# How much longer will we need to endure this terrible new Wyndham website?



## regatta333 (May 6, 2021)

The changes that have been made to both the Wyndham and RCI (through Wyndham portal) websites have made them almost unusable, at least from my perspective.
It is fine if you are searching for specific dates at specific resorts, but it is impossible to try to introduce any flexibility into the search parameters.

Today, I spent more than an hour trying to find a 7-8 day stay in Honolulu for June or first half of July.  I loved that you were able to search using a "first available" feature on the old website.  Now, select "Honolulu" under the Resorts/Explore Resorts banner.  I have to select a specific resort in order to be able to see an availability calendar.  The availability calendar looks completely open until you check a day, then the dates that are not available show crossed out.  When you scroll to the next month, same problem.  Then, there is no way to go back and check the availability calendars for the other resorts in Honolulu unless you start from the beginning.  I finally broke down and called the Reservations line and the VC was able to find an available week for me.  Should not be this difficult.

They have also made the RCI website similarly frustrating.  Fortunately, I am down to my last year and a half of using RCI.  With the exchanges fees now $249 and the elimination of the upgrade in points that used to be available for VIP members, it makes no sense to use it anymore.


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## troy12n (May 6, 2021)

Literally this took me less than 10 minutes:

Waikiki Beach Walk: has some 6 days but no 7-8 days in June

Club Wyndham Royal Garden at Waikiki
June 15-29 wide open, for studio
June 30-July 14 also available

Waikiki Marina Resort at the Ilikai
June 1-13 available for studio
June 28-Aug 6 is also available

I didn't look anywhere else other than Kona, but these resorts are available too, I didn't check every resort

Paniolo Greens
The ENTIRE months of June and July are available

Club Wyndham Kona Hawaiian Resort
July 27-Aug 4 2BR dlx, some spotty other availability, nothing other than that with a week contiguous

Club Wyndham Mauna Loa Village
June 4-12 1BR dlx
June 13-23 1BR dlx
July 21-31 1BR dlx

Club Wyndham Royal Sea Cliffs
Has several 5-6 day stretches


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## troy12n (May 6, 2021)

But honestly, you are looking to book one of the very high demand resorts at less than 60 days... the website isn't the issue. Procrastination is...


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## Roger830 (May 6, 2021)

With the abundance of unused points members accumulated because of covid, any prime dates available at 60 days should be considered a gift.


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## troy12n (May 6, 2021)

Roger830 said:


> With the abundance of unused points members accumulated because of covid, any prime dates available at 60 days should be considered a gift.



Even under normal circumstances, the number of posts here, and on some of the facebook groups of people being mad because there isn't availablility... 

IN JUNE, OR JULY... the PRIME SEASON

AT UNDER 60 DAYS BEFORE

AT SOME OF THE BUSIEST, MOST POPULAR RESORTS

Blows my mind... i'm really at a loss as to why people somehow think that it's a successful strategy to wait till the last minute to book a vacation at the height of prime season, at popular resorts, and then get mad when they can't find what they are looking for. 

Poor planning, not a bad website, is the root cause of most of these problems.


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## regatta333 (May 6, 2021)

Wow! Please don't jump to unfounded conclusions.  I was not complaining about lack of availability, but the usability of the website.  It is painfully cumbersome.
I was hoping to get a reservation for my daughter, her husband, and their two boys of one and two.  They live on Oahu, where her husband is stationed, and are having to vacate their rental for a week's time because the landlord has to arrange for a flooring replacement.  I was hoping to book something for them that would be better than being crowded into a hotel room with the two little ones.

My complaint was not about the lack of availability; I fully expected that it would be challenging to find something on such short notice.  My complaint was about how tedious it is to conduct a search on the website.  Ultimately, I had to resort to calling in.  The VC was able to locate a reservation in just a minute.  Their system obviously has more functionality, but she could not provide any suggestions for searching other than the method I was using.


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## troy12n (May 6, 2021)

Use the monthly calendar, like I said, it took me less than 10 minutes to find out what I posted. I've never struggled with the system like so many others appear to and really can't wrap my head around how so many people find it difficult.


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## Sandi Bo (May 7, 2021)

The website could/should be so much better. If you are on it all the time, and can learn the ins and outs, we definitely have an advantage over the casual (and typical) user.  And it's deprecated terribly since the implementation of voyager and now this May 2020 'enhancement' (I affectionately call it the COVID 2020 release).  Is it acceptable that depending on how you search your results are likely invalid? How would a casual user know that if they search by location, for special dates, and the website says nothing available, they need to search resort by resort using the monthly calendar (and then begin to understand why the monthly calendar has bolded dates that really aren't available)?

And if I have these wonderful VIP benefits (or points to burn) and I just want to go anywhere (regardless of why I am trying to book last minute) shouldn't I be able to go to the website and say show first available anywhere in the US or maybe just Hawaii, etc?  People have been asking for show first available since it was taken away (May 2017).

And because the website falls short of functioning properly, owners are unhappy, and the result is policies like no reservations over holidays?  Nice way to fix a problem, Wyndham! Or call in - I still can't believe it's acceptable to Wyndham as a corporation to have a website that necessitates the calls to the VC's.  In my IT years, we were called on the carpet for introducing anything that increased phone calls to customer service. That aspect of a change was always considered (the goal was always to decrease calls - voyager and this subsequent May 2020 has only exasperated that).  

I agree @regatta333, the VC's have more functionality than we do.  And yet it is still limited. Hard to understand why we are sitting here a year later with such a crappy system. "Little things" like overlapping reservations (more than 1 reservation in same owner's name) seem to be forgotten now.  The VC's see an alert, we do not (we used to). And yet they will still cancel a reservation if it's overlapping. There are many almost forgotten now (I guess that is the plan)?

PS @troy12n, next time I need a room can I send my request to you? Can you be our ongoing search guy?


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## wjappraise (May 7, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Even under normal circumstances, the number of posts here, and on some of the facebook groups of people being mad because there isn't availablility...
> 
> IN JUNE, OR JULY... the PRIME SEASON
> 
> ...



Really? 

You are correct that this is not the time to procrastinate. 

But it “blows your mind” that the new website is cumbersome? Are you on the IT team for Wyndham? That would be a plausible explanation for your dismissive attitude toward posters who have real experience using the older platforms and find the new one less than intuitive. Especially when they keep changing the nuanced search tools (monthly availability button keeps changing locations). 

The OP deserves better from you than your contempt. 

Maybe sit this discussion out and allow your mind to unblow. 

Just one man’s opinion.


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## bnoble (May 7, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> PS @troy12n, next time I need a room can I send my request to you? Can you be our ongoing search guy?



I'd be happy to do it at my normal consulting rate.


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## dgalati (May 7, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Are you on the IT team for Wyndham? That would be a plausible explanation for your dismissive attitude toward posters who have real experience using the older platforms and find the new one less than intuitive. Especially when they keep changing the nuanced search tools (monthly availability button keeps changing locations).
> 
> The OP deserves better from you than your contempt.
> 
> Just one man’s opinion.


Wes its hard to believe but there could be more then one agent of Wyndham trolling this board.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 7, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> The website could/should be so much better. If you are on it all the time, and can learn the ins and outs, we definitely have an advantage over the casual (and typical) user.  And it's deprecated terribly since the implementation of voyager and now this May 2020 'enhancement' (I affectionately call it the COVID 2020 release).  Is it acceptable that depending on how you search your results are likely invalid? How would a casual user know that if they search by location, for special dates, and the website says nothing available, they need to search resort by resort using the monthly calendar (and then begin to understand why the monthly calendar has bolded dates that really aren't available)?
> 
> And if I have these wonderful VIP benefits (or points to burn) and I just want to go anywhere (regardless of why I am trying to book last minute) shouldn't I be able to go to the website and say show first available anywhere in the US or maybe just Hawaii, etc?  People have been asking for show first available since it was taken away (May 2017).
> 
> ...



Bigger picture, many on TUG also have the advantage of history with respect to the various website iterations.  I've often seen TUGGERs state that the entire Wyndham IT team should be fired because of the website issues.  Ironically - what many people on here don't seem to understand - is that the Wyndham DT team - has been hired from outside and has been gradually built up over the past two years and IS entirely new to Wyndham.  But guess what happens when you take this approach?  The result is that you end up with a bunch of net new resources that have no history with Wyndham  who are making decisions on the product roadmap based solely on the feedback mechanisms that have been put in place for the new website.  The team does have some exposure to the prior Voyager site - but that's about it - they have no points of reference for anything prior to the Voyager website iteration.  So while a bunch of TUGGERs may long for the days of old - the team currently responsible for the website - has no idea what anyone referencing historical websites is talking about - they have no personal history or direct point of reference in other words.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 7, 2021)

dgalati said:


> Wes its hard to believe but there could be more then one agent of Wyndham trolling this board.



It's well known that Wyndham has always watched both the Wyndham forums on TUG and the Wyndham Facebook groups.  This is not news.


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## troy12n (May 7, 2021)

I certainly agree the website could be better. Nobody is saying otherwise. Also when using anything but the Monthly Calendar, it does seem to bring up either phantom availabilities, and / or no availability at times. I will have to take your word for that, as I never use that method.

Maybe it's just because i've always used the Monthly Calendar to do my searches, going back to the previous version of the website, it has never let me down. And I also don't find it cumbersome or time consuming. Using the OP's example, I checked every resort on Kona and Honolulu in 10 minutes, just clicking on the resort and monthly calendar for June and July, then attempted reservations just to make sure it was true availability.

I will admit maybe my response was a little heavy handed, and I apologize for that, but it seems like there's been a rash of these type posts lately which seem more like a user education issue and not necessarily a technical one. I will try to tone that down in the future...

Also, LoL at whomever thought I was a Wyndham employee...


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## Silverdollar (May 7, 2021)

troy12n said:


> I certainly agree the website could be better. Nobody is saying otherwise. Also when using anything but the Monthly Calendar, it does seem to bring up either phantom availabilities, and / or no availability at times. I will have to take your word for that, as I never use that method.
> 
> Maybe it's just because i've always used the Monthly Calendar to do my searches, going back to the previous version of the website, it has never let me down. And I also don't find it cumbersome or time consuming. Using the OP's example, I checked every resort on Kona and Honolulu in 10 minutes, just clicking on the resort and monthly calendar for June and July, then attempted reservations just to make sure it was true availability.
> 
> ...


I have been an owner with Wyndham (formerly Fairfield) for 39 years, and currently a VIP Platinum member. I have experienced a lot websites with Wyndham. The pre-2017 website allowed owners to see the "first available date" at EVERY RESORT with one click of a button. You could enter the specific # of days and # bedrooms you wanted and it would immediately bring up every resort in the system that matched that criterion. Then, you could quickly scroll through the available dates/resorts and make a selection in a matter of seconds, if not a couple minutes. Under the current system, you have to select a specific resort and enter a specific date and HOPE something is available. If not, then you have to laboriously search one resort at a time, one week at a time, month after month, wasting a lot time. I believe there are probably many owners like myself that would like to see what's available first and then make a decision, rather than tediously searching week by week, and month by month in hopes of finding something.


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## comicbookman (May 7, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Bigger picture, many on TUG also have the advantage of history with respect to the various website iterations.  I've often seen TUGGERs state that the entire Wyndham IT team should be fired because of the website issues.  Ironically - what many people on here don't seem to understand - is that the Wyndham DT team - has been hired from outside and has been gradually built up over the past two years and IS entirely new to Wyndham.  But guess what happens when you take this approach?  The result is that you end up with a bunch of net new resources that have no history with Wyndham  who are making decisions on the product roadmap based solely on the feedback mechanisms that have been put in place for the new website.  The team does have some exposure to the prior Voyager site - but that's about it - they have no points of reference for anything prior to the Voyager website iteration.  So while a bunch of TUGGERs may long for the days of old - the team currently responsible for the website - has no idea what anyone referencing historical websites is talking about - they have no personal history or direct point of reference in other words.



So what you are saying as since they get limited feedback and perform no outreach, they don't really know what they are doing from a customer satisfaction perspective.  Hell of a way to run a railroad.


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## Roger830 (May 7, 2021)

As I recall, pre Voyager, the reservations were pretty much restrictive to a weeks type of booking. To make a reservation for less than a week, the check-in had to be the beginning of a week or the checkout day had to be the last day of a week. This restriction pretty much assured the the days booked were contiguous.

Now the check-in and checkout days can be anywhere in the week, which leaves some days available that look like a full week, but in fact are different rooms. probably a VC can book such a group of days as a week and let the resort deal with it. I know of a few people that had to move during a stay because a full week wasn't available.

Under the pre Voyager system, I booked two reservations in Hawaii for Thursday-Sunday and Sunday-Wednesday, called the resort and had them group them into the same unit. At the time, I was told that they usually look for those type of situations.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 7, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> So what you are saying as since they get limited feedback and perform no outreach, they don't really know what they are doing from a customer satisfaction perspective. Hell of a way to run a railroad.



I never said the new team doesn’t gather feedback nor did I say they receive limited feedback. Those are false assumptions on your part. The current feedback mechanism captures CSAT stats persistently along with explicit feedback statements from any owner and/or user. 

The current website feedback mechanism is far better than anything that existed on Voyager or previous iterations - and the DT team also uses focus groups for proposed features and requested features for wireframe reviews. I know several owners who are often included in the focus groups for feedback, myself included. Wyndham also tracks specific feature usage on the current website to determine whether new and existing features are actually useful to the majority of the ownership base. They have better usage data now than they’ve ever had before. 


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## bryjake (May 7, 2021)

Shifting the drift of this thread...
I actually like the newly added videos added to the resort pages
Yes they are a bit propaganda-ish
Yes there is a bit of salemanship
They just make me feel a bit more appreciative of thier product... resorts and vacations
I feel they are pushing for more of an "upscale" feel after the rebranding of to Travel and Leasure


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## dgalati (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> The current website feedback mechanism is far better than anything that existed on Voyager or previous iterations - and the DT team also uses focus groups for proposed features and requested features for wireframe reviews. I know several owners who are often included in the focus groups for feedback, myself included. Wyndham also tracks specific feature usage on the current website to determine whether new and existing features are actually useful to the majority of the ownership base. They have better usage data now than they’ve ever had before.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Not much feedback if any was needed on the old system. Kudos to Wyndham they did improve the current website feedback mechanism. Without a improved feedback mechanism I couldn't imagine the user experience being where its at today.


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## regatta333 (May 8, 2021)

Trying to book using the calendar view poses its own set of problems.  The initial views shows everything open.  When you click on a check-in date, the unavailable date of the calendar then appear with a line through them.  Yet, when I click on a date that is supposedly open, I'll get an error message saying that a continuous stay is not available on that date, even though at least 2 days after that date appear to be available. This happens so frequently that it is almost impossible to find what is truly available without calling in to speak to a VC.


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## comicbookman (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> I never said the new team doesn’t gather feedback nor did I say they receive limited feedback. Those are false assumptions on your part. The current feedback mechanism captures CSAT stats persistently along with explicit feedback statements from any owner and/or user.
> 
> The current website feedback mechanism is far better than anything that existed on Voyager or previous iterations - and the DT team also uses focus groups for proposed features and requested features for wireframe reviews. I know several owners who are often included in the focus groups for feedback, myself included. Wyndham also tracks specific feature usage on the current website to determine whether new and existing features are actually useful to the majority of the ownership base. They have better usage data now than they’ve ever had before.
> 
> ...



So you are saying they limit their feedback to the same group over and over.  Tracking feature usage doesn't really help if the features people want don't exist.  The fact remains, they should have tracked usage from the old site before deciding what to eliminate or modify.  Your comment "The result is that you end up with a bunch of net new resources that have no history with Wyndham who are making decisions on the product roadmap based solely on the feedback mechanisms that have been put in place for the new website." agrees with this point.  As a 25+ year owner, and a 30+ year IT professional, I would call this roll out a disaster.  It was sloppy, appeared rushed after much delay and user feedback is being funneled through a small group.  This is not a knock on that group, just a bad design of a rollout.  The Wyndham website looks poor compared to other travel companies of it's size, or even half it's size.  It is time to stop making excuses and simply agree that this was a very flawed rollout of a bad website and a colossal waste of time and money on Wyndham's part.  I have been pretty happy with my Wyndham ownership over the decades and we have gotten a ton of use and enjoyment out of it.  That doesn't mean I don't call them out when they do something badly.


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## troy12n (May 8, 2021)

regatta333 said:


> Trying to book using the calendar view poses its own set of problems.  The initial views shows everything open.  When you click on a check-in date, the unavailable date of the calendar then appear with a line through them.  Yet, when I click on a date that is supposedly open, I'll get an error message saying that a continuous stay is not available on that date, even though at least 2 days after that date appear to be available. This happens so frequently that it is almost impossible to find what is truly available without calling in to speak to a VC.



I think it's safe to say that it was designed with the ability to do one-night bookings. When they took that away, it probably broke some of the logic, as-designed. So that's what you are seeing. There IS availability, but 3 nights in a row could be 3 different units, possibly with different unit types, and since you can't book like that anymore, it throws that error. I'm not sure how they fix that without displaying a lot of "false negatives"

When you select the start date of your booking, it forces an immediate search based on that start date for a contiguous stay, which at most resorts is a minimum of 2 nights. I have found it's really not difficult or frustrating to work around this, knowing the limitation. But maybe i'm just more patient than the average person


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## HitchHiker71 (May 8, 2021)

dgalati said:


> Not much feedback if any was needed on the old system. Kudos to Wyndham they did improve the current website feedback mechanism. Without a improved feedback mechanism I couldn't imagine the user experience being where its at today.



Go back and look at the litany of complaints about the Voyager website here on TUG starting from the time of Voyager rollout and for a solid two years after - even up until it was replaced by the current website - there are MANY threads on this website complaining about Voyager. Oh how quickly some of us seem to forget.  

The only relative constant here on TUG is the repeated complaints. My question is, what is anyone here on TUG doing about it besides complaining? The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results yes?


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## wjappraise (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Go back and look at the litany of complaints about the Voyager website here on TUG starting from the time of Voyager rollout and for a solid two years after - even up until it was replaced by the current website - there are MANY threads on this website complaining about Voyager. Oh how quickly some of us seem to forget.
> 
> The only relative constant here on TUG is the repeated complaints. My question is, what is anyone here on TUG doing about it besides complaining? The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results yes?
> 
> ...



I do a lot more than complain. I email. I call. I fill out the surveys. 

And how much difference has it made? Nothing. 

It appalls me that the various iterations of website continue to be released with massive amounts of bugs. It’s like beta testing is a foreign term. And given that this website tracks our points and guest confirmation usage among other things, it is a financial website. Yet it operates in a manner devoid of any accountability that my banks or credit card companies have. How often does your bank website have the same issues over and over? How long would you be patient if your bank misplaced your deposits? I appreciate that you are in a position to help - but the lack of reliability of the website is just terrible. And it should be indefensible. 

Just because you asked ... I’m sharing my opinion and experience. 


