# The Regency Collection – New to HGVC and not fully operational



## njaloha (Mar 30, 2016)

The Regency Collection is available to HGVC Premier owners and is a new addition since last fall.  But not all the perks offered are available to HGVC Premier owners.  We found out the hard way.

Our story begins with our upgrade to Premier in January 2016.  This was HGVCs second attempt to get us to upgrade.  We cancelled a contract last year while we were staying at Parc Soleil and for the life of me I can’t begin to understand why we went to contract this year except to say we fell for the Regency collection kool-aid they poured into us.  I swear there’s something in the water or the air that makes their offers irresistible for us.

Whenever we do these owners’ updates, they always ask what we like and dislike and where we like to stay, what changes we’d like to see.  We tell them more East Coast HGVC resorts, not Myrtle Beach, and don’t point us to RCI because the quality just isn’t there for us.  We stay on the Outer Banks of North Carolina every other summer and book a house with cash which seems silly considering our point level but there really isn’t anything through RCI that meets our needs.

We met with a Regency Collection Expert at Parc Soleil and he shared his great and powerful knowledge with us about how wonderful going Premier would be because of the Regency Collection.  Not only did we share our vacation preferences to the outer banks but we also shared that we cruise once a year and use our points to pay for the cruises.  He told us we were doing it all wrong because of the MFs and the cost of the cruise; whatever, I don’t fully remember or understand what he said.  I’m sure a bunch of you guys know what he’s talking about.

He proceeded to tell us how wrong we were to use our points for cruises and then presented a plan for the future based on our cruising costs and vacation needs in the Outer Banks.  We made sure to let him know that our cruises are always with Celebrity and never any other cruise line.  We made sure to tell him how important cruising is to us and that we enjoy it very much.  He told us that upgrading to Premier would give us the advantage of using points to obtain credits for cruises.  And that it would be a better use of the points (less points to cruise).  He also showed us a property on the Outer Banks in Duck that looked pretty decent.

We signed on the dotted line and never looked back.  Please don’t judge.  That’s the way we wanted to do it.  However, if I had it to do over, I would have gone the resale route just to get more points and Premier, Diamond Hilton Honors for LIFE! And Regency Collection be damned.

A few weeks ago, I called the Regency Collection travel concierge and asked about cruises and points to credits.  I had booked a future cruise onboard in January and the transfer-to-travel-agent 60-day window was rapidly closing.  I wanted to see how efficient the use of my points could be, for the cruise through the Regency Collection.

Imagine my surprise when Libby, the travel concierge, told me that the cruise option isn’t available for HGVC Premier owners.  I said WHAT! She had to be mistaken, please check again.  Nope, she said for some reason, HGVC Premier owners aren’t allowed to use the cruise option.

I sent a scathing email to Flavio Aragao. In a nutshell, I demanded answers or we wanted out.  I said that we were angry and that we were mis-lead and that the primary reason we upgraded was for the more efficient way to use points for cruises as promised by our sales rep, Regency Collection expert.  I demanded 50,000 bonus points to repair our relationship and if that couldn’t be given, then we wanted to cancel our contract.

Our sales rep called me and was upset by my email.  He agreed to look into the problem immediately and he did.  He found out that I was right.  Apparently, I had uncovered a hornets’ nest of a problem with the Regency Collection program.  As of Monday and after a meeting with the Director of the Regency Collection of RCI, our rep confirmed that HGVC Premier owners do not have access to the cruise option.  Nobody knows why.  None of the reps or sales managers or trainers knew about this (or so they claimed).  It’s now in negotiation to get it on the program.  It may happen.  It may not.  Nobody is promising anything.  Our rep insists he will hound the powers that be until this is available.

In the meantime, we now have 50,000 bonus points.  We’re going to make the best of our new level with HGVC, suck up the extra MFs which we’d have to pay whether we bought this way or resale way.  And as others have said, make these points count and enjoy the years of vacationing.  We now have enough to snow bird in Florida in a one bedroom for 2 months every year if we wanted to.

Bottom line, if you hear a presentation that promises The Regency Collection, be aware that it’s not completely what they are selling you.  Hopefully, some new training has already been implemented and the cruising option has been eliminated.  Funny thing is, it’s in the hard cover book we received in the mail and on the website which just makes me madder than a hatter every time I see it.

