night, so I can't check credit values. But, I'm sure the discount for a smaller unit, lower season and lesser view is nowhere near as big.
> 
> In my experience, points systems work best if there is a big discount for off-season (maybe half or more, depending on how seasonal the location is). Also, point size should be almost proportional to square footage, with, say, a suite that is three times as big as a studio (and sleeps twice as many people) costing maybe 2.5 times as many points as a studio.
> 
> Disney has done several point reallocations to equalize demand. They can only redistribute points within a single suite (same resort, size, and view), but they can change the ratio for different seasons or for different nights of the week. Disney also has five seasons instead of three.
> 
> Does Worldmark have any ability to reallocate credits?
> 
> Of course, it would also help if Worldmark stopped selling resorts in the Midwest, and telling owners they could use the credits from these resorts to book the West Coast and Hawaii. But, I think the failure to offer a large enough discount on lower seasons and smaller units is the biggest reason why availability is so low for large units in peak season. Small units actually seem to have OK availability. Studios for July at Seaside are sometimes just sitting there online, after the 13-month window has passed.



While I agree with your suggestion as a theoretical solution, I really believe it is a nonstarter to suggest increasing credit values to increase availability. But yes, they could reallocate.

And while a lot of hay is made about “Midwest” resorts, WM has not added a resort in the Midwest in quite some time. In 2011, units from those resorts were returned to Wyndham, and had no impact on availability on popular resorts. Because as you point out, it really is pressure from off-season credits that drive it.

And if credit availability is the driver, why not manage it by reducing the number of credits a member can control by doing away with the ability to have up to four years of credits in a account?


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## rhonda

FWIW, I find DVC to be a flawed point system.  Their point values have created too great a draw for studio stays while disfavoring the 1BR units.  I prefer WM's approach of clumping the the room-size-point-values close together to encourage guests to choose a room that fits best for occupancy rather than "costs."

For the record, we've owned WM since 2000 and DVC since 2004.  I'm writing this from DVC's Treehouse Villas.  (So I'm using my DVC points ... but it will never be my favorite timeshare.)



JudyS said:


> Wow, this is a fascinating thread! I have yet to digest it all.
> 
> I hope I won't re-open any pointed debates, but I have something I want to add. I think the biggest problem with Worldmark availability is that smaller units and off-season dates are not discounted enough. I own in several systems, including Worldmark and Disney Vacation Club. At Disney's Boardwalk Villas, where I own, the most expensive night of the year, preferred view, in a 3-bedroom is 145 DVC points. The least expensive night of the year in a studio, standard view, is 10 DVC points. Worldmark's system is shut down for the night, so I can't check credit values. But, I'm sure the discount for a smaller unit, lower season and lesser view is nowhere near as big.
> 
> In my experience, points systems work best if there is a big discount for off-season (maybe half or more, depending on how seasonal the location is). Also, point size should be almost proportional to square footage, with, say, a suite that is three times as big as a studio (and sleeps twice as many people) costing maybe 2.5 times as many points as a studio.
> 
> Disney has done several point reallocations to equalize demand. They can only redistribute points within a single suite (same resort, size, and view), but they can change the ratio for different seasons or for different nights of the week. Disney also has five seasons instead of three.
> 
> Does Worldmark have any ability to reallocate credits?
> 
> Of course, it would also help if Worldmark stopped selling resorts in the Midwest, and telling owners they could use the credits from these resorts to book the West Coast and Hawaii. But, I think the failure to offer a large enough discount on lower seasons and smaller units is the biggest reason why availability is so low for large units in peak season. Small units actually seem to have OK availability. Studios for July at Seaside are sometimes just sitting there online, after the 13-month window has passed.