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## HitchHiker71 (May 8, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> So you are saying they limit their feedback to the same group over and over. Tracking feature usage doesn't really help if the features people want don't exist. The fact remains, they should have tracked usage from the old site before deciding what to eliminate or modify. Your comment "The result is that you end up with a bunch of net new resources that have no history with Wyndham who are making decisions on the product roadmap based solely on the feedback mechanisms that have been put in place for the new website." agrees with this point. As a 25+ year owner, and a 30+ year IT professional, I would call this roll out a disaster. It was sloppy, appeared rushed after much delay and user feedback is being funneled through a small group. This is not a knock on that group, just a bad design of a rollout. The Wyndham website looks poor compared to other travel companies of it's size, or even half it's size. It is time to stop making excuses and simply agree that this was a very flawed rollout of a bad website and a colossal waste of time and money on Wyndham's part. I have been pretty happy with my Wyndham ownership over the decades and we have gotten a ton of use and enjoyment out of it. That doesn't mean I don't call them out when they do something badly.



Again, I never said what you are asserting. They have many different focus groups and the groups are formed, at least in part, based upon the feature usage data captured, to the best of my understanding. Wyndham DT is using standard agile DevOps MVP best practices. Biweekly sprints. I’ve also worked in IT for 25+ years. 

The website is obviously far from perfect. It needs work, that is for darn sure. The ELT decided to push up the release of the new website during COVID last year due to historic usage lows. The original intent was to release it around the same time as the new VIP program late last year. It was certainly a calculated risk to say the least. 


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## Sandi Bo (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Go back and look at the litany of complaints about the Voyager website here on TUG starting from the time of Voyager rollout and for a solid two years after - even up until it was replaced by the current website - there are MANY threads on this website complaining about Voyager. Oh how quickly some of us seem to forget.
> 
> The only relative constant here on TUG is the repeated complaints. My question is, what is anyone here on TUG doing about it besides complaining? The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results yes?
> 
> ...


I'm using the feedback tab (but over and over = (yup) insanity).  Thus instead of complaining, move on, use as is, not waste any more time on it. Learn to use it as delivered (track what I need to in my own spreadsheet as I still have no transaction history). I have reported that repeatedly, including to Michael Brown's office, many times on feedback, have a ticket.  If I stop complaining, then what? It will never get fixed. I mean really, I cannot look at past reservations. How is that acceptable? 

Voyager had its issued, they were somewhat fixing. Then from totally out of the blue, this. Wyndham never announced it and has never addressed/explained why they did it. We took many steps backwards and we've still not recovered, IMO.  If we don't complain, it will never be fixed. People have been pretty quiet for quite some time. As much as I appreciate your efforts and Richelle's, this is not an acceptable rollout of system for us to use. Nice they are listening to you, they are not listening to me. 

A great example of not listening to feedback is not showing next available. That is not something I particularly care about but I sure see a lot of complaints here on TUG and on Facebook. Surely that is a much requested feature/complaint?  And yet, here we are. Continuing to deprecate an already disfunctional search.  How many times have they heard people would like to see more than 3 reservations (and no pictures) on the upcoming transaction list. How can the reporting still be so poor?

Again, appreciate your efforts, but is this the way to run an IT department/system requirements and upgrades?


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## Sandi Bo (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Again, I never said what you are asserting. They have many different focus groups and the groups are formed, at least in part, based upon the feature usage data captured, to the best of my understanding. Wyndham DT is using standard agile DevOps MVP best practices. Biweekly sprints. I’ve also worked in IT for 25+ years.
> 
> The website is obviously far from perfect. It needs work, that is for darn sure. The ELT decided to push up the release of the new website during COVID last year due to historic usage lows. The original intent was to release it around the same time as the new VIP program late last year. It was certainly a calculated risk to say the least.
> 
> ...


LOL, I always wondered why one day in the middle of the pandemic - bam.  The lack of communication of it coming, or any subsequent enhancements, is not acceptable to me.   And with all that extra 'soak time' it is still not performing even close to as it needs to (measuring it against the introduction of the new VIP program).


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## HitchHiker71 (May 8, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> LOL, I always wondered why one day in the middle of the pandemic - bam. The lack of communication of it coming, or any subsequent enhancements, is not acceptable to me. And with all that extra 'soak time' it is still not performing even close to as it needs to (measuring it against the introduction of the new VIP program).



For those who attended the 2019 annual owners meeting in Austin, the COO affectionately referred to the new website as “project holiday” coming in late 2020 during the Q&A portion of the presentations - around the same time as the new VIP program. I’m not sharing anything that wasn’t publicly announced at the annual owners meeting in other words. 


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## Sandi Bo (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> For those who attended the 2019 annual owners meeting in Austin, the COO affectionately referred to the new website as “project holiday” coming in late 2020 during the Q&A portion of the presentations - around the same time as the new VIP program. I’m not sharing anything that wasn’t publicly announced at the annual owners meeting in other words.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Project Holiday sounds much nicer than the COVID 2020 release


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## VacayKat (May 8, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> I'm using the feedback tab (but over and over = (yup) insanity).  Thus instead of complaining, move on, use as is, not waste any more time on it. Learn to use it as delivered (track what I need to in my own spreadsheet as I still have no transaction history). I have reported that repeatedly, including to Michael Brown's office, many times on feedback, have a ticket.  If I stop complaining, then what? It will never get fixed. I mean really, I cannot look at past reservations. How is that acceptable?
> 
> Voyager had its issued, they were somewhat fixing. Then from totally out of the blue, this. Wyndham never announced it and has never addressed/explained why they did it. We took many steps backwards and we've still not recovered, IMO.  If we don't complain, it will never be fixed. People have been pretty quiet for quite some time. As much as I appreciate your efforts and Richelle's, this is not an acceptable rollout of system for us to use. Nice they are listening to you, they are not listening to me.
> 
> ...


I think this is a great perspective. Having been a Shell owner for a long time, the Wyndham website was nice, in that it gave me a little more functionality. Then Bam- all gone. Add to that customer service saying it was requested changes from owners and it was like a slap in the face. Basically what they indicated to me when I complained (and I did this to real people frequently because I had so many problems) is that they believe their owner base to want ‘simple’. Anything complicated and they see an uptick in calls. So essentially they attempted to make it for grandma and grandpa who don’t know a computer from a typewriter. In the end they made it harder to use and frankly their pathetic attempts at keeping the website up to date are unprofessional at best. If you launch a spring sale but you have it not show up for hours after your countdown timer expires (seriously???), or you have old sales that have expired showing up (finally fixed those), why launch a sale? The basic business premise is if you don’t have the functional shit together, don’t try anything fancy. Wyndham needs to go back to basics and get things like reservations working 100% of the time before they try to do reservations with discounts or free transactions. Or they should just shut the website down and make everyone call a real person and admit all of their departments are dysfunctional and can’t work together well enough to have a functional website.


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## Jan M. (May 8, 2021)

The website before Voyager, prior to May 2017, was so easy to use. For those of us who've owned longer it's really, really hard not to miss it.

Most of us who don't have computer or IT background can still grasp that a new website was necessary. That the old website was an outdated platform that was no longer supported. And as is typical over the years the numerous fixes by too many different people eventually had a cumulative effect.

Those of us who have a good understanding of things prior to Voyager know that Wyndham was determined to make it harder for the point managers and big, big megarenters. Also to stop them from being able to use bot programs. So hundreds of thousands of owners now pay the price because of what by comparison a few did. Hard to believe there was no other answer.

I can't claim any expertise but here's my take on things. We all know that Voyager was rushed because upper management thinks it's as simple as telling IT to get done it by x date. The result was a cluster you know what of epic proportions. We've heard from a lot of owners who do have IT background. Some a lot more expertise and experience than whoever Wyndham's had working on these websites. We've learned that management rarely comprehends what IT tells them. They want what they want even if it isn't realistic. And they make it clear you don't say no to them if you want to continue having a job.

So now we have this website with it's pretty and useless pictures because they wanted a website that would benefit sales and they're still only interested in hearing what they want to hear from IT. The search feature would make the Pope curse right after mass on Easter Sunday. Errors on unit information, like unit sleeping capacity. When you click on the information for a one bedroom suite you get pictures of a deluxe unit which isn't anywhere near the same. Upgrade paths that aren't right. Sometimes the automatic upgrades work and sometimes they don't. Reservations that load three at a time and the only way to the the vital information on each that we used to be able to see at a glance is to open each reservation. I'm sure there are other things I've missed.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 8, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> I do a lot more than complain. I email. I call. I fill out the surveys.
> 
> And how much difference has it made? Nothing.



Thanks for what you are doing - it does make a difference - even if appearances say otherwise. As I’ve repeatedly said here, you would be surprised how different TUG owners are when compared to the masses. Many of the TUG owners are outlier cases by definition - for various legitimate reasons.



> It appalls me that the various iterations of website continue to be released with massive amounts of bugs. It’s like beta testing is a foreign term. And given that this website tracks our points and guest confirmation usage among other things, it is a financial website. Yet it operates in a manner devoid of any accountability that my banks or credit card companies have. How often does your bank website have the same issues over and over? How long would you be patient if your bank misplaced your deposits? I appreciate that you are in a position to help - but the lack of reliability of the website is just terrible. And it should be indefensible.
> 
> Just because you asked ... I’m sharing my opinion and experience.
> 
> ...



Thanks very much for sharing your opinion. The UAT leaves a lot to be desired, on that we agree. I’d also like to see much of what you have said here become the norm as opposed to the exception. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## dgalati (May 8, 2021)

Jan M. said:


> The website before Voyager, prior to May 2017, was so easy to use. For those of us who've owned longer it's really, really hard not to miss it.
> 
> Most of us who don't have computer or IT background can still grasp that a new website was necessary. That the old website was an outdated platform that was no longer supported. And as is typical over the years the numerous fixes by too many different people eventually had a cumulative effect.
> 
> ...


Its a shame Wyndham gets away with serving up a plate of B.S. and owners are expected to help cleanup the the mess they created. SMH. I personally feel they know owners have no other choice but to eat the cow pies they serve and tip large. But if useless pictures sells more inventory that is given back with Ovations all works out well for them.


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## dgalati (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results yes?
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


My thoughts on Wyndham rolling out and the updates of websites with constant bugs or less functionality. No other company could stay in business serving up one failure after another.


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## VacayKat (May 8, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results yes?


Just for fun…. 
The actual definition of insanity is a legal defense to avoid culpability after committing a crime (Insanity isn’t a psychological term used by psychologists). In reality, Wyndham’s website is driving their customers to insanity, and they will have a legal defense if (or more likely when) one of them is driven to take things into their own hands.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 10, 2021)

dgalati said:


> My thoughts on Wyndham rolling out and the updates of websites with constant bugs or less functionality. No other company could stay in business serving up one failure after another.



Perhaps there are legitimate strategic business reasons for the observed indifference and the lack of focus on what TUGGERs assume should be prioritized.  I for one, looking at the bigger picture of the timeshare business landscape, see things very differently long term.  I see the concept and model of lifetime timesharing as it is known today dying a slow death for various reasons.  If someone like me can see this, there are many someones at Wyndham who can see the same thing coming down the pike, and the need to modernize the entire business and vacationing model moving forward.  Given every company has limited resources at their disposal, I would surmise, and to be clear this is all speculation on my part, that Wyndham has very different strategic priorities looking forward when compared to the majority of the aging owners on this forum.  Again, just my two cents, but I think that the strategy being leveraged by Wyndham is to "grandfather" the existing owner base, who really aren't interested in substantive modernizations and/or changes to the timesharing systems they have invested in over time, to the extent possible, and to head in very different directions with newer prospective customers.  What exactly this looks like in the future is anyone's guess, but that's what I see happening.

Just as one primary example, there's been quite a bit of feedback here on TUG about the whittling away of the VIP program benefits over time.  Did anyone step back and think that this is by design?  The entire intent of the VIP program was designed for lifetime timeshare ownership benefits.  I don't believe this is where Wyndham's focus will be long term.  The concept of lifetime ownership of anything isn't something current generations place much value upon.  Wyndham needs to adapt.  Point being, Wyndham may not actually _want _new VIP owners under the current program necessarily - at least not like before - which explains why they are whittling away at the benefits and making things less attractive for prospective VIP owners. This is why grandfathering is critical. Wyndham has to balance keeping their existing aging clientele happy - while designing new programs for the next generation of vacationers.

IMHO there is something big changing strategically - that hasn't been named yet.  I believe the T&L acquisition was central to the future direction Wyndham wants to go with respect to putting the world on vacation.  Another example is the Certified Exit program - why has Wyndham proactively formed a program that allows owners to turn inventory back in easily.  When Wyndham recovers inventory via Certified Exit - they are under no obligation to resell that inventory into Club Wyndham.  They can re-allocate recovered inventory solely at their discretion as they see fit.  They could already be doing this today - how would we know?  There isn't any way to easily determine where recovered timeshare inventory is actually going.  I suspect a portion of this inventory is being held back and, at least for the time being, rented by Wyndham directly via EH and other  third party vacationing websites.  Eventually this inventory would be reallocated into future programs that aren't tied to existing lifetime timesharing entities like CWP.  Either that or Club Wyndham may introduce a new type of club that is specifically designed for time blocked ownerships - think termed leasing as opposed to lifetime ownership.  Think subscription as opposed to up front purchase.  This is where the world is going - and if Wyndham is paying any attention - this is where they will be going as well.


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## dgalati (May 10, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Perhaps there are legitimate strategic business reasons for the observed indifference and the lack of focus on what TUGGERs assume should be prioritized.  I for one, looking at the bigger picture of the timeshare business landscape, see things very differently long term.  I see the concept and model of lifetime timesharing as it is known today dying a slow death for various reasons.  If someone like me can see this, there are many someones at Wyndham who can see the same thing coming down the pike, and the need to modernize the entire business and vacationing model moving forward.  Given every company has limited resources at their disposal, I would surmise, and to be clear this is all speculation on my part, that Wyndham has very different strategic priorities looking forward when compared to the majority of the aging owners on this forum.  Again, just my two cents, but I think that the strategy being leveraged by Wyndham is to "grandfather" the existing owner base, who really aren't interested in substantive modernizations and/or changes to the timesharing systems they have invested in over time, to the extent possible, and to head in very different directions with newer prospective customers.  What exactly this looks like in the future is anyone's guess, but that's what I see happening.
> 
> Just as one primary example, there's been quite a bit of feedback here on TUG about the whittling away of the VIP program benefits over time.  Did anyone step back and think that this is by design?  The entire intent of the VIP program was designed for lifetime timeshare ownership benefits.  I don't believe this is where Wyndham's focus will be long term.  The concept of lifetime ownership of anything isn't something current generations place much value upon.  Wyndham needs to adapt.  Point being, Wyndham may not actually _want _new VIP owners under the current program necessarily - at least not like before - which explains why they are whittling away at the benefits and making things less attractive for prospective VIP owners. This is why grandfathering is critical. Wyndham has to balance keeping their existing aging clientele happy - while designing new programs for the next generation of vacationers.
> 
> IMHO there is something big changing strategically - that hasn't been named yet.  I believe the T&L acquisition was central to the future direction Wyndham wants to go with respect to putting the world on vacation.  Another example is the Certified Exit program - why has Wyndham proactively formed a program that allows owners to turn inventory back in easily.  When Wyndham recovers inventory via Certified Exit - they are under no obligation to resell that inventory into Club Wyndham.  They can re-allocate recovered inventory solely at their discretion as they see fit.  They could already be doing this today - how would we know?  There isn't any way to easily determine where recovered timeshare inventory is actually going.  I suspect a portion of this inventory is being held back and, at least for the time being, rented by Wyndham directly via EH and other  third party vacationing websites.  Eventually this inventory would be reallocated into future programs that aren't tied to existing lifetime timesharing entities like CWP.  Either that or Club Wyndham may introduce a new type of club that is specifically designed for time blocked ownerships - think termed leasing as opposed to lifetime ownership.  Think subscription as opposed to up front purchase.  This is where the world is going - and if Wyndham is paying any attention - this is where they will be going as well.


Your assumption is a good explanation as to why Wyndhams resale inventory and certified exit inventory is not available for all owners to book. It certainly waters down the VIP ownership and discount perks with less availability to book.  It also helps a lot of people to understand the dynamics of what their ownership is really about. Many owners post about no availability when booking a reservation but finding it available on EH or the third party web sites. I can understand the frustration if a owner bought at developer pricing but it doesn't hurt so bad for a $0 cost resale owner.


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## dgalati (May 10, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Given every company has limited resources at their disposal, I would surmise, and to be clear this is all speculation on my part, that   Another example is the Certified Exit program - why has Wyndham proactively formed a program that allows owners to turn inventory back in easily.  When Wyndham recovers inventory via Certified Exit - they are under no obligation to resell that inventory into Club Wyndham.  They can re-allocate recovered inventory solely at their discretion as they see fit.  They could already be doing this today - how would we know?  There isn't any way to easily determine where recovered timeshare inventory is actually going.  I suspect a portion of this inventory is being held back and, at least for the time being, rented by Wyndham directly via EH and other  third party vacationing websites.  Eventually this inventory would be reallocated into future programs that aren't tied to existing lifetime timesharing entities like CWP.  Either that or Club Wyndham may introduce a new type of club that is specifically designed for time blocked ownerships - think termed leasing as opposed to lifetime ownership.  Think subscription as opposed to up front purchase.  This is where the world is going - and if Wyndham is paying any attention - this is where they will be going as well.


I can also add the free inventory adds $$$$$$$$$$ To their bottom line and that is what matters most to a publicly traded company.  No matter how they sell it subscription or a lifetime of travel the free inventory is a business model most companies could only dream of. The subscription model may even be a better deal to the bottom line IMHO.


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## Richelle (May 10, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> I do a lot more than complain. I email. I call. I fill out the surveys.
> 
> And how much difference has it made? Nothing.
> 
> ...





wjappraise said:


> I do a lot more than complain. I email. I call. I fill out the surveys.
> 
> And how much difference has it made? Nothing.
> 
> ...



I’m still catching up on this thread, so maybe it was mentioned. The frontend (website) does not keep track of your points. Just like the frontend of a banking website doesn’t keep track if your money. It’s the backend. The backend of the website was not upgraded as far as I know. So the analogy of a bank misplacing your money does not apply here because we are talking about the website. As an IT professional with years of experience, I’m sure you know that the frontend gets data from the backend and displays it to the user. It doesn’t usually do any calculations, track points, etc. That’s all done on the backend, which is still the same as it was before this most recent website change. When a user does a search, that query is run in the database and the front end displays the results. If the query fails, the website displays an error. It doesn’t mean the website itself failed. It could mean the backend had an issue with the search. 