And I can’t believe the shoddy way of doing business that this uncovered.  The next time we're at Parc Soleil or any HGVC property and we're asked to attend a presentation, we will let them know what we think of the way they run their business; the next time and every single stinking time we're offered a presentation or owner update.  What fun we will have.


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## presley (Mar 30, 2016)

I have no idea what the Regency Collection is. Are you saying it available to HGVC owners who are not Elite Premier? What is it?


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## Talent312 (Mar 30, 2016)

I 'spose the lesson here is that salesmen, even so-called "experts,"
are little more than trained seals who know only what they are told. 

Resale Points: AFAIK, you cannot buy your way to Premier with resale.
Used to be that you could add resale for elite-status, but not anymore.

I suspect that you're long past your statutory rescission period, but it's
nice that they tried to make it right, anyway.

BTW, it is true that using points for cruises is a poor option.
It devalues your points, right up there with converting H-Honors.

.


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## njaloha (Mar 30, 2016)

presley said:


> I have no idea what the Regency Collection is. Are you saying it available to HGVC owners who are not Elite Premier? What is it?



It's a 'perk' once you become Elite Premier.  You can't become Elite Premier through resale purchase.


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## Janann (Mar 30, 2016)

Maybe you mean The Registry Collection?

http://www.hgvcelite.com/resorts/rci-exchange/#registry-collection

This doesn't sound like much of a deal, since I recently booked a resort in this collection for 7 nights for only 3,400 points for a one bedroom, and I'm not an Elite member.  If I were an Elite member and I booked through HGVC rather than RCI, it would be 4,000 points or more according to the chart.


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## JSparling (Mar 31, 2016)

njaloha said:


> In the meantime, we now have 50,000 bonus points.



Too bad you didn't ask for 100,000 bonus points. Or 500,000. 

What's the expiration period on those 50,000 points? I think you generally get 2 years. Can you use that many points in 2 years?


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## Jason245 (Mar 31, 2016)

If you have enough for  $100k + that  this cost you and you and you like cruising,  why not buy into one of those timeshare ships directly. .. ??

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk


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## 1Kflyerguy (Mar 31, 2016)

That sounds really frustrating, i don't see where the Regency Collection lists the cruise option, but i may be missing that.

I had been getting calls and emails recently trying to get me to upgrade to Elite.. I focusing on some other things right now, and declined the invitation to even talk with the salesperson over the phone...  His parting email did mention they had recently added some new benefits for Elites, i am guessing this is one of the new perks.. I looked at the link he included, but nothing jumped out at me as new.. 

Based on your experience, it seems like this is not quite ready, or at least the sales people need more training..

I did not study the entire list of resorts shown for this option, but i have heard good things about some of them.


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## clotheshorse (Apr 1, 2016)

Janann said:


> Maybe you mean The Registry Collection?
> 
> http://www.hgvcelite.com/resorts/rci-exchange/#registry-collection
> 
> This doesn't sound like much of a deal, since I recently booked a resort in this collection for 7 nights for only 3,400 points for a one bedroom, and I'm not an Elite member.  If I were an Elite member and I booked through HGVC rather than RCI, it would be 4,000 points or more according to the chart.



How did you book it?  Through HGVC RCI?


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## Janann (Apr 1, 2016)

I booked Breezes Private Residences online with RCI through the HGVC portal, the same way as any other RCI resort.  A Tugger had posted the sighting of a huge number of units for this brand new resort.


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

1Kflyerguy said:


> That sounds really frustrating, i don't see where the Regency Collection lists the cruise option, but i may be missing that.
> 
> I had been getting calls and emails recently trying to get me to upgrade to Elite.. I focusing on some other things right now, and declined the invitation to even talk with the salesperson over the phone...  His parting email did mention they had recently added some new benefits for Elites, i am guessing this is one of the new perks.. I looked at the link he included, but nothing jumped out at me as new..
> 
> ...



The cruise exchange option is on this page:
https://www.theregistrycollection.com/information/member_benefits


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

Janann said:


> I booked Breezes Private Residences online with RCI through the HGVC portal, the same way as any other RCI resort.  A Tugger had posted the sighting of a huge number of units for this brand new resort.



Is this the one in Costa Rica?
And yes I meant the Registry Collection.


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

JSparling said:


> Too bad you didn't ask for 100,000 bonus points. Or 500,000.
> 
> What's the expiration period on those 50,000 points? I think you generally get 2 years. Can you use that many points in 2 years?