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## bizaro86

JudyS said:


> Wow, this is a fascinating thread! I have yet to digest it all.
> 
> I hope I won't re-open any pointed debates, but I have something I want to add. I think the biggest problem with Worldmark availability is that smaller units and off-season dates are not discounted enough. I own in several systems, including Worldmark and Disney Vacation Club. At Disney's Boardwalk Villas, where I own, the most expensive night of the year, preferred view, in a 3-bedroom is 145 DVC points. The least expensive night of the year in a studio, standard view, is 10 DVC points. Worldmark's system is shut down for the night, so I can't check credit values. But, I'm sure the discount for a smaller unit, lower season and lesser view is nowhere near as big.
> 
> In my experience, points systems work best if there is a big discount for off-season (maybe half or more, depending on how seasonal the location is). Also, point size should be almost proportional to square footage, with, say, a suite that is three times as big as a studio (and sleeps twice as many people) costing maybe 2.5 times as many points as a studio.
> 
> Disney has done several point reallocations to equalize demand. They can only redistribute points within a single suite (same resort, size, and view), but they can change the ratio for different seasons or for different nights of the week. Disney also has five seasons instead of three.
> 
> Does Worldmark have any ability to reallocate credits?
> 
> Of course, it would also help if Worldmark stopped selling resorts in the Midwest, and telling owners they could use the credits from these resorts to book the West Coast and Hawaii. But, I think the failure to offer a large enough discount on lower seasons and smaller units is the biggest reason why availability is so low for large units in peak season. Small units actually seem to have OK availability. Studios for July at Seaside are sometimes just sitting there online, after the 13-month window has passed.



I agree with this in general. I think the most expensive worldmark unit is a 40k 4 bedroom presidential, and the cheapest is a 3k studio week. That is a 13.333x multiple, so fairly large.

That said, their general practice of making things (both size and season) differ by 2k doesn't work now that the numbers are bigger, because the percentage difference is insufficient.

The "legacy" 2 bedroom chart was 6k blue, 8k white, 10k red. A red 2 bedroom is 66% more credits than a  blue 2 bedroom.

At west yellowstone, a newer and commonly complained about resort, the point schedule for a 2 bedroom is 13k red, 11.5k white, 9.5k blue. A red 2 bedroom is only 37% more credits than a blue 2 bedroom.

That is especially problematic with how seasonal west yellowstone is. The gate to the park isn't open to vehicles all year, which dramatically reduces demand in the winter.  But the cost is pretty close to a seaside summer week. So summer weeks are a big issue at more than 13 months, while winter is pretty much always available on bonus time. Making red more expensive and blue cheaper would improve availability in the summer and help the winter actually get used.

My biggest hesitation to this is the moral hazard. If the membership accepts credit re-allocation I worry Wyn will reallocate into their own pockets.

Also, I'm not sure that "midwest" characterization is totally fair. I think their are west resorts that are underutilized as well, and some of the foreclosed weeks additions don't look likely to be well used to me (Poconos, Lake Havasu eg)


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## JudyS

I don't know how many Worldmark owners own in other systems, but I own many different timeshares, and Worldmark availability for peak-season reservations is shockingly bad. One of my timeshares floats almost 1-52 (it's something like 7-48), and is on the Southern California coast, adjacent to a state beach. One year, some owners got into a fist-fight at the resort over July 4th reservations. But, that problem is only for July 4th week. If I give the resort a choice of two summer weeks other than July 4th, I *always* get one of those weeks. Worldmark is way worse.

None of my other resorts are as hard to book as Worldmark. My 1-52 float in Scottsdale -- I have to be online when reservations open, but if I am, I can get one of the best eight weeks of the year. Summer in a week that floats from February to November in Myrtle Beach -- fine, and I usually see July 4th availability. I just booked New Year's Eve at Disney's Boardwalk, in one of the most desirable room types. No problem.

With Worldmark, there are resorts where I get online right at the 13 month mark, and everything is already gone. Until I read this thread, I had no idea how people even booked those reservations.

Don't get me wrong, I'm happy with Worldmark. But, that's because I get good value when depositing non-Worldmark weeks via Exchange Plus, and also because I can rent out my credits if I can't book them. When I joined Worldmark, I was truly shocked at how bad peak-season availability is. I live in Michigan, so I don't do midweek stays out west. I can't reliably get the sorts of WM reservations that are worth traveling 2,000 miles to use. If Worldmark didn't make it easy to rent out surplus credits, I'd probably sell.  (Although I lucked out and Worldmark Austin opened at just the perfect time to get a bunch of rooms for my nephew's graduation -- and the resort is right next to UT-Austin!)