One of the main problems they have with the back end is they are still on monthly releases. So fixes take twice as long to implement. Obviously, since the backend is what keeps track of your point usage and balances, they are not quick to make changes to it. This causes problems getting the website to mesh with the backend. I cannot claim to know what the backend team is doing. They are not that forthcoming with information like the web team is. We only know what little bits of information the web team is able to give us. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Sandi Bo (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> I’m still catching up on this thread, so maybe it was mentioned. The frontend (website) does not keep track of your points. Just like the frontend of a banking website doesn’t keep track if your money. It’s the backend. The backend of the website was not upgraded as far as I know. So the analogy of a bank misplacing your money does not apply here because we are talking about the website. As an IT professional with years of experience, I’m sure you know that the frontend gets data from the backend and displays it to the user. It doesn’t usually do any calculations, track points, etc. That’s all done on the backend, which is still the same as it was before this most recent website change. When a user does a search, that query is run in the database and the front end displays the results. If the query fails, the website displays an error. It doesn’t mean the website itself failed. It could mean the backend had an issue with the search.
> 
> One of the main problems they have with the back end is they are still on monthly releases. So fixes take twice as long to implement. Obviously, since the backend is what keeps track of your point usage and balances, they are not quick to make changes to it. This causes problems getting the website to mesh with the backend. I cannot claim to know what the backend team is doing. They are not that forthcoming with information like the web team is. We only know what little bits of information the web team is able to give us.
> 
> ...


I liken this to trusting a bank that my money is there, and properly accounted for. The May 2020 release took away visibility to the details of our account. I am thankful the data is there and that at least we can call and the VC's can likely dig deeper. But it is not acceptable that the information is not available to us online.

Tongue in cheek that the VC's can do more than we can now. The implication is that they were given a more sophisticated system. I do not believe that is the case. In May 2020, owners were given a system that can do less. The VC's can maybe do what we both could prior to May 2020 (and after the launch of voyager in May 2017). But no more, as far as I can tell. Wyndham is not a company to empower their employees, I've seen that for a long time. Humorous to me, May 2017-2020 we seemed to both be using the same system (so we knew a VC couldn't do anymore for us), now we've been given a barebones version necessitating more calls to the VC's (and giving the illusion they can do so much more).  Super simple example, why do VC's see alerts for overlapping reservations and we do not?

I could see signs of the system bogging down with data prior to May 2020. And apparently it was not addressed on the back end, whilst they slapped a dysfuntional front end onto it. What's that saying about putting lipstick on a pig?


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> I liken this to trusting a bank that my money is there, and properly accounted for. The May 2020 release took away visibility to the details of our account. I am thankful the data is there and that at least we can call and the VC's can likely dig deeper. But it is not acceptable that the information is not available to us online.
> 
> Tongue in cheek that the VC's can do more than we can now. The implication is that they were given a more sophisticated system. I do not believe that is the case. In May 2020, owners were given a system that can do less. The VC's can maybe do what we both could prior to May 2020 (and after the launch of voyager in May 2017). But no more, as far as I can tell. Wyndham is not a company to empower their employees, I've seen that for a long time. Humorous to me, May 2017-2020 we seemed to both be using the same system (so we knew a VC couldn't do anymore for us), now we've been given a barebones version necessitating more calls to the VC's (and giving the illusion they can do so much more).  Super simple example, why do VC's see alerts for overlapping reservations and we do not?
> 
> I could see signs of the system bogging down with data prior to May 2020. And apparently it was not addressed on the back end, whilst they slapped a dysfunctional front end onto it. What's that saying about putting lipstick on a pig?


Problem is as owners we can only grin and bare it. No matter how bad it is now it could be worse on the next update. I personally have a hard time accepting the concept of rolling out a substandard product then expecting the end user to help fix the problem. If others feel the need to help or have nothing better to do with their time kudos to them. What will be expected next? If we check in and the room is still dirty will we be expected to clean it because house keeping failed to do the job. Very few if anyone would clean a dirty room upon check-in why do some here believe they should clean up the online user experience mess?


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

dgalati said:


> Problem is as owners we can only grin and bare it. No matter how bad it is now it could be worse on the next update. I personally have a hard time accepting the concept of rolling out a substandard product then expecting the end user to help fix the problem. If others feel the need to help or have nothing better to do with their time kudos to them. What will be expected next? If we check in and the room is still dirty will we be expected to clean it because house keeping failed to do the job. Very few if anyone would clean a dirty room upon check-in why do some here believe they should clean up the online user experience mess?



Nothing better to do with our time? What do you think a better use of our time would be? Parroting the same lines over and over? Beating a dead horse? Spouting things off as fact when you don’t know if it’s true or not? Maybe you shouldn’t be the one judging what a better use of time is. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> I liken this to trusting a bank that my money is there, and properly accounted for. The May 2020 release took away visibility to the details of our account. I am thankful the data is there and that at least we can call and the VC's can likely dig deeper. But it is not acceptable that the information is not available to us online.
> 
> Tongue in cheek that the VC's can do more than we can now. The implication is that they were given a more sophisticated system. I do not believe that is the case. In May 2020, owners were given a system that can do less. The VC's can maybe do what we both could prior to May 2020 (and after the launch of voyager in May 2017). But no more, as far as I can tell. Wyndham is not a company to empower their employees, I've seen that for a long time. Humorous to me, May 2017-2020 we seemed to both be using the same system (so we knew a VC couldn't do anymore for us), now we've been given a barebones version necessitating more calls to the VC's (and giving the illusion they can do so much more). Super simple example, why do VC's see alerts for overlapping reservations and we do not?
> 
> I could see signs of the system bogging down with data prior to May 2020. And apparently it was not addressed on the back end, whilst they slapped a dysfuntional front end onto it. What's that saying about putting lipstick on a pig?



I agree it could be better. I get the warning about overlapping reservations. What is it the VC’s can do that we cannot?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## wjappraise (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> I’m still catching up on this thread, so maybe it was mentioned. The frontend (website) does not keep track of your points. Just like the frontend of a banking website doesn’t keep track if your money. It’s the backend. The backend of the website was not upgraded as far as I know. So the analogy of a bank misplacing your money does not apply here because we are talking about the website. As an IT professional with years of experience, I’m sure you know that the frontend gets data from the backend and displays it to the user. It doesn’t usually do any calculations, track points, etc. That’s all done on the backend, which is still the same as it was before this most recent website change. When a user does a search, that query is run in the database and the front end displays the results. If the query fails, the website displays an error. It doesn’t mean the website itself failed. It could mean the backend had an issue with the search.
> 
> One of the main problems they have with the back end is they are still on monthly releases. So fixes take twice as long to implement. Obviously, since the backend is what keeps track of your point usage and balances, they are not quick to make changes to it. This causes problems getting the website to mesh with the backend. I cannot claim to know what the backend team is doing. They are not that forthcoming with information like the web team is. We only know what little bits of information the web team is able to give us.
> 
> ...



Backend. Front end. 

I don’t care how you categorize it - Wyndham’s long standing reputation for its website (both ends) is terrible. 

And the analogy regarding a bank website is spot on. 

If you can’t see that - perhaps you’re too close. Can’t see the forest for the trees. 

I can guarantee that if your bank misplaced your deposit you wouldn’t defend the front end website. Everyone associated would be guilty by association. 

I love how “IT professionals” here try to minimize our displeasure by looking down on us as far too ignorant to understand a website. Well it’s time to wake up to a reality - the emperor is wearing no clothes. The website is a mess and has been for a decade. 

Those of us without IT background have plenty of other websites we use and we can clearly see which ones are reliable and which ONE is not. 

Before you dismiss us as too stupid to know, remember my grandfather’s saying “I’m not a farmer, but I know BS when I see it.” 

So stop looking down on those who really are at least as intelligent as you are. 

Just one man’s opinion.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 12, 2021)

Jan M. said:


> The website before Voyager, prior to May 2017, was so easy to use. For those of us who've owned longer it's really, really hard not to miss it.



Yes and no.  For someone like me where 95% of my usage is on a mobile device - my iPhone 11 in this case - I didn't find Voyager very user friendly.  The site was never built or intended for use with the greater than 50% utilization of websites on mobile devices that is the reality today.  That said, I take your point - the functionalities that many power owners/users enjoyed in the Voyager website were not all brought across into the new website.  I believe this was, at least to some extent, by design.



> Most of us who don't have computer or IT background can still grasp that a new website was necessary. That the old website was an outdated platform that was no longer supported. And as is typical over the years the numerous fixes by too many different people eventually had a cumulative effect.
> 
> Those of us who have a good understanding of things prior to Voyager know that Wyndham was determined to make it harder for the point managers and big, big megarenters. Also to stop them from being able to use bot programs. So hundreds of thousands of owners now pay the price because of what by comparison a few did. Hard to believe there was no other answer.



Yes, the front end website tech platform had to be updated as part of the digital transformation efforts under way.  Regarding your point on the megarenters - we've debated in the past on other threads about how the MVP approach was used.  Unless a _majority _of the feedback from the actual owner base indicates a feature is missing - it will not be added back.  As I've repeatedly said here, TUG owners do _not _represent the average owner and are _far _from the majority - very much in the _minority _in reality.



> I can't claim any expertise but here's my take on things. We all know that Voyager was rushed because upper management thinks it's as simple as telling IT to get done it by x date. The result was a cluster you know what of epic proportions. We've heard from a lot of owners who do have IT background. Some a lot more expertise and experience than whoever Wyndham's had working on these websites. We've learned that management rarely comprehends what IT tells them. They want what they want even if it isn't realistic. And they make it clear you don't say no to them if you want to continue having a job.
> 
> So now we have this website with it's pretty and useless pictures because they wanted a website that would benefit sales and they're still only interested in hearing what they want to hear from IT. The search feature would make the Pope curse right after mass on Easter Sunday. Errors on unit information, like unit sleeping capacity. When you click on the information for a one bedroom suite you get pictures of a deluxe unit which isn't anywhere near the same. Upgrade paths that aren't right. Sometimes the automatic upgrades work and sometimes they don't. Reservations that load three at a time and the only way to the the vital information on each that we used to be able to see at a glance is to open each reservation. I'm sure there are other things I've missed.



This concept works both ways.  As someone who represents customer interests into a software services company - I can tell you that just as often what I've observed is that IT is often incapable of grasping the strategic business imperatives and is therefore often unwilling to embrace the changes necessary.  Layoffs and restructures end up being used to exit entrenched IT personnel that are more a part of the problem than a part of any solution.  These same IT folks will swear by everything under the sun that the management is way off base.  These IT folks are, in my experience, often wrong but seldom in doubt.  Remember this is coming from someone who has worked in IT for my entire career to date.  Specific to Wyndham, this is likely why they hired in an entirely new digital transformation team, comprised mostly of new resources from the outside.  This process often takes years to play out though - as part of strategic business modernization programs.

Specific to the website - I don't disagree - it needs work - as I've always maintained.  We will continue with our efforts to provide a voice into the DT team and to represent the changes requested here and elsewhere.


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Backend. Front end.
> 
> I don’t care how you categorize it - Wyndham’s long standing reputation for its website (both ends) is terrible.
> 
> ...


IMHO IT professionals defend the failures with nothing but excuses. I would never accept this from any of my employees or suppliers.  Shouldn't owners expect a better online experience? Amazon has succeed because their online website is superior compared to the competitions. Unfortunately Wyndham has a captive audience and owners have no other options but to eat the cow pies.


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Backend. Front end.
> 
> I don’t care how you categorize it - Wyndham’s long standing reputation for its website (both ends) is terrible.
> 
> ...



No one is calling anyone dumb or stupid, or looking down on you, or minimizing you. If you see it that way, that’s on you. I cannot help you with that. If we were minimizing you, thinking you’re dumb, or whatever, we wouldn’t be taking your feedback and questions to them. If we didn’t think your opinions were valid, we wouldn’t bother trying. I’ve said on numerous occasions that the site could be better or has flaws. Just because we don’t bash like you do, doesn’t mean we think otherwise. We simply take action when we see something wrong rather then bash it or complain about it. Bashing or complaining does nothing. That’s what frustrates me the most. Maybe we should give up and not bother because it doesn’t matter what we say, or what Wyndham does, you will never change your thinking. You feel like everything is bad with Wyndham and when we try to help or explain, you tell us we are looking down on you. I’m done. At least for awhile anyhow. If you need something, you can find me on Facebook. 


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> Nothing better to do with our time? What do you think a better use of our time would be? Parroting the same lines over and over? Beating a dead horse? Spouting things off as fact when you don’t know if it’s true or not? Maybe you shouldn’t be the one judging what a better use of time is.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Why so sensitive? Did you read the part where I said Kudos to you? I am happy for you If you don't mind wasting personal time and energy to help fix a system that should have been fully functional from the start!


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## VacayKat (May 12, 2021)

@Richelle and @HitchHiker71 can you tell us how we would be able to offer feedback to the company in the same manner you do? How did you get this access and how would someone else go about joining. While it is nice you do this, it would be great to contribute. And I’d feel less like I’m screaming into the wind.


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## wjappraise (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> No one is calling anyone dumb or stupid, or looking down on you, or minimizing you. If you see it that way, that’s on you. I cannot help you with that. If we were minimizing you, thinking you’re dumb, or whatever, we wouldn’t be taking your feedback and questions to them. If we didn’t think your opinions were valid, we wouldn’t bother trying. I’ve said on numerous occasions that the site could be better or has flaws. Just because we don’t bash like you do, doesn’t mean we think otherwise. We simply take action when we see something wrong rather then bash it or complain about it. Bashing or complaining does nothing. That’s what frustrates me the most. Maybe we should give up and not bother because it doesn’t matter what we say, or what Wyndham does, you will never change your thinking. You feel like everything is bad with Wyndham and when we try to help or explain, you tell us we are looking down on you. I’m done. At least for awhile anyhow. If you need something, you can find me on Facebook.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk



Wow. Calm down. 

Your post is way off. I’m not one who constantly complains. But I do take umbrage when some here flout their IT knowledge and dismiss the very real concerns we all have. And act like this website isn’t part of a fiduciary responsibility of Wyndham to get it right. 

The bottom line is - the website is pretty. But lacks what is important. Reliability and accuracy. 

Just because I don’t know how to fix it - that doesn’t mean I’m not qualified to say it’s broken. 

Chill.


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## comicbookman (May 12, 2021)

dgalati said:


> IMHO IT professionals defend the failures with nothing but excuses. I would never accept this from any of my employees or suppliers.  Shouldn't owners expect a better online experience? Amazon has succeed because their online website is superior compared to the competitions. Unfortunately Wyndham has a captive audience and owners have no other options but to eat the cow pies.


I am not the only IT professional that has specifically NOT defended the website.  Please don't tar us all.


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## comicbookman (May 12, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Again, I never said what you are asserting. They have many different focus groups and the groups are formed, at least in part, based upon the feature usage data captured, to the best of my understanding. Wyndham DT is using standard agile DevOps MVP best practices. Biweekly sprints. I’ve also worked in IT for 25+ years.
> 
> The website is obviously far from perfect. It needs work, that is for darn sure. The ELT decided to push up the release of the new website during COVID last year due to historic usage lows. The original intent was to release it around the same time as the new VIP program late last year. It was certainly a calculated risk to say the least.
> 
> ...


Actually you again said they are using a very limited way of getting feedback.  And I will say again, the agile method is just a way to do minimal work and testing and then let users sort it out. (which they seem to be doing a bad job at).  It's not just the picky users here on TUG that are upset.  There are a ton of less sophisticated users on facebook who are complaining as well.  Very few users seem to be happy with the website.  Also blaming the backend systems does not excuse the frontend.  As others have said, putting lipstick on a pig does not mean the bad shade of lipstick should be forgiven.


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> @Richelle and @HitchHiker71 can you tell us how we would be able to offer feedback to the company in the same manner you do? How did you get this access and how would someone else go about joining. While it is nice you do this, it would be great to contribute. And I’d feel less like I’m screaming into the wind.



We went to an owners meeting and talked with Annie Robert’s face to face and offered suggestions for improvements and also told her about feedback I’ve been seeing. She asked me to email her. After that, she introduced us to a few other people, that eventually led us to the web team. We can take any feedback back to them. If it’s something they can fix, they do. Sometimes, somethings take higher priority then others and if it’s an issue that only affects a small number of people, it may not be categorized as a high priority. That’s frustrating to the people who do experience that problem and gives people the impression Wyndham is not listening. There are some issues raised here that I consider high priority and we’ve pushed it by telling them why it’s a bigger issue then they may realize. I think all those extra details help them. Can you tell me what you’ve been trying to get them to fix? As you can see, there is a lot to fix, so I may have missed it if you said something. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## HitchHiker71 (May 12, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> I am not the only IT professional that has specifically NOT defended the website.  Please don't tar us all.



I don't see anyone defending the website.  As @Richelle said, we would not be here collecting feedback and reporting that feedback in a constructive manner if we didn't _agree _with much of the sentiment on some level.  We both believe in seeking first to understand before being understood.  We see both sides as a result.  We aren't defending anything, we have simply been trying to provide context when and where appropriate, but as Richelle said - the TUG forums have gradually become unproductive for us to continue this endeavor - and we have plenty of feedback from our Facebook groups in comparison. 

Consider this official notice that we are taking a hiatus and suspending all website related TUG data collection, sharing, participation and related activities for a period of not less than three months - to be revisited next fall.  See you all then.


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> Actually you again said they are using a very limited way of getting feedback. And I will say again, the agile method is just a way to do minimal work and testing and then let users sort it out. (which they seem to be doing a bad job at). It's not just the picky users here on TUG that are upset. There are a ton of less sophisticated users on facebook who are complaining as well. Very few users seem to be happy with the website. Also blaming the backend systems does not excuse the frontend. As others have said, putting lipstick on a pig does not mean the bad shade of lipstick should be forgiven.



Do you have surveys that say very few people are happy with the website or are you basing that on what you see on Tug? I’ve seen complaints on Facebook but many of the issues that they complained about in the beginning have been resolved. There are still some outstanding and some are new. People complain before they compliment so you’re always going to see more complaints. No one notices when you do something right. They only notice when you do something wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I would never in a million years ask you to like the website or overlook its flaws. What I am saying is, not everyone is unhappy like you are. Just because you see some complaints, doesn’t mean very few are happy with the website. 

Agile method gets fixes in quicker. If you’re ok with waiting longer for an issue to get fixed because they have to wait for the monthly release Great. I’m not. Many companies are changing to agile method to get fixes in quicker. They get the same amount of testing as the waterfall method, it’s just that they have more releases so you have fewer fixes waiting to go in. So if testing on a fix is done the day after the monthly release, they have to wait an entire month for that fix to go in, if they use the water all method. If they use the agile method, it’s two weeks. So if they were still on the waterfall method, it would take longer to get these bugs fixed. 

As @HitchHiker71 said, We will be getting our data and feedback from other areas for awhile. That will give some of you guys tons of time to complain and bash Wyndham. Hopefully by the time we come back, you’ll have tired of it and be ready to give constructive criticism instead of simply bashing Wyndham and their web team. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## geist1223 (May 12, 2021)

How long to put up with the current Wyndham Web Site? Until they come up with something worse!