They offered only 25,000 bp and I said then we want to cancel the contract.  He quickly backpedaled and got the 50,000 approved.  It is available immediately and we have 2 years to use it.  We were pretty sure we wouldn't be able to get out of the contract so we wanted something out of this.  We'll have no problem using the points in 2 years.  And if not, we'll convert them to HH points.  It was the principle of the thing.

Look, if we had it to do all over again, we wouldn't have signed and would have walked away.  We didn't and now we have to live with a bad decision and make the most of it as best we can.  

My purpose in posting is to let others know that the Registry Collection is a sham.  And the fact that Janann was able to book the very same resort through RCI makes this purchase even more of a mistake. 

And the fact that the cruise exchange option is still visible on the Regency Collection site accessed through the HGVCElite page makes us pretty pissed.  Doesn't look like our experience changed their practice at all.    We want others to be warned.


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

Jason245 said:


> If you have enough for  $100k + that  this cost you and you and you like cruising,  why not buy into one of those timeshare ships directly. .. ??
> 
> Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk



I have no idea what this is.  Never heard of it.  Please supply a link because I googled it and didn't find anything worth looking at.  Mostly just threads on forums discussing trading timeshares for cruises.


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

Janann said:


> Maybe you mean The Registry Collection?
> 
> http://www.hgvcelite.com/resorts/rci-exchange/#registry-collection
> 
> This doesn't sound like much of a deal, since I recently booked a resort in this collection for 7 nights for only 3,400 points for a one bedroom, and I'm not an Elite member.  If I were an Elite member and I booked through HGVC rather than RCI, it would be 4,000 points or more according to the chart.



RCI is the parent company here.  I did a quick look and the Breeze in Costa Rica was the only resort I found in the collection that was also available in RCI.  If you were an Elite Premier member, you would be able to book the Registry Collection.  It's only available for Elite Premier :whoopie:


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## 1Kflyerguy (Apr 2, 2016)

njaloha said:


> The cruise exchange option is on this page:
> https://www.theregistrycollection.com/information/member_benefits



Thanks for the link.  Seems like lots of good cruise partners there. 

Seems really odd that you have access to part of the program, but not all of it.. I wonder if this was intentionally left out of the contract between HGVC and Registry Collection, of if they might fix it in the future..

I agree with you that at this point, you just need to figure out how to maximize the value out of what you own.


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## Janann (Apr 2, 2016)

njaloha said:


> RCI is the parent company here.  I did a quick look and the Breeze in Costa Rica was the only resort I found in the collection that was also available in RCI.  If you were an Elite Premier member, you would be able to book the Registry Collection.  It's only available for Elite Premier :whoopie:



Other resorts that are widely available in RCI:


Grand Mayan resorts at multiple locations in Mexico
The Crane, Barbados
Tradewinds private cruises in the Caribbean


Elara Las Vegas is available directly from HGVC.
I will say though that there are some great looking resorts in the Registry Collection that are probably not part of RCI.  Its also possible that the Registry has access to dates that are more difficult or impossible to book in RCI.


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## Jason245 (Apr 2, 2016)

njaloha said:


> I have no idea what this is.  Never heard of it.  Please supply a link because I googled it and didn't find anything worth looking at.  Mostly just threads on forums discussing trading timeshares for cruises.


http://aboardtheworld.com/

Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

Jason245 said:


> http://aboardtheworld.com/
> 
> Sent from my SAMSUNG-SM-N910A using Tapatalk



Oh THE WORLD!    No this wouldn't be for us.  But I see your point.  I like having HGVC points for land vacations as well as cruises.  My point is that we were sold this upgrade based on mistaken information.  Hoping others will be aware of this.


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## njaloha (Apr 2, 2016)

1Kflyerguy said:


> Thanks for the link.  Seems like lots of good cruise partners there.
> 
> Seems really odd that you have access to part of the program, but not all of it.. I wonder if this was intentionally left out of the contract between HGVC and Registry Collection, of if they might fix it in the future..
> 
> I agree with you that at this point, you just need to figure out how to maximize the value out of what you own.



I've spoken to several folks down at Parc Soleil's sales center and all are mystified at the omission of cruising.  We're Celebrity cruisers and like the ships and itineraries and after our next cruise, we will have achieved our Elite status in their Captain's Club.  Even if HGVC Elite Premier did participate in The Registry Collection Cruise Exchange, Celebrity is not included.  Azamara is (part of the Royal Caribbean family as well as Celebrity).  That information was left out of the sales pitch.