About my "Midwest" comment, I think the location of resorts is a factor, but not the main factor. And, I was really thinking about the differences between resorts in states that have an ocean coast and those that are in the overall middle part of the country. Arizona isn't "Midwest" in the usual sense, but it doesn't have a coast. And, I grew up in the Poconos, and they might as well be in the Midwest -- they are similar in geography to where I live in Michigan, but even lower in tourist demand. 



ecwinch said:


> ...
> And if credit availability is the driver, why not manage it by reducing the number of credits a member can control by doing away with the ability to have up to four years of credits in a account?


I wasn't thinking about the total number of credits available at one time, but rather the small difference between peak season/large units and off season/small units.

Mgearenters controlling many credits at once is certainly a problem, but I was thinking more of regular owners, not megarenters,  competing for prime reservations.



rhonda said:


> FWIW, I find DVC to be a flawed point system.  Their point values have created too great a draw for studio stays while disfavoring the 1BR units....


There is a flaw with the Disney one-bedroom points values, but it isn't because of their size. It's because the one-bedrooms only provide onsite Disney privileges to four people, which is the same number as the studios. Yet, the one-bedrooms cost about twice as much as the studios. (I'm not sure the Disney resorts that aren't affiliated with theme parks have as much of a problem with the one-bedrooms being slow to book up.)

This four-person occupancy limit for one-bedrooms is a mistake that Disney made in designing their early resorts, and the Declarations don't allow them to re-allocate points to fix it. The newer resorts improve on this problem by having five (or maybe sometimes six?) people allowed in a one-bedroom. Plus, the newest Disney resort, Riveria, has some studios that are for just two people.

Overall, though, the problem with slow bookings for one-bedrooms at some Disney resorts supports the idea that point/credit allocation must truly reflect the use one can get out of a particular size (and season). There can't just be an arbitrary allocation of credits/points, which seems to be the case with a lot of Worldmark resorts.



On the topic of megarenters (who I think are part of the problem, but not as bad as the credit allocation problem), what about the idea of limiting the total number of guest certificates an owner can have per year? I know some megarenters are actually managers for other owners. Still, would it be possible to have a rule that one person/company could only have a certain number of GCs per year, even if they were managing for other owners? This would be hard to enforce, but just the threat of investigating and maybe canceling reservations would probably make a lot of owners think twice bout giving their points to a megarenter to manage. The question is whether there is the legal standing for such a rule. Eric, what do you think?


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## bizaro86

The reason peak availability for worldmark is so bad is because they really don't charge much extra for it, so everyone wants it. If they re-allocated credits between peak weeks and off-peak, the problem would probably be significantly improved.

The other thing is the flexibility you mention. Because wm credits last effectively 3 years (1 year to borrow and 2 years active) and can be easily transferred/sold, I suspect a lot less expire unused than in other systems. That takes a lot of slack out of the system as well.


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## JudyS

bizaro86 said:


> I agree with this in general. I think the most expensive worldmark unit is a 40k 4 bedroom presidential, and the cheapest is a 3k studio week. That is a 13.333x multiple, so fairly large....
> 
> At west yellowstone, a newer and commonly complained about resort, the point schedule for a 2 bedroom is 13k red, 11.5k white, 9.5k blue. A red 2 bedroom is only 37% more credits than a blue 2 bedroom.
> 
> That is especially problematic with how seasonal west yellowstone is. The gate to the park isn't open to vehicles all year, which dramatically reduces demand in the winter.  But the cost is pretty close to a seaside summer week. So summer weeks are a big issue at more than 13 months, while winter is pretty much always available on bonus time. Making red more expensive and blue cheaper would improve availability in the summer and help the winter actually get used.
> 
> My biggest hesitation to this is the moral hazard. If the membership accepts credit re-allocation I worry Wyn will reallocate into their own pockets.