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## comicbookman (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> Do you have surveys that say very few people are happy with the website or are you basing that on what you see on Tug? I’ve seen complaints on Facebook but many of the issues that they complained about in the beginning have been resolved. There are still some outstanding and some are new. People complain before they compliment so you’re always going to see more complaints. No one notices when you do something right. They only notice when you do something wrong. Don’t get me wrong, I would never in a million years ask you to like the website or overlook its flaws. What I am saying is, not everyone is unhappy like you are. Just because you see some complaints, doesn’t mean very few are happy with the website.
> 
> Agile method gets fixes in quicker. If you’re ok with waiting longer for an issue to get fixed because they have to wait for the monthly release Great. I’m not. Many companies are changing to agile method to get fixes in quicker. They get the same amount of testing as the waterfall method, it’s just that they have more releases so you have fewer fixes waiting to go in. So if testing on a fix is done the day after the monthly release, they have to wait an entire month for that fix to go in, if they use the water all method. If they use the agile method, it’s two weeks. So if they were still on the waterfall method, it would take longer to get these bugs fixed.
> 
> ...


Traditional methods, when done correctly, don't have a ton of fixes required, so waiting for fixes is not really an issue.  I am sorry that you guys (you and Hitchhiker have put in a ton of work, in good faith) are taking your ball and going elsewhere, but it just highlights my point about the limiting and selective use of feedback to fix the website.  No you don't ask us to overlook the flaws, but you do go out of your way to defend the existence of those flaws.  What I and others hare on TUG are saying is a company with Wyndham's resources should not be dumping a flawed product, connected to a creaky backend on users.  There is no excuse for that, but you guys keep putting forth excuses.  The use of the agile model being the main one.  The agile model was created by cheap lazy companies who were not trying to serve user interest, but just trying to get something out the door fast.  The only time the agile model is justified (in my opinion) is when you are creating something brand new basically from scratch.  Replacing a functional system is not a place to employ it.  I can tell you I have no doubt that I would be fired, after 22 years running the IT department were I am, if I had approved and rolled out something in this manner this poorly.


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

dgalati said:


> Why so sensitive? Did you read the part where I said Kudos to you? I am happy for you If you don't mind wasting personal time and energy to help fix a system that should have been fully functional from the start!



Saying Kudos to me is like starting a sentence with “No offense but…”. You still say I’m “wasting” my time. Saying someone is wasting their time is telling them that what they are doing is not worth anything. You’re telling me What I am doing is not worth doing? How am I not supposed to take offense to that? You know exactly what I’m saying is true. I actually thought it was funny that you were telling us that we had nothing better to do with our time, when you spend a ton of time parroting the same lines over and over even though it doesn’t accomplish anything. Pot, kettle. 

You’re going back to trying to bait people into an argument or get them worked up. I know you said you enjoy doing that, but you’re barking up the wrong tree. Go find someone else who will take the bait to entertain you. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## paxsarah (May 12, 2021)

Jan M. said:


> The website before Voyager, prior to May 2017, was so easy to use. For those of us who've owned longer it's really, really hard not to miss it.





HitchHiker71 said:


> Yes and no. For someone like me where 95% of my usage is on a mobile device - my iPhone 11 in this case - I didn't find Voyager very user friendly. The site was never built or intended for use with the greater than 50% utilization of websites on mobile devices that is the reality today. That said, I take your point - the functionalities that many power owners/users enjoyed in the Voyager website were not all brought across into the new website. I believe this was, at least to some extent, by design.



To clarify, she was talking about the pre-Voyager website, not Voyager. Obviously, that would look terrible on mobile, but it did have some functionality that was never returned in Voyager or since (especially the next available vacation function).

That said, there are a number of functionalities that we gained with Voyager that I think if we were to suddenly revert to the pre-Voyager website, we would miss without realizing that we'd acclimated to their existence, such as the ability to start a stay of any length on any day of the week (subject to seasonal and booking window-based minimums). I remember setting calendar reminders for the 90 day mark so I could book a 5-night stay. Booking single nights was limited to "orphaned" nights. (Obviously we can't book single nights at all right now, but when we could it was any single night available.) The normalized calendar. Booking ARP online.



HitchHiker71 said:


> and we have plenty of feedback from our Facebook groups in comparison.
> 
> Consider this official notice that we are taking a hiatus and suspending all website related TUG data collection, sharing, participation and related activities for a period of not less than three months - to be revisited next fall. See you all then.



Although I'll miss TUG's contribution, Wyndham really needs to hear the concerns of the FB group members. With some notable exceptions of really savvy owners (and not even all TUGgers!), the FB owner population is less informed and more easily confused by things that seem normal to us, or issues we've learned to work around with some success. Our questions/issues/requests are highly specialized; their questions are basic. They are the vast majority of the owner base. My only concern is that with a group that's starting at such a basic level, sometimes the question they're asking or the issues they claim to have aren't articulated well and need to be translated before being acted upon. I have to wonder if the newest filter kerfuffle came from people expressing confusion about the message about the Pigeon Forge Margaritaville (but not _mentioning_ the PF Margaritaville), so Wyndham made it a filter that could be turned off instead - seemingly putting more control in the hands of the owner. But now, instead of only showing a message for searches in the Smokies, it shows a message for every search everywhere and still doesn't explain what it's actually filtering, nor that just because the message shows it doesn't mean any actual search results were changed. With some of these issues (such as why the availability calendar will seem to show continuous dates, but when a date is clicked on there's no continuous stay available), even if there's a logical explanation for it, there's only so much explaining to seemingly every owner on Facebook you can do before thinking maybe it's Wyndham's problem for not explaining well, rather than the owners' problem for failing to recognize how it works under the surface. Even some of these things that would require more complex, lengthy fixes could be at least partially assuaged by simply more detailed explanatory pop-ups in the interim. Explain what "membership type" is. Explain that the availability calendar shows every individual night available and not necessarily a contiguous stay, and that limiting the unit size will return more meaningful results. Default that filter to off rather than on (considering that when the filter is off, the results for the unbookable resorts already state outright that I cannot book them). Good luck, Facebookers!


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> Traditional methods, when done correctly, don't have a ton of fixes required, so waiting for fixes is not really an issue. I am sorry that you guys (you and Hitchhiker have put in a ton of work, in good faith) are taking your ball and going elsewhere, but it just highlights my point about the limiting and selective use of feedback to fix the website. No you don't ask us to overlook the flaws, but you do go out of your way to defend the existence of those flaws. What I and others hare on TUG are saying is a company with Wyndham's resources should not be dumping a flawed product, connected to a creaky backend on users. There is no excuse for that, but you guys keep putting forth excuses. The use of the agile model being the main one. The agile model was created by cheap lazy companies who were not trying to serve user interest, but just trying to get something out the door fast. The only time the agile model is justified (in my opinion) is when you are creating something brand new basically from scratch. Replacing a functional system is not a place to employ it. I can tell you I have no doubt that I would be fired, after 22 years running the IT department were I am, if I had approved and rolled out something in this manner this poorly.



No worries. I won’t “defend” anything to you or anyone for awhile. You can commence bashing Wyndham, the website, and the web team to your hearts content. It doesn’t actually accomplish anything, but that’s fine. You do what you need to. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> I am not the only IT professional that has specifically NOT defended the website.  Please don't tar us all.


My apologies.


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## comicbookman (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> No worries. I won’t “defend” anything to you or anyone for awhile. You can commence bashing Wyndham, the website, and the web team to your hearts content. It doesn’t actually accomplish anything, but that’s fine. You do what you need to.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


Thank you for your permission and your condescending attitude.  It just furthers my point about the limiting and filtering of feedback.


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## VacayKat (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> We went to an owners meeting and talked with Annie Robert’s face to face and offered suggestions for improvements and also told her about feedback I’ve been seeing. She asked me to email her. After that, she introduced us to a few other people, that eventually led us to the web team. We can take any feedback back to them. If it’s something they can fix, they do. Sometimes, somethings take higher priority then others and if it’s an issue that only affects a small number of people, it may not be categorized as a high priority. That’s frustrating to the people who do experience that problem and gives people the impression Wyndham is not listening. There are some issues raised here that I consider high priority and we’ve pushed it by telling them why it’s a bigger issue then they may realize. I think all those extra details help them. Can you tell me what you’ve been trying to get them to fix? As you can see, there is a lot to fix, so I may have missed it if you said something.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


I think it’s more that I really don’t want to spend a lot of time funnelling the bugs and failures through these forums- I get you guys are doing the best you can and that’s great. However, at this point, I’d like to find a way to be part of the solution. Like I mentioned on another thread- the way to find resorts with availability to use up some of the points Ihave for this use year ending June 30 has got so frustrating that I gave up and now need to find a different use for the points- super fun. Before they launch changes site wide, they should have a group of users to test the changes - and I’m a fairly typical site user, but with lots of experience with testing changes. In general my expectations are very simple- whatever is published should work, and the basic needs of owners should be available. An example of this is (maybe was, haven't looked in a while) the button for automatic payments set up - doesn’t tell you if you already are, or any details about that payment just ‘you can do it if you want’. That is basic info that all owners should be able to see. The fact that MF fee charges were updated to payments but no documentation was available AND they never sent me anything in the mail is problematic at best, not to mention bad business practices. So basically what I’m saying is, if Wyndham wants the website to work they need to have a solid testing user group or at least a larger group of owners to get feedback from. Badically the wyndham site is turning me into one of those cranky old people (and I’m actually not even middle aged) who begrudgingly uses it when I have to but doesn’t expect it to be easy, fast or successful.


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> Before they launch changes site wide, they should have a group of users to test the changes. In general my expectations are very simple- whatever is published should work, and the basic needs of owners should be available.  So basically what I’m saying is, if Wyndham wants the website to work they need to have a solid testing user group or at least a larger group of owners to get feedback from.


Owners should expect nothing less!


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## dgalati (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> Saying Kudos to me is like starting a sentence with “No offense but…”. You still say I’m “wasting” my time. Saying someone is wasting their time is telling them that what they are doing is not worth anything. You’re telling me What I am doing is not worth doing? How am I not supposed to take offense to that? You know exactly what I’m saying is true. I actually thought it was funny that you were telling us that we had nothing better to do with our time, when you spend a ton of time parroting the same lines over and over even though it doesn’t accomplish anything. Pot, kettle.
> 
> You’re going back to trying to bait people into an argument or get them worked up. I know you said you enjoy doing that, but you’re barking up the wrong tree. Go find someone else who will take the bait to entertain you.
> 
> ...


Why are you so sensitive to anyone that is critical of the website? Why should any owner contribute countless hours of free time to help fix a system that Wyndham paid someone else to upgrade? That's not how the private sector works. If you pay a mechanic to repair your car and it has to go back several times for the same problem do you complain? Or do you spend countless hours of your own time trying to help him fix it?


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## PhilD41 (May 12, 2021)

I am really feeling like I should defend the Agile Development Method after reading some of the posts above.... but I am pretty sure this isn't the right time or place. I will just offer that there is a correct way to "agile" and a very wrong way to "agile." They have VERY different outcomes.   Carry on....


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## wjappraise (May 12, 2021)

PhilD41 said:


> I am really feeling like I should defend the Agile Development Method after reading some of the posts above.... but I am pretty sure this isn't the right time or place. I will just offer that there is a correct way to "agile" and a very wrong way to "agile." They have VERY different outcomes.  Carry on....



Thanks for sharing. 

Your perspective is appreciated. For those of us not versed in IT matters we don’t have an opinion on how the website can be fixed. 

We DO have an opinion that the long standing practice of Wyndham rolling out a new or revised website that’s full of bugs is not acceptable to us. 

It’s that simple. We just want a reliable and accurate website. We don’t need meaningless photos of families enjoying the resorts. We need a platform that allows us to book those resorts and not show us ghost inventory. We need a platform that accurately tracks our points, reservations, guest certificates, and other things that are financially based. We need to be able see more than three reservations at once. And we need to search our booked reservations by resort. 

And most of all - we need a systemic change in philosophy to no longer release platforms or websites full of bugs. We need this to be like a banks website. Reliable. Accurate. Accountable. 

And if we have volunteers to help us get there - they need to be ones who don’t get easily upset and offended. And threaten to take their toys and go home. 

Just one man’s opinion.


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## PhilD41 (May 12, 2021)

I am right there with you @wjappraise. I am not an IT guy either. I am actually an Aero-Space Engineer. Most of my product blow up. (on purpose)   I just have extensive experience in Agile, at least in my field, and hate seeing it get a bad rap.  

For the most part (ish) I have tried to keep my dog out of this fight. I get both sides, trying to justify the challenges and difficulties of data intensive systems; especially if you are even slightly invested or emotionally close. I also recognize that almost all other players in various fields have managed to do a better job of it than Wyndham.  It is a hard problem to solve, but no worse than most of the other web applications out there, such as YNAB (a MUCH smaller company). Certainly they have a different level of motivation (and likely funding) than say Marriott or even the Wyndham hotel web development team. I believe from reading this, EVERYONE agrees this is frustrating and "not right" (to be read as not owner focused).

I fall into the camp of "I don't know what I am missing." I didn't use it much at all prior to this year. Now that I am trying to rent out extra points... There are LOTS of areas for improvement. I provide feedback and hope for the bet. I may feel differently after putting up with it for a few years and seeing it degrade (as longer term users have). Hopefully they turn that trend around soon!


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## Rolltydr (May 12, 2021)

@Richelle and @HitchHiker71, thank you for all the work you have put into, and progress you have made, for us users. I have 779,000 annual points and currently have 12 reservations, amazingly, none of which I had any trouble making through the website. Does it have issues? Yes. But, don’t they all! My least favorite thing about the site is Captcha, but I’d like it even less if it had no security. I wish Amazon had a better website. I wish Regions Bank had a better website. Have you ever tried reading the USA Today site on an iPad using the Safari browser? I find it unreadable but, apparently, USA Today is pretty successful and the site has quite a few viewers. Granted, they aren’t trying to make reservations, but still. Anyway, I’ll miss your positive interactions here on TUG for the next few months but I certainly understand why you would need a break. I would have stopped long ago when it became clear that TUGGERS were just going to complain, regardless of what changes/improvements were made. I’ve never seen a group of people want to go back in time so badly. It ain’t gonna happen guys. Get over it.

So, I appreciate everything the two of you have done and I hope we hear from you again after the break. I’m not on facebook so I won’t see you there but, hopefully, they appreciate your efforts more than many here on TUG do.

I hope you enjoy your break.


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## Richelle (May 12, 2021)

Rolltydr said:


> @Richelle and @HitchHiker71, thank you for all the work you have put into, and progress you have made, for us users. I have 779,000 annual points and currently have 12 reservations, amazingly, none of which I had any trouble making through the website. Does it have issues? Yes. But, don’t they all! My least favorite thing about the site is Captcha, but I’d like it even less if it had no security. I wish Amazon had a better website. I wish Regions Bank had a better website. Have you ever tried reading the USA Today site on an iPad using the Safari browser? I find it unreadable but, apparently, USA Today is pretty successful and the site has quite a few viewers. Granted, they aren’t trying to make reservations, but still. Anyway, I’ll miss your positive interactions here on TUG for the next few months but I certainly understand why you would need a break. I would have stopped long ago when it became clear that TUGGERS were just going to complain, regardless of what changes/improvements were made. I’ve never seen a group of people want to go back in time so badly. It ain’t gonna happen guys. Get over it.
> 
> So, I appreciate everything the two of you have done and I hope we hear from you again after the break. I’m not on facebook so I won’t see you there but, hopefully, they appreciate your efforts more than many here on TUG do.
> 
> I hope you enjoy your break.



You have special permission to message me through Tug PM.  seriously though. Thank you for the kind words. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## geist1223 (May 12, 2021)

Did Wyndham go through the Beta Phase and have it tested by actual Wyndham Members/Users of various skill levels?


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## troy12n (May 12, 2021)

geist1223 said:


> Did Wyndham go through the Beta Phase and have it tested by actual Wyndham Members/Users of various skill levels?



*WE* are the beta testers, what you talkin' bout Willis?


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## troy12n (May 12, 2021)

I've seen a lot of references about last year's updates necessary to make the site more usable from phones. And while I can appreciate that, I'm at a loss as to why the website for PC's needed to be broke to accomplish that. Web browsers for years have been able to determine the  browser type and platform, and more importantly redirect to a mobile version of the site. I don't know why they could not have just done that. 

I never use my phone to make reservations. I wouldn't no matter how much improvement they make to it. It's just not convenient for me, and how I work. 

I'm confident they have statistics of who uses mobile vs PC, and I understand the desire to sell to millennials with attention spans shorter than a 2 year old, but for christs sake, some of the changes made are regressive to what I have to assume is a very large userbase of older people who don"t want to do reservations on a phone. 

Was any analysis done about this?


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## Sandi Bo (May 12, 2021)

Richelle said:


> I agree it could be better. I get the warning about overlapping reservations. What is it the VC’s can do that we cannot?
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


I get a message about overlapping reservations at the time of booking. What I am referring to is the alerts we used to get if we did not resolve the overlapping condition. VC's still get them, but we don't.


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## chapjim (May 13, 2021)

It's getting so I expect something unexpected to happen.


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## Sandi Bo (May 13, 2021)

chapjim said:


> It's getting so I expect something unexpected to happen.


It was the very first message I saw this morning when I logged in (on my Dashboard). I had to chuckle (and think, no, no, this is not unexpected).  They really do need to change that message, lol.


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## wjappraise (May 13, 2021)

I just made a reservation today. And it got interrupted as the website told me “a bot was detected”. Brilliant. I just back arrowed once, hit continue and confirmed the reservation. 

The bar is so incredibly low that I did a little victory dance and treated myself to a Bloody Mary. I am astounded how little we have come to expect of OUR website. And yet if we share the experiences of our discontent we are “trashing the website”? Are we in Russia? Is Putin the web designer? Will I get poisoned for posting this? 

Maybe we could have a thread here that only allows congratulations to the developers and volunteers who have succeeded in helping one owner keep his/her 700,000 points and 12 reservations “mostly” intact. The rest of us could just leave that thread alone and post our real world concerns that “mostly” isn’t good enough. And those looking to take offense could just ignore that thread. Because in my book that’s what has happened. None of my concerns posted here, called in, or put on a survey have been rectified. NONE. And yet I should only post “positive experiences”? 

The emperor is wearing no clothes.


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## wjappraise (May 13, 2021)

Rolltydr said:


> @Richelle and @HitchHiker71, thank you for all the work you have put into, and progress you have made, for us users. I have 779,000 annual points and currently have 12 reservations, amazingly, none of which I had any trouble making through the website. Does it have issues? Yes. But, don’t they all! My least favorite thing about the site is Captcha, but I’d like it even less if it had no security. I wish Amazon had a better website. I wish Regions Bank had a better website. Have you ever tried reading the USA Today site on an iPad using the Safari browser? I find it unreadable but, apparently, USA Today is pretty successful and the site has quite a few viewers. Granted, they aren’t trying to make reservations, but still. Anyway, I’ll miss your positive interactions here on TUG for the next few months but I certainly understand why you would need a break. I would have stopped long ago when it became clear that TUGGERS were just going to complain, regardless of what changes/improvements were made. I’ve never seen a group of people want to go back in time so badly. It ain’t gonna happen guys. Get over it.
> 
> So, I appreciate everything the two of you have done and I hope we hear from you again after the break. I’m not on facebook so I won’t see you there but, hopefully, they appreciate your efforts more than many here on TUG do.
> 
> I hope you enjoy your break.