The excuse seemed to be that HGVC already has a cruise partner, Our Vacation Center, which isn't the greatest but maybe there was some deal with them; nobody knows or nobody is telling.

I was told they would continue in negotiations about this with RCI but I bet they don't.  I'll probably never hear another word.


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## njaloha (Apr 3, 2016)

Janann said:


> Other resorts that are widely available in RCI:
> 
> 
> Grand Mayan resorts at multiple locations in Mexico
> ...




The Elara - These are signature suites available to Registry Collection only.
Grand Mayan - I didn't see these on the RCI website through HGVC.
The Crane, Barbados - Dangit, yes!  on RCI for crying out loud as are
The Tradewinds cruises.  
What a rip. 
Can I scream now?

I really want to call HGVC and vent, stamp, scream and say, give me my money back.


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## presley (Apr 3, 2016)

It looks like you can book any of those cruises from the normal HGVC member site. I checked Celebrity and 10 pages of cruises came up. It also lists Cunard, Regent, etc. I understand the frustration with the Regisrty thing not covering the cruises, but since you can book them from your normal HGVC account, why not just do that and not stress out not being able to do it through the Registry page? As you've said, what's done is done. May as well enjoy what you already have.


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## Janann (Apr 3, 2016)

njaloha said:


> Grand Mayan - I didn't see these on the RCI website through HGVC.



I should have said "THE Grand Mayan."  Acapulco, Cabo, Nuevo Vallarta and Riviera Maya all have plenty of availability.  To make it even more interesting, someone posted on these boards this morning that the exchange fee is currently waived at one or more Grand Mayan resorts.  I tried a test run to book a unit, and they are asking for the $219 exchange fee.  It would be worth a phone call to RCI for anyone who is currently booking an exchange with Grand Mayan.

http://tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=240495

Anyway, I hope your membership turns out for you.  Timeshare sales people can't be trusted, which is why TUG is such a great website and priceless source of information.


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## njaloha (Apr 3, 2016)

presley said:


> It looks like you can book any of those cruises from the normal HGVC member site. I checked Celebrity and 10 pages of cruises came up. It also lists Cunard, Regent, etc. I understand the frustration with the Regisrty thing not covering the cruises, but since you can book them from your normal HGVC account, why not just do that and not stress out not being able to do it through the Registry page? As you've said, what's done is done. May as well enjoy what you already have.



Hi Presley,
Yes, I'm well aware of the HGVC cruise partner perk.  I've done it many times.
The reason this is ticking me off so much is that, if you read my original post, we were told in the pitch that we were doing cruises "all wrong" and that in order to get more bang for our points, we needed to upgrade to Premier to get the Registry collection where we'll use less points for cruises.

In follow up conversations with muckity mucks down in Orlando, we were told that they didn't understand why we weren't allowed to use our points through the Registry Collection for cruises.  What a mystery.  Maybe it's too many options to book cruises, they said.  I call BS on this because I just did some research and found that the same company, Our Vacation Center, that is the HGVC cruise partner, is the same company that handles RCI cruises and The Registry Collection cruises.  

So they're telling me that they don't know???  Really?  You just sat down with the Director of The Registry Collection of RCI and you walked away from that meeting not knowing?  Ridiculous. Just ridiculous.
This isn't over yet....:annoyed:


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## njaloha (Apr 3, 2016)

Janann said:


> I should have said "THE Grand Mayan."  Acapulco, Cabo, Nuevo Vallarta and Riviera Maya all have plenty of availability.  To make it even more interesting, someone posted on these boards this morning that the exchange fee is currently waived at one or more Grand Mayan resorts.  I tried a test run to book a unit, and they are asking for the $219 exchange fee.  It would be worth a phone call to RCI for anyone who is currently booking an exchange with Grand Mayan.
> 
> http://tugbbs.com/forums/showthread.php?t=240495
> 
> Anyway, I hope your membership turns out for you.  Timeshare sales people can't be trusted, which is why TUG is such a great website and priceless source of information.



AHHHH, 'THE', Now I see it.  Thanks.  And I'm hoping someone somewhere will learn from my mistake.  Just wish I had the right name in the title.  Registry not Regency.  
I'm not done with these guys yet.


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