In the Hyatt system (which I don't own), the most seasonal resorts charge over 10 times as much for peak season as for the lowest season. And, their roads aren't even closed in winter.

I'm not sure if Wyndham could line their pockets with a credit reallocation. The rule would probably be that the total number of credits to book the resort for the year would be the same.

That 3k studio -- it isn't at the same resort as the 40k 4-bedroom presidential, is it? And, does anyone know what the square footage difference is? The Disney 3-bedroom I was talking about is at the same resort as the studio, and is about 6 times the square footage for 5 times the number of points, for the same view category. I'd say furnishings aren't that different -- there is no presidential versus regular distinction.

Perhaps Eric is correct that credit reallocation is a non-starter. I would really like to see smaller units discounted more, though, even if the difference between seasons stayed the same. What do other WM owners here think?


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## geist1223

If I remember correctly from the WMTC governing Documents Credits can be re-allocated within the Resort by Room Size and Season but the total Points for each Resort has to remain the same.This would probably cause a major fight within the WMTC Community. People are already upset by the number of Penthouse and Presidential Units in the new Resorts with their astronomically high Point Values. Just take a look at the New Resort in Portland.

As to the original topic we are on the side that almost everything the WMTC BOD has done at the behest of Wyndham (their sole advisor) had hurt the average to small Owners more than it has hurt the megarentors.


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## JudyS

bizaro86 said:


> ...The other thing is the flexibility you mention. Because wm credits last effectively 3 years (1 year to borrow and 2 years active) and can be easily transferred/sold, I suspect a lot less expire unused than in other systems. That takes a lot of slack out of the system as well.


Ah, I missed your post because we were writing at the same time. I see your point about few credits expiring. I actually wonder where WM finds the inventory for Bonus Time, Inventory Specials, etc. I would think that would lead to a surplus of credits in the system. Perhaps it does lead to a surplus, and that is one reason why peak season availability is so hard to find. 



geist1223 said:


> If I remember correctly from the WMTC governing Documents Credits can be re-allocated within the Resort by Room Size and Season but the total Points for each Resort has to remain the same.This would probably cause a major fight within the WMTC Community. People are already upset by the number of Penthouse and Presidential Units in the new Resorts with their astronomically high Point Values. Just take a look at the New Resort in Portland.


Well, if the members don't want to reallocate, they don't want to reallocate. Still, I suspect reallocation would be more acceptable at some resorts than others. The resorts that offer exceptionally good deals on large units during peak season are probably the ones that are so hard to book. These are the resorts where reallocating makes sense, and these are also the resorts that probably are targeted by people looking for inventory to rent. Resorts that are already expensive aren't going to be desirable for renting, and I would guess these resorts are easier for ordinary owners to book. (Although I don't have enough experience booking high-demand WM reservations to be sure.) 



geist1223 said:


> As to the original topic we are on the side that almost everything the WMTC BOD has done at the behest of Wyndham (their sole advisor) had hurt the average to small Owners more than it has hurt the megarentors.


You could be right, although I don't know much about the megarenters. So, I don't know how much the new rules impact them. The rules are certainly a hassle for ordinary owners. I suspect the current booking rules are too complicated for some ordinary owners to even understand. WM seems to have an awful lot of online resources designed to explain their booking rules.


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## geist1223

I believe that most Points to support BT, IS, MM come from the huge block of Points that Wyndham still owns. Also remember BT has a very short fuse for Booking. So if rooms in a Resort are not Booked 14 before then it is unlikely that they will be Booked. For IS these are offered at Resorts that are historically under booked for the time period listed and they are mainly midweek. Though some IS do offer weekends.


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## ronparise

geist1223 said:


> I believe that most Points to support BT, IS, MM come from the huge block of Points that Wyndham still owns. Also remember BT has a very short fuse for Booking. So if rooms in a Resort are not Booked 14 before then it is unlikely that they will be Booked. For IS these are offered at Resorts that are historically under booked for the time period listed and they are mainly midweek. Though some IS do offer weekends.