Can you help me? Seriously. What has been fixed or changed? 

Maybe a list of the improvements, as well as the planned improvements, would help ones like me to feel better. I am not one who loves to complain but I also am not going to drink the Kool Aid when I see the same issues over and over. 

I am not being sarcastic here - please just list what has been improved and what’s going to be improved soon. 

Thanks for help. 

Wes


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## Rolltydr (May 13, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Can you help me? Seriously. What has been fixed or changed?
> 
> Maybe a list of the improvements, as well as the planned improvements, would help ones like me to feel better. I am not one who loves to complain but I also am not going to drink the Kool Aid when I see the same issues over and over.
> 
> ...


@HitchHiker71 kept a spreadsheet populated with the fixes and improvements in a separate thread. I’m not going to look it up for you. You should be able to do that yourself if you’re actually interested. I suspect you really don’t care and I’m not wasting my time.

Again, I haven’t had any problems making a reservation. The website may not work exactly as I’d like for it to but I don’t one that does. I also had a 35 year career in IT so I’m not speaking without some level of knowledge about how they work. I use the Wyndham site to make reservations. I haven’t had any problems making a reservation. I have been unable to access the website a couple times when it was down, but every website goes down occasionally. I get in later and do what I need to do. 

Instead of drinking more Koolaid, I’m just going to hit Ignore on this thread.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 13, 2021)

PhilD41 said:


> I am right there with you @wjappraise. I am not an IT guy either. I am actually an Aero-Space Engineer. Most of my product blow up. (on purpose)   I just have extensive experience in Agile, at least in my field, and hate seeing it get a bad rap.
> 
> For the most part (ish) I have tried to keep my dog out of this fight. I get both sides, trying to justify the challenges and difficulties of data intensive systems; especially if you are even slightly invested or emotionally close. I also recognize that almost all other players in various fields have managed to do a better job of it than Wyndham.  It is a hard problem to solve, but no worse than most of the other web applications out there, such as YNAB (a MUCH smaller company). Certainly they have a different level of motivation (and likely funding) than say Marriott or even the Wyndham hotel web development team. I believe from reading this, EVERYONE agrees this is frustrating and "not right" (to be read as not owner focused).
> 
> I fall into the camp of "I don't know what I am missing." I didn't use it much at all prior to this year. Now that I am trying to rent out extra points... There are LOTS of areas for improvement. I provide feedback and hope for the bet. I may feel differently after putting up with it for a few years and seeing it degrade (as longer term users have). Hopefully they turn that trend around soon!



Thanks for your response.  Agile/scrum is, for many very legitimate business reasons, superior to waterfall development methodologies.  Is agile perfect?  Nope, no methodology ever is.  As you said, _how _agile/scrum is implemented makes all of the difference. Agile can be implemented badly - oftentimes due to a lack of training for the resources in scope to properly make the transition from waterfall to agile/scrum. Is this the case for Wyndham? Hard to say, but overall I don't think the answer is binary in this instance.

Specific to your question, based upon my experiences to date, for the most part what may be missing is that the Wyndham digital transformation team responsible for the website development via a cloud based platform is hamstrung, at least to some extent, by the back end team that controls the databases and middleware.  While the DT team is using agile/scrum with MVP, the back end team is still largely waterfall based.  As I'm sure you can imagine - this makes it much more difficult to manage the overall user experience.  We have many product enhancement and bug fixes documented on our sheet that have been there for months untouched, because the change request requires the back end team to do something.  I don't fault the DT team for this problem, and unfortunately while we _do _have visibility/relationships with the DT team, we do _not _have visibility/relationships with the back end team.  AFAIK - no one outside of Wyndham does.

For those who seem to believe that we are in any way defending Wyndham, let's take a step back and examine this accusation.  What did Richelle and I actually do?  We collected, documented, and put in front of Wyndham a list of no less than 150+ regressions, bugs, enhancement requests, and content management requests shortly after the initial release of the new website.  Think about what I just said for a minute in that single statement.  We went directly to Wyndham, and essentially handed them a comprehensive list of 150+ complaints - in some cases with steps to reproduce, videos showing examples, etc.  We essentially delivered a massive list that essentially said to Wyndham's website rollout that what you did was far from good, and here's a massive list of detailed complaints proving this fact.  Now let's put that in context to the accusation.  We, Richelle and I, are somehow accused of defending Wyndham.  Yet we were the ones who, more than anyone else on this website or likely anywhere else, put all of our cards on the table with Wyndham VIPs.  We delivered a large list that was incredibly critical of Wyndham in essence.  How on earth does this somehow translate into us defending Wyndham?  If anyone here can provide a rational and logical answer, I'm all ears.  All we are doing whenever we respond here on TUG is to provide _context _when people bring up questions in an attempt to help explain what is or may be happening, based upon our collective experiences.  We are not defending anyone - Richelle and I, more than _anyone _on this website, have in point of fact been more critical of Wyndham - because we keep them accountable via documented collected experiences on a persistent basis.  Are we happy with the rate of change for the website?  No we are _not.  _Does that mean we won't provide _context _when appropriate?  No it does _not.  _

That said, there are a subset of forum members here on TUG that are unwilling to accept _any context _that does not meet with their opinion of Wyndham.  We are _far _from the first users to "take a break" from TUG due to this subset of forum members.   In an effort to minimize the noise, we are also placing certain forum members on ignore and will no longer see nor respond to those forum members.  This forum function exists for good reason, and we intend to use it as we deem appropriate.  If this strikes anyone as unfair, we will have to agree to disagree and leave it at that.

@VacayKat you asked about leveraging the relationships we have built over time.  We are under general agreement with those we interact with to not share any contact information without explicit agreement, and subject to Richelle and I's discretion.  We have on a couple of occasions brought additional people into our fold, some of which are here on TUG, after careful consideration and observation.  If/when we arrive at this point specific to your request, we will let you know.  That said, none of this prevents anyone on this site from doing what we did.  We are two relatively "typical" Wyndham owners who simply made the decision to actually attempt to do something about our own frustrations and observations - and we then extended it out to others in an attempt to better represent a wider swath of owners over time.

@Rolltydr thanks for your kind words.  I cannot speak for @Richelle but I'm not leaving TUG altogether - I'm simply suspending the process we have maintained specific to tracking regressions, bugs, enhancements, etc.  I will still be contributing elsewhere when appropriate.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 13, 2021)

geist1223 said:


> Did Wyndham go through the Beta Phase and have it tested by actual Wyndham Members/Users of various skill levels?



Yes, though given they moved up the website release by six months to May 2020, I suspect there was limited testing prior to release.  This is speculation on my part to be clear, but it makes logical sense to me.  There are 70-80 focus groups comprised of typical Wyndham owners maintained for various different purposes to the best of my understanding.  Richelle and I have participated in a few of these over time, usually tied to evaluating proposed enhancements.  One noteworthy example was the evaluation of the monthly availability calendar that was not included in the initial website release in May 2020 - we both evaluated and provided feedback on the re-introduction of the monthly availability calendar in June 2020 prior to public release.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 13, 2021)

troy12n said:


> I've seen a lot of references about last year's updates necessary to make the site more usable from phones. And while I can appreciate that, I'm at a loss as to why the website for PC's needed to be broke to accomplish that. Web browsers for years have been able to determine the  browser type and platform, and more importantly redirect to a mobile version of the site. I don't know why they could not have just done that.
> 
> I never use my phone to make reservations. I wouldn't no matter how much improvement they make to it. It's just not convenient for me, and how I work.
> 
> ...



Yes, I've shared these usage stats in past threads.  I don't have time to go back and dig them up, and those stats are 6-12 months old now anyways, so are of limited value now IMHO.


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## dgalati (May 13, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> I just made a reservation today. And it got interrupted as the website told me “a bot was detected”. Brilliant. I just back arrowed once, hit continue and confirmed the reservation.
> 
> The bar is so incredibly low that I did a little victory dance and treated myself to a Bloody Mary. I am astounded how little we have come to expect of OUR website. And yet if we share the experiences of our discontent we are “trashing the website”? Are we in Russia? Is Putin the web designer? Will I get poisoned for posting this?
> 
> ...


Its like handing out participation trophies where everyone is a winner!


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## VacayKat (May 13, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> you asked about leveraging the relationships we have built over time.  We are under general agreement with those we interact with to not share any contact information without explicit agreement, and subject to Richelle and I's discretion.  We have on a couple of occasions brought additional people into our fold, some of which are here on TUG, after careful consideration and observation.  If/when we arrive at this point specific to your request, we will let you know.  That said, none of this prevents anyone on this site from doing what we did.  We are two relatively "typical" Wyndham owners who simply made the decision to actually attempt to do something about our own frustrations and observations - and we then extended it out to others in an attempt to better represent a wider swath of owners over time.


I appreciate the specificity of your response- though I wasn’t actually asking to leverage your relationship to join rather I was just hoping to understand the avenue you took. Wyndham is different in that we ‘own’ part of it, so in some ways I feel that they should be responsible to the owners. And that would involve having avenues to gather ongoing feedback and solicit input prior to changes. It is a different relationship than I would have with any other website I would do business with. For e.g. if I was shopping on amazon and their app crashed on my phone I’d be annoyed, but I wouldn’t think they owed me a working app. whereas for wyndham, if I’m looking for something to book and I get the ‘something unexpected happened’ alert for every resort and every date I put in (or how I *still* can’t see outrigger availability), I do think Wyndham owes me a better working website. And if it’s just my account that has been poorly or improperly configured then they owe me that explanation and an apology. But finding an avenue to get someone to care has been difficult to say the least. 
So I appreciate yours and @Richelle’s responses on HOW you found a way in. Now I have to do the same thing but thanks to your experience I at least know there MIGHT be a way in.
One way to explain how I feel about the current wyndham website is to liken it to the transition from text based websites to image based sites back when connection speeds were increasing enough to make it possible. Website owners (some, not all) got so excited they could put pretty pictures on the site that they forgot everyone wasn’t ready to make the jump-nor did they have access to increased speeds. I remember sitting there and thinking - thanks for wasting my time, that picture was utterly useless and I also had to pay more for this experience (because internet cost was usage based) - never coming back here because you disrespected my time, money and value. Yet when the images were thoughtful, integral and added value (and appropriately sized!) it made the experience better. All I’m wanting is Wyndham to ensure their website is a value-add, not a frustrating waste of my time. It should not be too much to ask. Now I just have to find someone who works there to listen to me- so thanks for letting me know how you got to where you are, I’ll let you know if I find a way in.


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## comicbookman (May 13, 2021)

PhilD41 said:


> I am really feeling like I should defend the Agile Development Method after reading some of the posts above.... but I am pretty sure this isn't the right time or place. I will just offer that there is a correct way to "agile" and a very wrong way to "agile." They have VERY different outcomes.   Carry on....



i won't disagree with your statement, but doing it the wrong way is soo much easier and cheaper, that it seems to be the predominant way.


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## PhilD41 (May 13, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> i won't disagree with your statement, but doing it the wrong way is soo much easier and cheaper, that it seems to be the predominant way.


That I certainly can't argue with. As a SAFe Program Consultant for one of my many roles in my organization.... I have seen much more of that then doing it right. It isn't the wild west of design that people think it is.... or treat is as.


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## dgalati (May 13, 2021)

comicbookman said:


> i won't disagree with your statement, but doing it the wrong way is soo much easier and cheaper, that it seems to be the predominant way.


It has become the norm and when people complain about failure or a substandard service they are looked down on. Mediocrity and failure is rewarded  with participation trophies very often today.


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## wjappraise (May 13, 2021)

Rolltydr said:


> @HitchHiker71 kept a spreadsheet populated with the fixes and improvements in a separate thread. I’m not going to look it up for you. You should be able to do that yourself if you’re actually interested. I suspect you really don’t care and I’m not wasting my time.
> 
> Again, I haven’t had any problems making a reservation. The website may not work exactly as I’d like for it to but I don’t one that does. I also had a 35 year career in IT so I’m not speaking without some level of knowledge about how they work. I use the Wyndham site to make reservations. I haven’t had any problems making a reservation. I have been unable to access the website a couple times when it was down, but every website goes down occasionally. I get in later and do what I need to do.
> 
> Instead of drinking more Koolaid, I’m just going to hit Ignore on this thread.



Thank you. I guess. Not sure why it would be so tough to simply say where the mission accomplished list is residing ... 

Does everyone with an IT background have to treat the rest of us with contempt? 

Geez.

I have a family account accumulated over 25 years back to the Fairfield days.  We have a lot of points with half being developer purchased.  And we have a lot of owners (all extended family) so we have a lot of just plain old users.  So our sample size of experience with the website will dwarf yours.  And ALL of the other owners refuse to use the new platform leaving it to me to navigate this monolith.  And we have over 70 current reservations.  All made be me. And about half have had issues.  So, while your 12 were fine, ours aren’t.  And that shouldn’t happen. Not if we are owners who are a captive market.  I’m in too deep to go to a competitor. 

I don’t need to list all of the issues we’ve had (unless someone wants me to do so) but suffice it to say that NONE of them have been resolved.  So if I’m not ready to congratulate that design team, have some empathy for me. There isn’t a week that goes by that someone from the family consortium ownership doesn’t call or text me with a new frustration with the website. 

One example - we are supposed to be able to add days to a reservation if the inventory exists.  And it did. So I tried adding the day. It kept getting stuck where it offered me the $149 points protection.  Eventually after numerous tries I called in ... the representative was able to do it for me. She told me that it’s never really worked for the end user like myself and IT doesn’t know how to fix it.  

So ... yeah.  Drink your kool aid and smuggly enjoy your 12 reservations as you huddle in your IT ivory tower.  The rest of the unwashed masses are so happy you condescend to offer your thanks to other IT professionals and hurl insults at us.


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## comicbookman (May 13, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Thank you. I guess. Not sure why it would be so tough to simply say where the mission accomplished list is residing ...
> 
> Does everyone with an IT background have to treat the rest of us with contempt?
> 
> ...



Only IT people trying to justify WYndham's failure treat those that point out the failure with contempt.  They also seem to think that they get to go on and on about why it's not a failure, but those that disagree are simply whining.  Their justification is the large amount (and it is a large amount, no sarcasm intended) of, apparently volunteer, work they have put in to try to fix this thing.  However, it's they who are taking their ball and leaving.  The latest explanation, that it is a backend vs front end problem, just makes Wyndham look worse.


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## Sandi Bo (May 14, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Yes, I've shared these usage stats in past threads.  I don't have time to go back and dig them up, and those stats are 6-12 months old now anyways, so are of limited value now IMHO.


I have a thought about this. Sorry, I am in the same camp as @troy12n. I do recall the stats you posted and they don't make sense to me. I rarely use my cell phone. I do at times use it, and I appreciate the more friendly mobile pages.  But I prefer my desktop whenever possible. I also track on excel anything I do, and for that, too, I use my desktop. 

I wonder how many people don't use their cell phone OR the website. I wonder how many people call because they aren't able to for whatever reasons (I'll leave it at that). Because surely the owner base is still of the older generations? If Wyndham were interested in cutting down calls to the VC's (which I sure don't get the impression they are), they would strive for a more user friendly website.


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## troy12n (May 14, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Thank you. I guess. Not sure why it would be so tough to simply say where the mission accomplished list is residing ...
> 
> Does everyone with an IT background have to treat the rest of us with contempt?
> 
> So ... yeah.  Drink your kool aid and smuggly enjoy your 12 reservations as you huddle in your IT ivory tower.  The rest of the unwashed masses are so happy you condescend to offer your thanks to other IT professionals and hurl insults at us.






comicbookman said:


> Only IT people trying to justify WYndham's failure treat those that point out the failure with contempt.  They also seem to think that they get to go on and on about why it's not a failure, but those that disagree are simply whining.  Their justification is the large amount (and it is a large amount, no sarcasm intended) of, apparently volunteer, work they have put in to try to fix this thing.  However, it's they who are taking their ball and leaving.  The latest explanation, that it is a backend vs front end problem, just makes Wyndham look worse.



Where I am sitting, a couple of you loudmouths have pissed off the only two people who have helped fix this mess. While I admittedly don't have as many issues as some of you with the website, I am appreciative of the help (read: *countless, volunteer hours*) @Richelle and @HitchHiker71 have given to help fix it. Which is a lot more than some of you *whiners* ever have.

It's a shame a couple of you have made them abandon their effort. If you think this is a net gain for us by not having any advocates with inside connections, then, I guess *congratulations*... and enjoy continuing to deal with what we have


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## comicbookman (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Where I am sitting, a couple of you loudmouths have pissed off the only two people who have helped fix this mess. While I admittedly don't have as many issues as some of you with the website, I am appreciative of the help (read: *countless, volunteer hours*) @Richelle and @HitchHiker71 have given to help fix it. Which is a lot more than some of you *whiners* ever have.
> 
> It's a shame a couple of you have made them abandon their effort. If you think this is a net gain for us by not having any advocates with inside connections, then, I guess *congratulations*... and enjoy continuing to deal with what we have


It is more than a couple of us.  Also, while I appreciate  them volunteering their time, I'm not sure why they get to decide for the rest of us.  Many of us have owned fairfield/Wyndham for decades, yet they get to appoint themselves our spokespersons. That and the condensending attitude rub many of us the wrong way, dispite thier good intentions.  As for whining, they have given as good as they got.  Last as far as inside connections, part of my position is that should not be required.  The fact that it is, is further proof that something is not right.


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## Jan M. (May 14, 2021)

I'm catching up on this thread. Several thoughts struck me.

1.  How much worse off would we be with this website without the efforts of Craig and Richelle? They've both put in considerable time and effort in listening to our concerns, making the effort to understand when our experience differs from theirs and conveying our concerns. I, like many others, appreciate that. They've been able to do what they've done because thanks to being at the owner's meeting in Austin in November 2019 they were able to talk to and connect with Annie Roberts. In case anyone was wondering how this came about and how I know this it's because I was there too.

2.  How is it that a big company like Wyndham with an entire IT team they're paying absolutely needs the help of professionals like Craig and Richelle, who they aren't paying, to understand what's wrong? I'm thinking how messed up is that when for all I know it could be normal. I kind of doubt it is but it wouldn't be the first or even second time I was wrong.

3.  It's one thing for me and others to fault Wyndham, both management and IT, in regards to the websites they've inflicted on us. I give Craig and Richelle a lot of credit for maintaining such a high level of professionalism in refraining from engaging in that. They're both a ways away from retirement age and that's a line it isn't smart to cross. Please keep that in mind and give them a break.


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## wjappraise (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Where I am sitting, a couple of you loudmouths have pissed off the only two people who have helped fix this mess. While I admittedly don't have as many issues as some of you with the website, I am appreciative of the help (read: *countless, volunteer hours*) @Richelle and @HitchHiker71 have given to help fix it. Which is a lot more than some of you *whiners* ever have.
> 
> It's a shame a couple of you have made them abandon their effort. If you think this is a net gain for us by not having any advocates with inside connections, then, I guess *congratulations*... and enjoy continuing to deal with what we have



Save your lectures. 