 
There is something in Worldmark called Travelshare. Travelshare allows an owner to use their credits for things other than worldmark reservationsSo wyndham has a lot of credits to work with from unsold inventory and the credits that owners have exchanged through Travelshare for airfare, cruises, car rentals etc.


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## ecwinch

JudyS said:


> Well, if the members don't want to reallocate, they don't want to reallocate. Still, I suspect reallocation would be more acceptable at some resorts than others. The resorts that offer exceptionally good deals on large units during peak season are probably the ones that are so hard to book. These are the resorts where reallocating makes sense, and these are also the resorts that probably are targeted by people looking for inventory to rent. Resorts that are already expensive aren't going to be desirable for renting, and I would guess these resorts are easier for ordinary owners to book. (Although I don't have enough experience booking high-demand WM reservations to be sure.)



But in terms of availability, I dont see how increasing the cost of the most popular resort/seasons while lowering the cost of off-season does much to improve availability. It is not as if many members who want the high-demand reservation will instead choose the off-season reservation because the credits are lower. Their booking patterns are likely driven by when they can take vacations vs the credit cost. And even if they did, I think they are easily replaced by someone else willing to pay the increased credits.

Maybe everyone else plays the game differently, but given the numerous cash booking options I tend to not use credits for my off-season bookings. Saving them for prime season reservations.

And all cash booking options except BT are using Wyndham credits - either owned or acquired via TS.


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## bizaro86

I think you (and most of us here) are 10x more savvy than the average owner. I spend lots of time at WM Canmore during white/blue season, and chat with other owners.

Tons of them book using credits, even though Fax is always an option then, and IS and bonus time are also reliably available. I used to point that out to people (trying to be helpful). I only ever received two categories of responses. 

1) why would I want to save my credits? I've already paid for them OR I have more than I can use

2) a blank and befuddled stare that can't comprehend cash booking options

My experience is that WM points are a sunk cost fallacy item. People have them, so they use the amount they have for what it can get. If they can't get a prime vacation (either because what they want is booked or they dont have enough credits) they go through other choices until they find something. Even if that something is a lower season week.

So I think if you made W Yellowstone way more expensive in the summer it would still get booked up on credits. But the much lower cost winter weeks would be more likely to get booked then too, because the lower cost would be enticing for someone.


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## ecwinch

Ok - accepting that as true, doesn’t increased off season utilization result in less availability?


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## easyrider

chemteach said:


> I purchased Worldmark recently, and from the short experience I have had with the online system, it's pretty clear that whatever Worldmark has done with housekeeping fees and guest certificate fees - it may have impacted the bottom line of megarenters, but they are just as active now (concluded based on my studying the availability of Hawaii Xmas weeks for 2019) as they ever were.  Every morning for the last 5 days, I tried to get a good unit at a good time.  But what happens is that between the hours of 6 and 7am, the current date's availability disappears (as expected), but if only one unit was available today, within a half hour, availability for the following 3 days slowly goes from >5 to 0 units available for many unit types - sometimes just for the following day, sometimes for the next 2 days, sometimes for 5 days.  If people are only allowed to book from today to 13 months from today, then the availability of units for the following 6 days should only decrease by the number of units that could be booked 13 months from today.  It seems Worldmark has some serious glitches in its system.  I have not seen anything like this in Vistana.  I have read a lot about people doing strange things with waitlists.
> 
> It doesn't seem like the problem with the system is megarenters - Worldmark has nothing in its bylaws against renting units out.  The problem is with the 13 month rule not being applied equally to all Worldmark owners.  Worldmark really needs to fix the situation with 13 month reservation workarounds.  Owners are blaming megarenters for the problem - but any owner can do whatever it is a megarenter is doing as soon as an owner figures out how to "beat" the system.
> 
> 
> If Worldmark wants to fix the real problem, they need to do something about the reservation rules (and the computer programming - their online system is very glitchy) and the waitlist rules.  A small subset of Worldmark owners have the know-how to get reservations booked in advance of 13 months - that's pretty clear.  This morning was crazy to watch how the availability for high demand Xmas weeks suddenly disappeared completely - even checking in on a Monday, Tuesday, or Wednesday.  Worldmark has to know what is happening - and the fix seems pretty easy - if two accounts appear to be working together in a fixed pattern - where one cancels, and the other account continuously gets the cancelled units off the waitlist - there is clearly a link between the two accounts, and a problem in the system.  If someone at Worldmark took 3 hours to look at the history of waitlist placements and cancellations for Kihei units, they could likely identify a number of people who are using some type of workaround.  Worldmark could contact any owners doing this and tell them to stop.
> 
> There should at least be a rule in place that says if accounts are found to be connected to create workarounds for creating reservations greater than 13 months in advance for more than "x" units per year, those accounts will lose their current reservations.  There could be an additional rule that if those accounts continue to use workarounds, they will no longer be allowed to borrow credits into their account, and not be allowed to make reservations until the 12 (or 11) month window - or... make up a consequence...
> 
> I find it difficult to understand why this has gone on for so long.  (Based on prior posts - it appears this is something owners have known about for a good number of years.) The average owner should have the same access to high demand weeks as any other owner - and not have to watch availability for checkin dates 13 months +1,2,3 days out disappear between the hours of 6-6:30am.  It's crazy!!