I have posted very little here on this subject. And ONLY after I was invited to post my actions by one of the volunteers. And then when I did that, the second volunteer went off the rails. So, if you’d actually read what I said you’d know that didn’t make them quit. 


Geez.


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## Eric B (May 14, 2021)

Aaarrrrghhhhh!  The same type of website/development process is showing up for WorldMark as their new and improved one to be imposed there this year!!!  Twice the fun if you own both sides....


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## Roger830 (May 14, 2021)

I'm in the camp that has been successful making reservations with my 433,000 points, but that doesn't imply that I'm pleased with the website.
Usually I know my start date and location, so the search functions ok.
The most frustrating thing is when doing research, after searching for a resort or looking at a calendar view, backing up takes one back to the beginning and all of the data must be entered again.
There's no way that I would want more points so that I could manage them for family, friends, or renters.


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## r4rab (May 14, 2021)

It could be interesting to see the metrics on # VC calls over time. I don't know if Wyndham tracks the reason for a call but a high level categorization (reservation, availability search, account issue, etc.) could also be interesting. I'm sure Wyndham has some if not all of these statistics but I wonder if the dev team is using them as another feedback mechanism. The stats would probably need to be normalized based on #owners but even without that normalization it seems there would be a huge real-life data set across a wide swath of users (sophisticated and none) that could be informative and a metric by which to judge success of website releases.


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## Sandi Bo (May 14, 2021)

Haven't had time to respond as much as I'd like to, and don't want to miss the opportunity to say how much I do appreciate @Richelle and @HitchHiker71's help. Kudos for building the relationship they have. Very much appreciate their time. I for one walked away for a month or so in May 2020, waiting for bugs to work out, felt the site unusable at that time (and didn't need to use it, thank you covid). For the most part, don't feel Wyndham listens to me. I have offered multiple times, for years, and got thanks, but no thanks, we have plenty of smart people working on this (that was a pre-voyager comment). My 35 years experience in IT (dev, QA, and Business Analyst) are not needed. So good for Richelle and Craig, but still frustration on my part.

I also think Wyndham has taken advantage of them, as well. It appears they are expected to communicate to us.  I still am very frustrated with the lack of communication, especially on this release. From it just appearing one day, to tripping across enhancements and bugs as the vast majority of changes are not announced (maybe a few big things when they are adding a feature - like adding on a night or points protection added back (if my memory serves me right it was never communicated when it was taken away - just one day it was gone). It is wrong of Wyndham to expect Richelle and Craig to be communicators of those things.  I do not expect them to defend the current system nor do I feel they are responsible in any way for the mess. 

Maybe Wyndham should start with a communications specialist. If they can't communicate to us, how can we possibly trust they are listening to us? For ever discussions about silos, and difference experiences by different owners (if at first you don't succeed, try a different VC or owner care). 

And please don't try to shame me for wanting things the old way, like I can't accept change. I am not asking for cancel/rebook, rolling, stripping, credit pool, etc. I am asking to be able to search, book, see current and past reservations, and financial information, and a little communication.


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## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

Eric B said:


> Aaarrrrghhhhh!  The same type of website/development process is showing up for WorldMark as their new and improved one to be imposed there this year!!!  Twice the fun if you own both sides....


We knew it would just be a matter of time before they got to Worldmark.


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## wjappraise (May 14, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> Haven't had time to respond as much as I'd like to, and don't want to miss the opportunity to say how much I do appreciate @Richelle and @HitchHiker71's help. Kudos for building the relationship they have. Very much appreciate their time. I for one walked away for a month or so in May 2020, waiting for bugs to work out, felt the site unusable at that time (and didn't need to use it, thank you covid). For the most part, don't feel Wyndham listens to me. I have offered multiple times, for years, and got thanks, but no thanks, we have plenty of smart people working on this (that was a pre-voyager comment). My 35 years experience in IT (dev, QA, and Business Analyst) are not needed. So good for Richelle and Craig, but still frustration on my part.
> 
> I also think Wyndham has taken advantage of them, as well. It appears they are expected to communicate to us. I still am very frustrated with the lack of communication, especially on this release. From it just appearing one day, to tripping across enhancements and bugs as the vast majority of changes are not announced (maybe a few big things when they are adding a feature - like adding on a night or points protection added back (if my memory serves me right it was never communicated when it was taken away - just one day it was gone). It is wrong of Wyndham to expect Richelle and Craig to be communicators of those things. I do not expect them to defend the current system nor do I feel they are responsible in any way for the mess.
> 
> ...



I agree wholeheartedly Sandi. 

I too took some months off during the past year due to COVID travel restrictions. 

And I am probably way behind the information superhighway here. But In my ignorant opinion I am irritated that Wyndham throws two volunteers to us wolves. 

But perhaps there is a better way to approach this than to simply act as though any criticism of the website is counterproductive. 

For instance, is there a thread devoted simply to providing suggestions to the two volunteers? If so, can that be a “sticky” here? 

And if that’s the case, can the volunteers stay off threads like this one? This thread was started by a member who wanted to vent about the website. But somehow the thread got hijacked and became a heated defense of the current website and a place for the volunteers to be offended. It was never their thread. 

Isn’t this where we should go to vent? And maybe get some helpful pointers? But that’s not what happened. The OP gets blamed by Troy12n for procrastinating, that the website is not to blame. That triggers me to offer that procrastination is not the only problem, that the website is unacceptable. Then Craig asks me what have I done about my issues besides complain. So I answer. And Richelle dismisses my opinions and experiences with contempt. And then Craig says they won’t be using TUG for input anymore. Am I wrong to infer that we are being punished because we don’t like the bugs in the website? And aren’t willing to defer to the IT experts and parrot what we are told? I love the fact that Sandi is an expert but speaks honestly. 

Anyway - if the volunteers stay off the threads started by the “loudmouths” maybe that would work. 

Thanks for listening.


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## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> I agree wholeheartedly Sandi.
> 
> I too took some months off during the past year due to COVID travel restrictions.
> 
> ...


 @troy12n the loud mouth statement was uncalled for. @wjappraise  I agree condescending attitudes for others that may not agree with a opinion should not be the norm.  Opinions are expected on a open forum and If someone is offended and disagrees they have the option of not reading or ignoring the original poster. Rudeness is usually associated with the following but has no place in a open forum. Just my personal opinion and hope some are not offended. 
*7 Root Causes Of Rudeness*

Low Self-esteem. ...
Personal Problems. ...
Learned *Behavior*. ...
Personality Disorders. ...
Cultural Differences. ...
'Brain Strain' *Caused* By Technology Overload. ...
Emotional Immaturity And Low Emotional Intelligence.


----------



## troy12n (May 14, 2021)

@*dgalati * I have yet to see you make one positive contribution to this forum. You consistently use the forum as your soapbox against retail owners because seemingly you got caught by Wyndham gaming the system and got your hand slapped. Maybe i'm wrong, prove it. But your schtick is really tiresome. You parrot the same BS opinions in every thread. And the idea that you have any moral standing to be making judgments of others is laughable at best.

@*wjappraise *My initial responses to the OP I thought were pretty accurate. If not a bit heavy handed, and I already apologized for that. Specifically the OP said she couldn't find occupancy in certain places, and I did, within a few minutes, using the website monthly calendar. Where this went after that, I can hardly be blamed for, and I feel you coming in here downplaying your role in that is kind of ridiculous too. Throwing insults and downplaying the efforts of volunteers isn't a good luck. No matter how many bookings you have this year... (congratulations,  ), it doesn't entitle you to any more or less of an opinion on things


----------



## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> @*dgalati * I have yet to see you make one positive contribution to this forum. You consistently use the forum as your soapbox against retail owners because seemingly you got caught by Wyndham gaming the system and got your hand slapped. Maybe i'm wrong, prove it. But your schtick is really tiresome. You parrot the same BS opinions in every thread. And the idea that you have any moral standing to be making judgments of others is laughable at best.
> 
> @*wjappraise *My initial responses to the OP I thought were pretty accurate. If not a bit heavy handed, and I already apologized for that. Specifically the OP said she couldn't find occupancy in certain places, and I did, within a few minutes, using the website monthly calendar. Where this went after that, I can hardly be blamed for, and I feel you coming in here downplaying your role in that is kind of ridiculous too. Throwing insults and downplaying the efforts of volunteers isn't a good luck. No matter how many bookings you have this year... (congratulations,  ), it doesn't entitle you to any more or less of an opinion on things


I still own not only Wyndham but Worldmark.  Your rude and condescending behavior is a example of a few retail owners that feel they are entitled to insult anyone that did not buy retail but its no excuse for rude and bad behavior.


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## troy12n (May 14, 2021)

dgalati said:


> I still own not only Wyndham but Worldmark.  Your rude and condescending behavior is a example of a few retail owners that feel they are entitled to insult anyone that did not buy retail but its no excuse for rude and bad behavior.



Find one instance of me doing that... I've insulted you for being a crybaby whiner and a liar, I've never insulted anyone for buying resale and challenge you to find one example of me doing that. Because it hasn't happened.


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## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Find one instance of me doing that... I've insulted you for being a crybaby whiner and a liar, I've never insulted anyone for buying resale and challenge you to find one example of me doing that. Because it hasn't happened.


What you call gaming is what I call using the system to my advantage.  No different then a what a VIP owner does when using loopholes available to their advantage. Lets not talk about what brought about all the recent changes and focus on your rude insulting behavior to other posters that you disagree with.


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## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> .. I've insulted you for being a crybaby whiner and a liar.





dgalati said:


> *7 Root Causes Of Rudeness*
> 
> Low Self-esteem. ...
> Personal Problems. ...
> ...


----------



## troy12n (May 14, 2021)

So I didn't "insult resale owners"... thanks for validating this for me...


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## dgalati (May 14, 2021)

troy12n said:


> So I didn't "insult resale owners"... thanks for validating this for me...


troy12n said:

.. I've insulted you for being a crybaby whiner and a liar.


If I wasn't a resale owner this might be true.


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## troy12n (May 14, 2021)

Oh, i've clearly insulted you... not "resale owners". You've set yourself up for any ridicule you get because of your stupid comments. You need to own it. Goodnight.


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## Sandi Bo (May 15, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> I agree wholeheartedly Sandi.
> 
> I too took some months off during the past year due to COVID travel restrictions.
> 
> ...


Thank you for your kind words, as well as thoughts/suggestions on guidelines.   I agree some kind of guidelines would be nice.  TUG has certainly changed over the years. I feel like we've been walking on eggshells for quite some time now.  Interesting the search got even worse after the Wednesday night release (anyone else see that 'your page has taken a vacation when you tried to select a specific resort in order to view the monthly calendar' - yes figured out a workaround (couple more clicks) and it is fixed now).  Not a peep about it. 

Agree, we need to vent. Also to confirm others are having issues as well as to learn what may have been resolved (or not). 

Maybe start with being kind, no way should someone be saying people have nothing better to do with their time, for starters.  I try not say anything here I wouldn't say to someone's face (anonymity makes it so much easier to be critical/thoughtless).


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## bnoble (May 15, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> anonymity makes it so much easier to be critical/thoughtless


That's why I make it a point to use my real identity in online forums.

Well, that and I know if someone wanted to find out who I was, they could even if I was trying to hide it. This way I remember to think at least a _little_ bit.


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## 55plus (May 15, 2021)

Back to the original topic, “How much longer will we need to endure the terrible new Wyndham website?” For whatever reason all the website shows when I login are Worldmark resorts. I don’t own any Worldmark, only Wyndham. I wish they stop updating the website, they are only make it worse.


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## Sandi Bo (May 15, 2021)

55plus said:


> Back to the original topic, “How much longer will we need to endure the terrible new Wyndham website?” For whatever reason all the website shows when I login are Worldmark resorts. I don’t own any Worldmark, only Wyndham. I wish they stop updating the website, they are only make it worse.


They really are struggling with the search.  I suspect many of the issues we are seeing is around them trying to filter our accounts for what we are eligible to book. Although that doesn't explain not finding anything when you search by location. It really has gotten bad.

Which leads me to suggest for you to select the filter and uncheck the 'Only Show Resorts I Can Book'. I feel like there is a lot of messed up logic around it and the accessibility checkbox (which does not appear at the moment in this screenshot - I haven't figured out the why's around it's appearance or not).





If at first you don't succeed, try, try again!  Or call and talk to a VC


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## 55plus (May 15, 2021)

I had the website set for, Only Show Resorts I Can Book, and all it showed were Worldmark Resorts. And like I said, I don’t own any Worldmark Resorts, only Wyndham.


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## VacayKat (May 15, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> They really are struggling with the search.  I suspect many of the issues we are seeing is around them trying to filter our accounts for what we are eligible to book. Although that doesn't explain not finding anything when you search by location. It really has gotten bad.
> 
> Which leads me to suggest for you to select the filter and uncheck the 'Only Show Resorts I Can Book'. I feel like there is a lot of messed up logic around it and the accessibility checkbox (which does not appear at the moment in this screenshot - I haven't figured out the why's around it's appearance or not).
> 
> ...


This one cracks me up- it filters exactly 1 resort for me- no idea what resort I can’t book, but that’s a whole lot of work to filter out one resort.


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## paxsarah (May 15, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> This one cracks me up- it filters exactly 1 resort for me- no idea what resort I can’t book, but that’s a whole lot of work to filter out one resort.


Do you own Outrigger, I assume? I’m going to guess the one resort is Pigeon Forge Margaritaville.


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## VacayKat (May 15, 2021)

paxsarah said:


> Do you own Outrigger, I assume? I’m going to guess the one resort is Pigeon Forge Margaritaville.


Wow- you hit it spot on! What’s the membership type needed to book there?


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## paxsarah (May 15, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> Wow- you hit it spot on! What’s the membership type needed to book there?


You have to be a Margaritaville owner (it’s the only MV that doesn’t eventually open to other owners). It has a very small number of units.


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## geist1223 (May 17, 2021)

Wyndham is currently writing/creating a new online site for Worldmark. So I am concerned with what I read here. First of all thank you to the folks who have spent so much time working with Wyndham to try and make the Wyndham online site more user friendly. I apologize in advance if I offend anyone with my questions/comments (Oh boy you say stand back he is about to be a total jerk.) I was never an IT Specialist. My experience is having to work with many different Systems during my active work life. I have not taken a formal Computer science class since the 1970's.

My first issue would be is Wyndham using purely internal Wyndham Employees for the Wyndham Site they are creating? Are they using the 500 Computer Engineers from India Approach? Or did/is Wyndham bringing in outside Experts? I ask this because while I have no experience in this area my Son owns his own Firm. They write Applications and Programs as Independent Contractors for many firms such as Liberty Mutual, Harvard, Samsung, etc.

We have discussed this process several times and the various avenues Private Companies use to create new Applications and Programs. He has nothing good to say about the 500 Engineers from India Approach. His experience is that this leads to poorly designed and integrated Programs that take years to fix. This is used by Firms that primarily want to save a Buck.

The Companies that use Internal Sources tend not to have the Best and Brightest (apologies to Corporate Computer folks). The folks tend to write programs by assembling modules. This leads to 100's of lines of unnecessary code and usually internal conflicts.

Corporations that hire Firms (like my Son's) may pay more upfront but the final Product normally works as designed. My Son's Firm will first sit down (well use to sit down during COVID a lot of Zoom type meetings) first with the Corporate folks to understand what they think they want - what is the true end goal. Then they meet with the actual people that will be using the Application or Program after it is completed to understand what they need/want. They stay with the Project until all the Bugs are worked out and everybody (Corporate and Users) are satisfied.

My own personal experience from working with different Businesses during my active work life falls in line with my Son's comments.


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## rickandcindy23 (May 17, 2021)

The website is awful, I agree.  It's not working as it should and one has to hope that they are constantly updating it to make it better.  I get a lot of error messages, and that makes me log off and on again to start over with the same search I tried before.  

The original website that we had in 2007 was so much better, but don't get me started, don't even get me started.  (This is reference/joke from SNL a long time ago.)

I think we can all agree that Wyndham has a lot of issues with their website, but the people who work at Wyndham are nothing but kind and sincere, even though we are mega renters and corporate hates us.  Just have to say that.


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## WyndhamBarter (May 17, 2021)

rickandcindy23 said:


> don't get me started, don't even get me started.



I couldn't resist looking up this skit from 20 years ago.

https://snltranscripts.jt.org/00/00kjeannie.phtml

Perhaps off topic, but R&C's reference seems apropos to me. ;-)


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## geist1223 (May 17, 2021)

I do not care if the Wyndham folks working on the new Worldmark Site are Kind and Sincere. Are the best available? That is what I want. If they are the same folks that wrote/designed the "new" Wyndham Site then Worldmark Owners are in for a rough road and the Worldmark Owners will not be nice. Most of us do not understand why they are replacing what we have. We do not want a bunch of bells and whistle. We so not need a bunch of pretty pictures/graphics (This is what they are showing in the previews). We want a system that is as simple and functional as what we have now.


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## troy12n (May 17, 2021)

geist1223 said:


> I do not care if the Wyndham folks working on the new Worldmark Site are Kind and Sincere. Are the best available? That is what I want. If they are the same folks that wrote/designed the "new" Wyndham Site then Worldmark Owners are in for a rough road and the Worldmark Owners will not be nice. Most of us do not understand why they are replacing what we have. We do not want a bunch of bells and whistle. We so not need a bunch of pretty pictures/graphics (This is what they are showing in the previews). We want a system that is as simple and functional as what we have now.



Just being real here, you have a zero percent chance of getting what you are asking for. Based on what Wyndham has done for their own website and the RCI site. 

They seem to think that owners want flashy and "apps". And i'm sure if they want to sell to people under 40, they probably should be heading in that direction. Honestly if a younger person, who is their sales target these days, saw the Worldmark or old RCI website they would probably laugh the salesman out of the room it's so archaic... despite functionality, it looks like it was designed by Peter Norton in 1996 and never updated. That's not a good look for a multi-billion dollar company like Wyndham. 

They definitely could do better than what we have right now. For me anyway, i've learned how to make it usable. And for me, I can deal with it. 

But you have zero chance of getting a website like what you have now on the Worldmark side. So buckle in... and no amount of owner complaints is going to change that. Because we've been complaining and it's not been fixed in a year. You can only hope you get "more functional" than what we got on day 1 of the cutover last ~May


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## troy12n (May 17, 2021)

And just like that... Midtown 45 not showing up as an available resort for me at all.


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## WyndhamBarter (May 17, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Midtown 45 not showing up as an available resort



I've noticed a little hinky behavior if I click on the resort name in an an existing M45 reservation.
(It refreshes my dashboard page instead of going to an M45 page.)

But, for me, a homepage search for "midtown" yields two hits - the first is the
discount promo page, and the second still works for the real M45 page.

So I think the URL to try (after you are logged in) would be:

https://clubwyndham.wyndhamdestinat...ica/new-york/new-york/club-wyndham-midtown-45


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## wjappraise (May 17, 2021)

troy12n said:


> And just like that... Midtown 45 not showing up as an available resort for me at all.



Same for me. 

Sigh.


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## Jan M. (May 17, 2021)

troy12n said:


> And just like that... Midtown 45 not showing up as an available resort for me at all.



You and everyone else. A friend who owns there gets that message.


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## wjappraise (May 17, 2021)

It’s like Wyndham IT just keeps shooting itself in the foot. Could they really be this incompetent? Does every “enhancement” they add just seem to make it worse? 

It’s downright embarrassing.


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## dgalati (May 18, 2021)

Not many companies could deliver a product this bad and retain customers. Remember the updates are intended to "enhance your user experience!"


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## Sandi Bo (May 18, 2021)

I think they need to go back to searching. Period. I don't have a clue what they are doing. Trying to show personal favorites first, filtering stuff, hit or miss (usually miss) with locations. 

I often get this 'page has gone on vacation message' when I directly try to search for a resort. My workaround is to search for a specific location with dates I know are available. That will allow me to see the view monthly calendar link. Tip toe around, coming in the back door, cross my fingers, and usually works. 

Also playing cat and mouse with the select dates calendar (which does make it impossible to find anything, even with the above approach). 






Which leads me to the feedback tab. I have recommend before that we be able to add screenshots. Maybe that would help them?


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## paxsarah (May 19, 2021)

troy12n said:


> And just like that... Midtown 45 not showing up as an available resort for me at all.


I know none of our feedback here will be funneled back to Wyndham, but I did some digging/experimentation on this issue and I thought I'd at least post it here for posterity. I also submitted it on Wyndham's feedback tab. Regarding the resort map search/explore resorts (not the general/magnifying glass website search), usually when I first log in and go there, it will show me 261 resorts, but it will quickly revert to 250 (both with the default filter remaining on - this has nothing to do with the filter itself). When the total number of results is 250, Midtown 45 is missing. What I did is determine what the other 10 resorts are, and the good news is that almost all of them are closed/no longer available with Club Wyndham. Here's the full list:

Carriage Hills
Carriage Ridge
Grand Chicago Riverfront
*Midtown 45 (this one is not like the others!)*
Hotel Galvez
Orange Tree Associate
Peacock Suites Associate
Donatello Associate
Legacy Golf Resort Associate
Vino Bello Associate (all of these associate resorts also have a non-associate version that's still available in the list of 250)
Worldmark Coral Baja (this one appears like it should also still be available, but since owners have to call to book it's less of an issue)
So this is definitely some sort of a glitch - obviously Midtown 45 is bookable and should appear in the search, but somehow got flagged to be suppressed like these other resorts that are not in fact bookable. The good thing is that it's still possible to find Midtown 45 on the general website search (magnifying glass), and use the availability calendar to book (which is usually the better choice anyway).

What is a pain, though, is that in trying to explain to people on Facebook that "the filter itself does almost nothing and no, your membership type didn't change, and yes, you do really have access to all the same resorts you've always had," I now have to caveat it with, "yes, I know Midtown 45 doesn't come up in your resort search, and no, it's not the filter doing that to you, it's just a glitch, and yes, you still have access to it, etc." Wyndham doesn't make it easy to be helpful. For a lot of people telling them, "it's not the filter, it's just a glitch introduced in the update that happened at the same time as the filter," does not assuage their concerns.


----------



## wjappraise (May 19, 2021)

paxsarah said:


> I know none of our feedback here will be funneled back to Wyndham, but I did some digging/experimentation on this issue and I thought I'd at least post it here for posterity. I also submitted it on Wyndham's feedback tab. Regarding the resort map search/explore resorts (not the general/magnifying glass website search), usually when I first log in and go there, it will show me 261 resorts, but it will quickly revert to 250 (both with the default filter remaining on - this has nothing to do with the filter itself). When the total number of results is 250, Midtown 45 is missing. What I did is determine what the other 10 resorts are, and the good news is that almost all of them are closed/no longer available with Club Wyndham. Here's the full list:
> 
> Carriage Hills
> Carriage Ridge
> ...



Thanks Sarah. 

While misery may love company ... for me it helps to know I’m not the only one with these issues. 

Now if Wyndham could solve the issues ... without causing four or five more.  

Wes


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## troy12n (May 19, 2021)

I don't know if it's doing this for everyone, but for me, even if you go in on the filter, and remove all filters, including "resorts i'm not entitled to" or whatever that verbiage is, not only does Midtown not show up in the search results, it does not even show up on the map, when you zoom into Manhattan... Not even a dot on the map. MOST of the time anyway. Because occasionally it does on the map, but you can't click on it. The only way I was able to get to the result was via the direct link someone else provided earlier. I was actually looking to bookj there in June, but it looks like those deals ended.

At times, i've been a defender of the website, because despite it's issues, i've always been able to make it work. This is the first time i've encountered an issue where it just isn't working at all, for certain resorts. So something is indeed wrong.


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## dgalati (May 19, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Now if Wyndham could solve the issues ... without causing four or five more.
> 
> Wes


 LOL! I feel we are all crash dummies in Wyndhams quest to deliver a functional web experiance.


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## wjappraise (May 19, 2021)

troy12n said:


> I don't know if it's doing this for everyone, but for me, even if you go in on the filter, and remove all filters, including "resorts i'm not entitled to" or whatever that verbiage is, not only does Midtown not show up in the search results, it does not even show up on the map, when you zoom into Manhattan... Not even a dot on the map. MOST of the time anyway. Because occasionally it does on the map, but you can't click on it. The only way I was able to get to the result was via the direct link someone else provided earlier. I was actually looking to bookj there in June, but it looks like those deals ended.
> 
> At times, i've been a defender of the website, because despite it's issues, i've always been able to make it work. This is the first time i've encountered an issue where it just isn't working at all, for certain resorts. So something is indeed wrong.



That’s the beauty of this forum. We can all provide a different perspective. 

I know my initial reaction is to be irritated and slam the website. So it’s good when others provide a balancing viewpoint reminding me that some aspects can be successful if we try other routes. 

Thangs for sharing your view.


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## dgalati (May 19, 2021)

troy12n said:


> I don't know if it's doing this for everyone, but for me, even if you go in on the filter, and remove all filters, including "resorts i'm not entitled to" or whatever that verbiage is, not only does Midtown not show up in the search results, it does not even show up on the map, when you zoom into Manhattan... Not even a dot on the map. MOST of the time anyway. Because occasionally it does on the map, but you can't click on it. The only way I was able to get to the result was via the direct link someone else provided earlier. I was actually looking to bookj there in June, but it looks like those deals ended.
> 
> At times, i've been a defender of the website, because despite it's issues, i've always been able to make it work. This is the first time i've encountered an issue where it just isn't working at all, for certain resorts. So something is indeed wrong.


Its hard to defend mediocrity let alone failure. I would expect more not less on a upgrade. Anyone that thinks otherwise is helping to perpetuate the continuous beatings we take as owners on the so called upgrades to our user experience. Would you accept a studio thinking you were upgraded to a 2 bedroom from a 1 bedroom?


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## schoolmarm (May 22, 2021)

There has been an update!  You can actually get a list of resorts by state or location without using the map to filter.  YAY!

BUT the monthly availability "book this resort" button is now at the BOTTOM of the resort page. WHAT? If you are in the hospitality business and have resorts to book, wouldn't you put the BOOK or RESERVE button towards the top?

It is a vast improvement...still a bit wonky, but maybe better.


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## troy12n (May 22, 2021)

schoolmarm said:


> There has been an update!  You can actually get a list of resorts by state or location without using the map to filter.  YAY!
> 
> BUT the monthly availability "book this resort" button is now at the BOTTOM of the resort page. WHAT? If you are in the hospitality business and have resorts to book, wouldn't you put the BOOK or RESERVE button towards the top?
> 
> It is a vast improvement...still a bit wonky, but maybe better.



Doesn't look or work any differently than it did for me yesterday. Maybe they rolled back the change. Monthly calendar link on the resort page is in the exact same spot it was as well. Also Midtown 45 still not showing up in the search. It is on the map for me now, but you cannot click on it to navigate to the resort webpage from the map.


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## PhilD41 (May 22, 2021)

dgalati said:


> I would expect more not less on a upgrade



You did get more... much more. At least for a day or so the Chicago property was back.   Sorry I couldn't resist, obviously. If my humor is in bad taste I will go sit quietly.

@schoolmarm, I think I saw you mention an update on a different thread. I am with @troy12n on this one. I don't see anything different. I wonder if they have the ability to beta test bast on location or IP? It does make me wonder what is going on.


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## wjappraise (May 22, 2021)

PhilD41 said:


> You did get more... much more. At least for a day or so the Chicago property was back.  Sorry I couldn't resist, obviously. If my humor is in bad taste I will go sit quietly.
> 
> @schoolmarm, I think I saw you mention an update on a different thread. I am with @troy12n on this one. I don't see anything different. I wonder if they have the ability to beta test bast on location or IP? It does make me wonder what is going on.



I love the humor. Keep it up!


----------



## southwestmagnolia (May 22, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Use the monthly calendar, like I said, it took me less than 10 minutes to find out what I posted. I've never struggled with the system like so many others appear to and really can't wrap my head around how so many people find it difficult.


You are fairly new so do not understand how it used to be.  Their IT folks should be focused on making it easier rather than more difficult to find availablility.


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## Jan M. (May 22, 2021)

southwestmagnolia said:


> You are fairly new so do not understand how it used to be.  Their IT folks should be focused on making it easier rather than more difficult to find availablility.



IT can only attempt to deliver what Wyndham tells them they want. Unfortunately Wyndham apparently either has very little understanding of what we the owners want and need or perhaps doesn't care if it isn't deemed a benefit to sales.


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## dgalati (May 23, 2021)

Jan M. said:


> IT can only attempt to deliver what Wyndham tells them they want. Unfortunately Wyndham apparently either has very little understanding of what we the owners want and need or perhaps doesn't care if it isn't deemed a benefit to sales.


I wonder if the same IT is used for sales team?


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## 55plus (May 25, 2021)

Question: How much longer will we need to endure this terrible new Wyndham website? 
Answer: Until the next update or revision, then it will be worse.


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## dgalati (May 26, 2021)

55plus said:


> Question: How much longer will we need to endure this terrible new Wyndham website?
> Answer: Until the next update or revision, then it will be worse.


Updating system "To enhance the online user experience".


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## Don40 (May 26, 2021)

I have just been calling in and letting the VC do searches for me.  What is old is new again.


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## Sandi Bo (May 28, 2021)

Cautiously optimistic - looks like some good fixes to the search. 
* Monthly calendar link is back on the original resort listing page (saving extra clicking and scrolling). Sometimes (ok, a lot of the time) I get used to a work around I'm using don't notice fixes like this right away, but I think this is a new fix.
* Appears searching by location is working (search for Destin or Orlando, etc) and availability (or not) for specific resorts looks accurate to me. That's a quick spot checking, but seems to be working. I haven't played with the accessible or only resorts I can book filters.
* Those ghost reservations at the Club Wyndham Grand Palms (Myrtle Beach area) are gone!!! Woot woot! Looks like you can now search for the Myrtle Beach area and see accurate availability!

I was not a user of the map feature, but will be checking it out more after seeing some of the comments here. Maybe others have more comments on it being fixed (as well as other search issues reported here).


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## paxsarah (May 28, 2021)

It looks like the membership type filter is completely gone (!), but I’m still having a hard time making the resort/map search give me Midtown 45. (As always, it is still easily found using the website search and availability calendar.)

Edit: If I search Pigeon Forge, it gives me the old message about a resort being unavailable to my membership type in that area. If I search Hawaii without dates, though, it does show me the Outrigger resorts in the list of results. (They had been hidden from me when the newer membership type filter was enabled.) But they won’t return results if I put in dates, and their individual resort pages tell me I can’t book them.


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## HitchHiker71 (May 28, 2021)

paxsarah said:


> It looks like the membership type filter is completely gone (!), but I’m still having a hard time making the resort/map search give me Midtown 45. (As always, it is still easily found using the website search and availability calendar.)
> 
> Edit: If I search Pigeon Forge, it gives me the old message about a resort being unavailable to my membership type in that area. If I search Hawaii without dates, though, it does show me the Outrigger resorts in the list of results. (They had been hidden from me when the newer membership type filter was enabled.) But they won’t return results if I put in dates, and their individual resort pages tell me I can’t book them.



It’s not technically gone - it’s still in place but it’s been disabled for all membership types except for Discovery - which is really the only membership type where this setting has a significant impact on search results displayed. They may bring it back as a filter option for other membership types - but it will not be enabled by default. At least this is what we were told last week, subject to change of course. 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## HitchHiker71 (May 28, 2021)

Sandi Bo said:


> Cautiously optimistic - looks like some good fixes to the search.
> * Monthly calendar link is back on the original resort listing page (saving extra clicking and scrolling). Sometimes (ok, a lot of the time) I get used to a work around I'm using don't notice fixes like this right away, but I think this is a new fix.
> * Appears searching by location is working (search for Destin or Orlando, etc) and availability (or not) for specific resorts looks accurate to me. That's a quick spot checking, but seems to be working. I haven't played with the accessible or only resorts I can book filters.
> * Those ghost reservations at the Club Wyndham Grand Palms (Myrtle Beach area) are gone!!! Woot woot! Looks like you can now search for the Myrtle Beach area and see accurate availability!
> ...



We provided quite a bit of detailed feedback on the reported search results issues two weeks back now - including all three of the above listed items among others - so am glad to see some positive changes in the recent sprint rollout.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## wjappraise (May 29, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> We provided quite a bit of detailed feedback on the reported search results issues two weeks back now - including all three of the above listed items among others - so am glad to see some positive changes in the recent sprint rollout.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk



Thank you.


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## VacayKat (May 29, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> It’s not technically gone - it’s still in place but it’s been disabled for all membership types except for Discovery - which is really the only membership type where this setting has a significant impact on search results displayed. They may bring it back as a filter option for other membership types - but it will not be enabled by default. At least this is what we were told last week, subject to change of course.
> 
> 
> Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


I have been wondering if there is a way to filter Worldmark in the works? Since we can’t see availability it would be nice to have the option to filter them.


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## VacayKat (May 30, 2021)

Not sure if these are news or not but from my customer service calls: 1. One night stays will come back after covid- they are removed because of inability to clean the rooms for that quick of a turn over. In the mean time- even call center can’t override. 2. end of use year auto transfer to RCI may or may not work- she thought that it had been removed. It still says it on the website, so ‍“shrug”. If you are planning on using that feature as a VIP platinum or founders, be careful (also apparently presidential reserve are treated differently, so keep that in mind too if it’s you.) 3. Cost to bank points to future years is $39 on website, $49 via telephone (freebies are long gone).They are told to tell you to do it yourself.


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## dgalati (May 30, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> Not sure if these are news or not but from my customer service calls: 1. One night stays will come back after covid- they are removed because of inability to clean the rooms for that quick of a turn over. In the mean time- even call center can’t override. 2. end of use year auto transfer to RCI may or may not work- she thought that it had been removed. It still says it on the website, so ‍“shrug”. If you are planning on using that feature as a VIP platinum or founders, be careful (also apparently presidential reserve are treated differently, so keep that in mind too if it’s you.) 3. Cost to bank points to future years is $39 on website, $49 via telephone (freebies are long gone).They are told to tell you to do it yourself.


Customer service at its best "do it yourself "  So much for status and Privilege?


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## wjappraise (May 30, 2021)

dgalati said:


> Customer service at its best "do it yourself " So much for status and Privilege?



No. I think it’s simply to save $10. It’s really simple to do. So even though I have Platinum I will do this myself. 

Not everything with the new website is doom and gloom. I’m one who hates the bugs but they are working to improve things and some features like adding a night or two to an existing reservation are actually nice additions. Although I can’t do it on my iPhone. I have to use the desktop computer. But it’s improving. 

So we can give credit where due. And still reserve the right to complain about the glitches. But their are reasons to be pleased with the improvements and fixes.


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## VacayKat (May 31, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> No. I think it’s simply to save $10. It’s really simple to do. So even though I have Platinum I will do this myself.
> 
> Not everything with the new website is doom and gloom. I’m one who hates the bugs but they are working to improve things and some features like adding a night or two to an existing reservation are actually nice additions. Although I can’t do it on my iPhone. I have to use the desktop computer. But it’s improving.
> 
> So we can give credit where due. And still reserve the right to complain about the glitches. But their are reasons to be pleased with the improvements and fixes.


Yes, it was for the save $10 that they encourage you to do it yourself. I suspect the price reduction for do it yourself has to do with how many wait up until the last minute and clog the phone lines. To be fair- I was confirming with them when I could wait until and how much it cost, so there was no slight intended. Personally I’m irritated there *IS* a cost for this, that just seems like nickel and diming. There are other timeshares that don’t charge for this.


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## dgalati (Jun 1, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> Yes, it was for the save $10 that they encourage you to do it yourself. I suspect the price reduction for do it yourself has to do with how many wait up until the last minute and clog the phone lines. To be fair- I was confirming with them when I could wait until and how much it cost, so there was no slight intended. Personally I’m irritated there *IS* a cost for this, that just seems like nickel and diming. There are other timeshares that don’t charge for this.


100% correct on the nickle diming. It should be free online or calling in. Plain and simple money grab.  Worldmark doesn't have as many of the BS fees that Wyndham has.


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## wjappraise (Jun 1, 2021)

dgalati said:


> 100% correct on the nickle diming. It should be free online or calling in. Plain and simple money grab. Worldmark doesn't have as many of the BS fees that Wyndham has.



Oh those fees are coming to WorldMark!


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## dgalati (Jun 1, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Oh those fees are coming to WorldMark!


Sad to say its just a matter of time.


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## HitchHiker71 (Jun 3, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> I have been wondering if there is a way to filter Worldmark in the works? Since we can’t see availability it would be nice to have the option to filter them.



We have this documented on our list - however it's been there for months with no movement.  I suspect we won't see any movement on any items related to Worldmark until the new Worldmark website has been released and there's a roadmap in place on any possible online reservation integration pieces.  That's just speculation on my part to be clear, but that's my overall sense resulting from my interactions to date.


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## VacayKat (Jun 3, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> We have this documented on our list - however it's been there for months with no movement.  I suspect we won't see any movement on any items related to Worldmark until the new Worldmark website has been released and there's a roadmap in place on any possible online reservation integration pieces.  That's just speculation on my part to be clear, but that's my overall sense resulting from my interactions to date.


That's super helpful. I had forgotten Worldmark website was been revamped and the integration between them and Wyndham was still not complete. I was super bummed when I had been told that there was 'in the works'  a way for VIP owners to book Worldmark without the fee and that didn't get included in the new VIP program. We're burning some points that are expiring with a Worldmark reservation and the fees are about $200 for 3 nights. Would be super painful if it wasn't somewhere we really wanted to go, but just for that long.
On a completely different note, I'm super pleased that when I return to the resorts page that the location (and sometimes) dates I had put in remained after navigating to one of the resorts it found for me. Not sure if you had any input on that, but it has made using the search function much more pleasant.


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## troy12n (Jun 3, 2021)

I've noticed recently that when you go to a resort, details, then click "back", the search remembers your previous search, and applies that locale. Which is kind of what it used to do on the old website, almost. This change is a definite improvement on what it had been doing, which is just revert to some random list of resorts...