It looks like the charge for guest certificates did cause the projected occupancy rate to go down.


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## sdowner

Well this thread is a year old now, but I guess it's that time of year again where the issue comes up. So I'm new to the WorldMark beyond 13 month availability game and I'm just trying to figure things out. I'm not quite sure I still fully understand how people are able to guarantee a booking 13-months + 2,3, or 4 days.

Let's say my goal is to get a check-in 12/18/2020 for 7 nights and I'm willing to manipulate through waitlist to get this (Goal Reservation)

On 11/11/2019 I am able to secure many reservations for 12/11/2020-12/19/2020 for 8 nights (Throw-Away Reservation). That takes away all the availability for anyone check-in on 12/18/2020 (let's say the next earliest availabiliy is now on 12/19/2020). On 11/18/2019 I cancel all my Throw-Away Rservations and rebook from 12/18/2020 for 7 nights (Goal Reservation).

But the problem is that anyone else could have put a waitlist request in on day 11/12/19 (for 12/12/20), 11/13/19 (for 12/13/20), etc. and blocked me from rebooking when I cancel my Throw-Away Reservations.

Even if I myself put in a waitlist request on each of those subsequent days, I'm not guaranteed that my waitlist request will be the waitlist request that is next in line to receive an offer. I have no idea where I am in the waitlist line. If there's anyone ahead of me on the waitlist, then that is the person that could end up with my Goal Reservation.

So it seems like the person that gets the desired Goal Reservation may or may not be the person that made the initial Throw-Away Reservations. The person that gets the Goal Reservation is just lucky with the waitlist.

But it doesn't seem that a megarenter would want to risk that. They'd want a way to guarantee that they are the ones to get the Goal Reservation. Can someone help and explain what I'm missing here?


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## chemteach

I think you have the right idea of what people are trying to do.  But I don't think anyone is guaranteed of being first on the waitlist to get a week they want, even the megarenters.  But there are people out there who supposedly manage a bunch of different accounts, and put waitlist requests on all the accounts, thus gaining an advantage by having more requests in the system.  I also think that no matter how Worldmark might try to change the system to get megarenters from gaming the system, people find workarounds.  It's an unfortunate aspect of owning Worldmark.


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## sdowner

Thanks for your response. That makes more sense. 

Assuming that the waitlist system is fair and goes in a first in first out order (so that earlier waitlists have higher priority), then it seems like getting the multiple waitlist requests in right at 6:00 am is important. But it still seems rather risky, because 1) someone else can always get in even earlier or 2) the system is not prioritizing the requests fairly.

For me, I just want to use the reservation for my own family's use. I guess the best way is to use a lot of throw-away lead-in days before the dates I actually need, and then never cancel. Seems like that's the only way to guarantee the dates I want. In the end, that may be pretty fair after all. Someone else had mentioned raising the high value seasons costs more in order to spread out usage. Using throw-away lead-in days is an implicit way to increase the cost of those desirable high value dates. It just results in wasted (unused) days, but they might have gone used anyways (e.g. first couple of weeks of December).


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## geist1223

Every time WMTC BOD tries to adjust things to cut down on Megarenters it has a large negative effect on small Account holders. Plus it only has a short time effect on Megarenters.


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## sdowner

Well... there's an unexpectedly happy ending to my 2020 booking quest. Someone had reserved the dates over Christmas 2020 (check-in 12/18/2020) that I wanted, so on 11/18/19 (a couple days ago)  I put my the waitlist request. I got the waitlist offer just now, called customer service and was able to book my full week. So I guess all that planning and strategizing for next year didn't even turn out to be necessary after all. I didn't even have to wait more than a couple days


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## chemteach

sdowner said:


> Well... there's an unexpectedly happy ending to my 2020 booking quest. Someone had reserved the dates over Christmas 2020 (check-in 12/18/2020) that I wanted, so on 11/18/19 (a couple days ago)  I put my the waitlist request. I got the waitlist offer just now, called customer service and was able to book my full week. So I guess all that planning and strategizing for next year didn't even turn out to be necessary after all. I didn't even have to wait more than a couple days


It's likely that you got in ahead of a mega renter . So glad you got the week you wanted!!!


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## DaveNV

sdowner said:


> Well... there's an unexpectedly happy ending to my 2020 booking quest. Someone had reserved the dates over Christmas 2020 (check-in 12/18/2020) that I wanted, so on 11/18/19 (a couple days ago)  I put my the waitlist request. I got the waitlist offer just now, called customer service and was able to book my full week. So I guess all that planning and strategizing for next year didn't even turn out to be necessary after all. I didn't even have to wait more than a couple days




So are you planning to rent out the week?  LOL!  

Dave


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## sdowner

Haha. No I definitely would like to use it. I don't have that many vacation days in a year and so Christmas is definitely a time that I want to use for myself and family (have school aged kids). Really relieved that we can have a solid vacation next year!


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## DaveNV

sdowner said:


> Haha. No I definitely would like to use it. I don't have that many vacation days in a year and so Christmas is definitely a time that I want to use for myself and family (have school aged kids). Really relieved that we can have a solid vacation next year!



Glad you got what you wanted, and I hope you have a wonderful time.  Now that you have the reservation, if you don't mind, which resort is this? If you mentioned it, I missed it.

Dave


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## sdowner

DaveNW said:


> Glad you got what you wanted, and I hope you have a wonderful time.  Now that you have the reservation, if you don't mind, which resort is this? If you mentioned it, I missed it.
> 
> Dave


Thanks! It's at Park City, 3 bedroom deluxe.


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## DaveNV

sdowner said:


> Thanks! It's at Park City, 3 bedroom deluxe.



That's going to be a great Christmas holiday!

Dave


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## ecwinch

The strategy requires someone to control 2 or more WM accounts, and to have a large number of credits. It works best at resorts that have a short peak season and a limited number of units in desirable unit size. Hopefully the BoD will act to close it.


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## sdowner

ecwinch said:


> The strategy requires someone to control 2 or more WM accounts, and to have a large number of credits. It works best at resorts that have a short peak season and a limited number of units in desirable unit size. Hopefully the BoD will act to close it.



But it doesn't even seem like that great of a strategy if it requires putting in a waitlist request. If I understand things correctly, it's very possible that someone else might have a higher priority on the waitlist. Depending on a waitlist seem to be a major weak point in the method, because there is little control over who is granted a waitlist offer.

I can see how it might increase their chances of landing a good reservation, if they flood the property with waitlist requests around their desired dates. But it still seems like just a gamble to me, because other people will also be submitting waitlist requests. 

Maybe they are okay with a less than perfect hit rate? Unlike someone like me that has only one vacation window, they are okay with missing out on a lot of reservations, as long as they land enough so that overall they are profitable over the year?


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## clifffaith

I've noticed that days you couldn't get at 6am sometimes get thrown back later the same day, so it does pay to look again. I don't know if there is a lag in wait lists starting or what. I built a 6 day vacation in Marina Dunes for next August, when I wasn't even looking for one. I just happened to look one day, and two days were available 13 months out. OK, I'll take them and do a waitlist to see if I can build to at least 4 days. Next day, single day is just sitting there available so I grabbed it. Repeat 3 more days. Don't know what was going on, possibly I was catching a unit that had been removed for a refurb, maybe someone was fiddling with their plans. Don't even have a strong desire to go to MD (we were there in 2018), but it is so hard to get into might as well take it since I basically fell into it.


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## sdowner

I just read this strategy on WMowners.com that was posted 18 Dec 2019 by user *samehere*, and it seems like the strategy that megarenters are doing:

"It seems that the problem is that people make reservations a few days before the prime time period an then use multiple accounts and wait listing to walk the reservations forward into the prime time period. They cancel the reservation from one account, and the cancelled reservation is immediately picked up by the waitlist in their other account. At least, I think this is how it works, since I have never done it. "

https://www.wmowners.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=32&t=49421&start=30

In an earlier post, I said relying on waitlisting seems to be a major weak point in the walking+waitlist strategy, but seems to be a good way to work around it. But by getting first in line with their waitlist request from a different account, a megarenter can immediately pickup the newly dropped days and jump in front of any other waitlist requests 

The key seems to be that they start their walking super early, in white season.


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## OneTwoThree

THank you for the information


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## sdowner

OneTwoThree said:


> THank you for the information



You're welcome. It's my hope that enough people will complain and force the Board to implement rules that prevent this type of gaming. Alternatively, maybe more people will be encouraged to try this method, thereby reducing inventory, and frustrating the megarenters out there.


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## easyrider

Do Travelshare owners have a more than 13 month window to reserve WM ?

Bill


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## sdowner

easyrider said:


> Do Travelshare owners have a more than 13 month window to reserve WM ?
> 
> Bill



No. Owners with Travelshare are similarly restricted to the 13 month check-in date limitation at WorldMark properties. Travelshare allows owners to book at Club Wyndham destinations via the Club Pass program.  But that only allows a reservation with a check-in at the 9 month mark, so inventory is even worse.


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## geist1223

Every time the WM BOD has enacted new Rules to try and control Megarenters it has really hurt the small account owners. Renting is allowed in the Founding Documents.


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## sdowner

geist1223 said:


> Every time the WM BOD has enacted new Rules to try and control Megarenters it has really hurt the small account owners. Renting is allowed in the Founding Documents.



I agree that the solution is not easy, but it doesn't mean that there isn't a workable solution out there. It's really a matter of political will.

No one said renting should be prohibited or that what Megarenters are doing is against the rules. But they are clearly manipulating the system in ways that the average owner cannot. 

One proposal I read somewhere, for instance, involved picking waitlist requests out of a lottery. That is, every waitlist request that came in on a certain day would not be prioritized based on the time of the request. Waitlist request submitted on a certain day would not be First In First Out in priority. (That's how megarenters get a jump on the waitlist - they control the timing of when the waitlist becomes open). Instead all the waitlist requests that came in on a certain day would go into a pot that get their priorities randomized within that respective day. The priority then becomes based on day it is made and not by the millisecond a request is entered. Even a Megarenter that controls a thousand accounts cannot match the waitlist requests of ten thousand owners wanting to book Christmas in Hawaii.

Giving ten thousand owners a small chance at getting Christmas in Hawaii seems like a better world to me than letting a few Megarenters grab all the the Christmas in Hawaii inventory for the purpose of maximizing a monetary profit.

Of course, there are certainly unintended consequnces to this strategy that need to be worked out. But it's not my job as the owner to figure it all out. It is my job as the owner to recognize the problem and to complain about it to the Board.

Again my hope is that the more people become aware of the problem, the more pressure the Board will feel do something reasonable.


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