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## HitchHiker71 (Jun 3, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> That's super helpful. I had forgotten Worldmark website was been revamped and the integration between them and Wyndham was still not complete. I was super bummed when I had been told that there was 'in the works'  a way for VIP owners to book Worldmark without the fee and that didn't get included in the new VIP program. We're burning some points that are expiring with a Worldmark reservation and the fees are about $200 for 3 nights. Would be super painful if it wasn't somewhere we really wanted to go, but just for that long.
> On a completely different note, I'm super pleased that when I return to the resorts page that the location (and sometimes) dates I had put in remained after navigating to one of the resorts it found for me. Not sure if you had any input on that, but it has made using the search function much more pleasant.



Yes, sorry I forgot to mention about the search criteria becoming sticky.  This is a big win as well.  The browser back button actually works!


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## WhiskeyJack (Jun 3, 2021)

Sorry if I missed this.  When searching with the flexible dates button checked on, the results bring back the dates +/- from your search date, however I still get no results displayed when clicking on the + button to open up a flexible date period.  Is this still not working for everybody or do I have to do something on my end to make it work again.  Same question for the filter selection after search results come back.  If I click on a filter then no results always is what returns.  Is this still not working or something on my end?  Thanks


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## VacayKat (Jun 3, 2021)

WhiskeyJack said:


> Sorry if I missed this.  When searching with the flexible dates button checked on, the results bring back the dates +/- from your search date, however I still get no results displayed when clicking on the + button to open up a flexible date period.  Is this still not working for everybody or do I have to do something on my end to make it work again.  Same question for the filter selection after search results come back.  If I click on a filter then no results always is what returns.  Is this still not working or something on my end?  Thanks


I get that on iPad consistently, however the entire interface on iPad doesn't necessarily adjust to the way I use my browser (e.g. using 1/2 browser, 1/2 other app means I have to omit doing things like entering dates on the resort search page as it doesn't seem to have a responsive web design.) Just tried it on a laptop browser and I get the same thing. It does show briefly but then it disappears. Seems like the underlying logic to show the information is intact just not the visual implementation.


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## Sandi Bo (Jun 4, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> Yes, sorry I forgot to mention about the search criteria becoming sticky.  This is a big win as well.  The browser back button actually works!


And here I go complaining about it.

The sticky search criteria could use some tweaking. That random list of resorts @troy12n refers to is still there, but the previous input is too, so it actually executes the search again. Thus wasting processing. If you want to change the search, you have to clear the parameters. To clear a date you have to select the calendar and then select clear. A lot of extra steps if you are looking for something different.   So depending on what I'm doing, I like it or I hate it.

And the filtering @WhiskeyJack is referring to, agree, filtering can't be used/trusted. Sometimes it works, sometimes it fails, sometimes the results are incorrect. He has detailed it better than I as far as next available. Interesting (and haven't figured out why - sometimes you have the checkbox for 'include accessible suites', sometimes you don't). But if it is there, it probably doesn't work.  Example (on desktop using Chrome)
*1  Search for Panama City Beach, June 20-22
*2  Returns  'No Results Found' but recommends Bonnet Creek and Reunion  (nice, btw)
*3  Select Filter and select 'Include Accessible Suites'  (Can click on View Resorts in the filter button) - same search results, it doesn't show any accessible available
*4  Click on view monthly calendar for Bonnet Creek and from the BC calendar view, select 'Include Accessible Suite' and there are a few. Proving step *3 results are wrong
*5  Start 'new search' - Sticky Bonnet Creek/June 20-22 retained AND executes - shows the correct results (for this search I likely did not want to execute). Interesting that step *3 did not return correct results and now here in step *5 it does

Also at times I have to reselect my resort to get the search to execute. If resort and dates are populated, and you remove the dates (in the multi-step process I described above), you then have to reselect the resort to get the search to execute.  Seems like overall what is needed is a button to click we want the search to execute (like we get in the filter window). Rather than the website executing when it wants to, sometimes when it should (but not always).

Summary - nice to have the stickiness (sometimes) but for sure still some flakiness as well as inaccurate results.   Using it but still go back using monthly calendar for most accurate results.

Love that the browser back button works!


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## Sandi Bo (Jun 4, 2021)

And then there's this little tease... after searching for specific dates in Destin, nothing is found, it suggests other resorts (even Palm-Aire, which is fine, I'm liking that it suggests other places).  This flexible date thing also appears, show 1 resorts, but I can't click on anything here to show what resort they found that is available 7/23 to 7/25.


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## HitchHiker71 (Jun 4, 2021)

WhiskeyJack said:


> Sorry if I missed this.  When searching with the flexible dates button checked on, the results bring back the dates +/- from your search date, however I still get no results displayed when clicking on the + button to open up a flexible date period.  Is this still not working for everybody or do I have to do something on my end to make it work again.  Same question for the filter selection after search results come back.  If I click on a filter then no results always is what returns.  Is this still not working or something on my end?  Thanks



I've seen these same issues when attempting to view alternate dates and when applying additional filter criteria after the initial search results are displayed.  I'll find some time either today or over the weekend so perform some searches and send screenshots and videos to show the following unexpected behaviors:


When using flexible date search - and expanding the date range - the results appear very briefly but then disappear and are no longer visible.  This occurs for all flexible date ranges displayed.
When performing an initial search - and then applying any additional filter criteria - there are zero results displayed.  Removing the filter criteria does not restore the search results.  A new search must be performed using the filter criteria from inception for the proper search results to be displayed.
The 'Include accessible suites' filter criteria does not always display as a filter option - it appears intermittently. 
My only recommendation for the time being when it comes to using filter criteria - is to set up whatever filtering you want when performing the initial search - the search results - at least from my very limited testing - seem consistent when taking this approach.  Overall - stick with using the monthly availability calendar - still the best and most reliable search that we have at our disposal IME.  I'll post an update when I have something substantive to share.


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## VacayKat (Jun 4, 2021)

HitchHiker71 said:


> I've seen these same issues when attempting to view alternate dates and when applying additional filter criteria after the initial search results are displayed.  I'll find some time either today or over the weekend so perform some searches and send screenshots and videos to show the following unexpected behaviors:
> 
> 
> When using flexible date search - and expanding the date range - the results appear very briefly but then disappear and are no longer visible.  This occurs for all flexible date ranges displayed.
> ...


I also had a very brief issue last night - I think I was 'sort of' logged in? Or maybe they were doing something behind the scenes but didn't take the whole site down. Basically when trying to use the search function it wouldn't select dates and when it did it was off by a day, or maybe it selected the first date but didn't the second, or vice versa. I didn't think to document it because it was late and it sort of sent me over the edge because I had spent like 3 hours earlier in the day going back and forth between the reservations page and the resort pages to see how I could change our December vacation in Hawaii because family changed their dates. (fun fact, if you use the back button to navigate to the vacations page it doesn't load anything past where you last loaded to) -yep, I'm sure a better solution would be to make a paper list of all the details of each vacation instead of using that page, but back to the original thought- my point is- does it help if I take the screen shots and document and send you a message with the info?


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## Sandi Bo (Jun 4, 2021)

VacayKat said:


> I also had a very brief issue last night - I think I was 'sort of' logged in? Or maybe they were doing something behind the scenes but didn't take the whole site down. Basically when trying to use the search function it wouldn't select dates and when it did it was off by a day, or maybe it selected the first date but didn't the second, or vice versa. I didn't think to document it because it was late and it sort of sent me over the edge because I had spent like 3 hours earlier in the day going back and forth between the reservations page and the resort pages to see how I could change our December vacation in Hawaii because family changed their dates. (fun fact, if you use the back button to navigate to the vacations page it doesn't load anything past where you last loaded to) -yep, I'm sure a better solution would be to make a papntler list of all the details of each vacation instead of using that page, but back to the original thought- my point is- does it help if I take the screen shots and document and send you a message with the info?


I've intermittently had that date issue, also (not being able to select to and from).  

And I keep a paper record of all my reservations as well as save all Wyndham transaction in a separate email account.  Easier to track things and refer to them in this manner than use the website  :-(

 Good idea not to keep a hammer close to your keyboard.


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## troy12n (Jul 23, 2021)

Well, I had my first complete website meltdown today...

Had a 4BR Presidential Reserve at Clearwater Beach reserved for today through Monday, was about to leave to go there, looking forward to a great room. Got a call from the resort at 4pm saying the room was no longer available. At first they told me they had NO availability and were completely booked. 

WTF?

Long story short, the *ONLY *room they had was a 1BR Deluxe, so I had to call and explain to my guests that they can't come. Serious egg on my face. Not sure yet what the points refund situation will be, but I won't be charged for more than a 1BR at my VIP inside 60 day discount.

This is the first time that i've experienced a situation where a booked, confirmed resort stay didn't actually exist, or there may be more to the story, I don't know.


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## WyndhamBarter (Jul 23, 2021)

troy12n said:


> WTF?



Holy moly!  Sorry to hear that!!

Since you will be there in person it will be fascinating to see what additional details they share.

And what they intend to do to "make you whole" again!

Please let us all know if you get any resolution or further info. 

I understand that "things happen" in the hospitality business.  But what if your
guests were (or are) flying in for the weekend!!


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## j.d. (Jul 24, 2021)

Yesterday, I saw a 4 day BONUS Time, 1 bedroom full kitchen at Workdmark Oceanside! I checked the boxes and went to get a credit card for payment.
After only a few seconds the reservation was gone! But, Worldmark left me a 800 number to call. Long story_short, after 55 minutes, I was informed that I lost the reservation. I asked her to look and again I was informed that I lost the reservation! Well, I continued to view world mark oceanside bonus time and YES, I saw the same days Again! This time I used my points and am Happy to say , I have the reservation!


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## troy12n (Jul 24, 2021)

So this isn't going great so far. Went from having a 4BR Presidential, in all likelihood oceanfront, with multiple guests on the way, to having a 1BR Deluxe, 5th floor street view (facing East) with a great view of a construction site and a restaurant/bar with live music blasting right outside my window.

Had to call my guests and try to explain the situation, but this is not a great look.

When checking in, after voicing my displeasure, the check in person with no indignation said "it happens all the time", not comforting to say the least. The general attitude I got from them, without actually saying it was "you are lucky we were able to get you any room".

One thing about this unit, the air handler is *IN THE BEDROOM*. It's in a closet with a louvered door, and you can hear the a/c running fairly loudly. I could not think of a worse place to put it. Also apparently a 1BR deluxe here has no dining room table, at all. That's a first. Very uncomfortably firm couch too. Like sitting on a rock. Will see how the rest of the stay goes.

So I don't know if this is a website issue, or something local with how inventory is being reported back to the main system. But it needs fixed, especially when they admit knowing about the issue.


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## CO skier (Jul 24, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Well, I had my first complete website meltdown today...
> 
> Had a 4BR Presidential Reserve at Clearwater Beach reserved for today through Monday, was about to leave to go there, looking forward to a great room. Got a call from the resort at 4pm saying the room was no longer available. At first they told me they had NO availability and were completely booked.
> 
> ...


Was the 4 bedroom reserved using full points for personal use or was it an "upgrade" from a 1 bedroom with a guest use?  Big difference.


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## troy12n (Jul 24, 2021)

CO skier said:


> Was the 4 bedroom reserved using full points for personal use or was it an "upgrade" from a 1 bedroom with a guest use?  Big difference.



When I went to make the reservation, both units were showing available for the timeframe I selected. I could have directly booked the 4BR Pres. But I tried to see if I could get an instant upgrade, and booked the 1BR Deluxe. And it upgraded. If it didn't, I was planning on backing out and just booking the 4BR Pres directly. It was a good enough discount.

It was for my personal use, a GC was never attached to it, if that's what you were asking. This is clearly something broke with the inventory here. I would have never booked the 1BR because of the plans we had made, but we were packed, loaded and literally walking out the door when the resort called me.

So this changed from a "Me, my wife, and 3 other adult couples weekend in a nice, oceanfront room" to a "Me and my wife weekend, in a mediocre room with a view of a construction site". But we are making the best of it.


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## CO skier (Jul 24, 2021)

troy12n said:


> When I went to make the reservation, both units were showing available for the timeframe I selected. I could have directly booked the 4BR Pres. But I tried to see if I could get an instant upgrade, and booked the 1BR Deluxe. And it upgraded. If it didn't, I was planning on backing out and just booking the 4BR Pres directly. It was a good enough discount.


Well, there it is.  And not saying booking the 4 BR directly using full points would have been different, but maybe.

It seems the "upgrade" from the 1 bedroom may have been the issue.


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## troy12n (Jul 24, 2021)

CO skier said:


> Well, there it is.  And not saying booking the 4 BR directly using full points would have been different, but maybe.
> 
> It seems the "upgrade" from the 1 bedroom may have been the issue.



Based on conversations I had with the resort, booking it directly would have had made no difference because apparently the unit was just not available, at all. Which is the issue. Not the fact that I upgraded into it. 

Actually bookable "phantom inventory" ive never experienced, and i'm not sure I have seen reports of this happening before. And like I said, this was a booking I would not have made if I knew I was going to wind up with a 1BR. This was about a shared experience with friends, which we can't get.


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## chapjim (Jul 24, 2021)

CO skier said:


> Well, there it is.  And not saying booking the 4 BR directly using full points would have been different, but maybe.
> 
> It seems the "upgrade" from the 1 bedroom may have been the issue.



It's all @troy12n's fault for being greedy?  Is that what you're saying?


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## rickandcindy23 (Jul 24, 2021)

chapjim said:


> It's all @troy12n's fault for being greedy?  Is that what you're saying?


Sounds like it to me as well.  Upgrades are included with all levels of VIP at a certain point.  If people don't have VIP, then maybe they ought to buy VIP.


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## troy12n (Jul 24, 2021)

chapjim said:


> It's all @troy12n's fault for being greedy?  Is that what you're saying?



Guess i'm expecting too much for a confirmed reservation to be honored, upgrade or not, silly me


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## harveyhaddixfan (Jul 24, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Guess i'm expecting too much for a confirmed reservation to be honored, upgrade or not, silly me



What I want to know is how were they able to tell that it was the unit you booked and not someone else’s? If they were able to tell
It was yours, why did it take till the day of to let you know? This is shady as all get out.


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## troy12n (Jul 24, 2021)

harveyhaddixfan said:


> What I want to know is how were they able to tell that it was the unit you booked and not someone else’s? If they were able to tell
> It was yours, why did it take till the day of to let you know? This is shady as all get out.



I certainly can't answer that... perhaps because I was the last person who reserved a room of that type, or it was the only one of that room type being checked in that day. Who knows... but the general sentiment I got from the front desk staff when checking in was a very flippant "well, it happens here all the time"... which is problematic if true. And pretty poor customer service is she just made it up on the spot. In general, I was made to "feel lucky I got anything", which doesn't exactly play into the idea of VIP ownership, or at least the narrative they drive


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## rickandcindy23 (Jul 24, 2021)

troy12n said:


> I certainly can't answer that... perhaps because I was the last person who reserved a room of that type, or it was the only one of that room type being checked in that day. Who knows... but the general sentiment I got from the front desk staff when checking in was a very flippant "well, it happens here all the time"... which is problematic if true. And pretty poor customer service is she just made it up on the spot. In general, I was made to "feel lucky I got anything", which doesn't exactly play into the idea of VIP ownership, or at least the narrative they drive


That is a HUGE problem, if it is true.


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## 55plus (Jul 24, 2021)

The bigger question is, what if your party was from out of state and on the road when the call came. Better yet, what if no one called and all of you were standing in the lobby when you were informed? There must be some sort of liability for their major screwups.


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## wjappraise (Jul 24, 2021)

So … they can’t get this website to run reliably and accurately … but they are going to take on the Herculean task of analyzing resale ownership and changing the points buckets for all owners with a mixture of developer and resale contracts. 

Yeah, that should be a smooth operation with no glitches! You can’t make this stuff up. Truth is stranger than fiction. What a deluded company! I miss Fairfield.


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## wjappraise (Jul 24, 2021)

55plus said:


> The bigger question is, what if your party was from out of state and on the road when the call came. Better yet, what if no one called and all of you were standing in the lobby when you were informed? There must be some sort of liability for their major screwups.



Yup. But now you can’t blame the mega renters.


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## wjappraise (Jul 24, 2021)

chapjim said:


> It's all @troy12n's fault for being greedy? Is that what you're saying?



I am with you Jim. 
I really try … but I can’t understand the Wyndham Apologist. Is nothing ever Wyndham’s fault? 

I remember years ago he would attack Ron P here all the time. Ron actually wondered aloud if he was a closeted Wyndham employee or contractor who was paid for defending Wyndham on social media like this. Ron was quite astute.


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## VAlegacy (Jul 24, 2021)

regatta333 said:


> *How much longer will we need to endure this terrible new Wyndham website?*


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## wjappraise (Jul 24, 2021)

troy12n said:


> So this isn't going great so far. Went from having a 4BR Presidential, in all likelihood oceanfront, with multiple guests on the way, to having a 1BR Deluxe, 5th floor street view (facing East) with a great view of a construction site and a restaurant/bar with live music blasting right outside my window.
> 
> Had to call my guests and try to explain the situation, but this is not a great look.
> 
> ...



Man I am so sorry for you with this debacle. I know I haven’t always agreed with your posts, but I respect your thoughtfulness and your forward thinking that challenges my stubbornness from time to time. And I deeply feel for you with this situation. 

Is there anything we can do to help? Look for reservations for you? Get rooms in Orlando to help? Please PM if I can help. 

Wes 


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk


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## Zeke_62 (Jul 24, 2021)

I have had this happen at the Grand Desert.  One time I saw the 4br presidential available with a great upgrade and booked it as a spur of the moment trip.  They called me the day after booking and before any real plans had been made to say the unit did not exist.  That one was not a huge deal, except for that same question - what if the resort had not noticed and we had arrived with a big group to check in.  Another time I had guests who arrived to find out their 3br unit did not exist.  The worst time possible to make this determination.    After I got on the phone with them and pushed the point, the Grand Desert provided them with a 2br and a 1br.  They tried to play the "you booked the 1br and then upgraded, so all we are obligated to provide to you is the 1br".  Um.  No.


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## troy12n (Jul 25, 2021)

wjappraise said:


> Man I am so sorry for you with this debacle. I know I haven’t always agreed with your posts, but I respect your thoughtfulness and your forward thinking that challenges my stubbornness from time to time. And I deeply feel for you with this situation.
> 
> Is there anything we can do to help? Look for reservations for you? Get rooms in Orlando to help? Please PM if I can help.
> 
> Wes



So as it has worked out, this has been a pretty good weekend despite the forced cancellation of my guests at the last minute. It's not what I envisioned, but it's still been a good weekend and we've made the best of it. Thank you for the sympathies


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## dgalati (Jul 25, 2021)

troy12n said:


> Guess i'm expecting too much for a confirmed reservation to be honored, upgrade or not, silly me


I just booked a reservation this morning for the 28th-1st. When I confirmed reservation the dates changed to the 30th-3rd? Verified the original dates a few time before booking but the dates recieved will have to work.


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## JerseyDeb (Jul 25, 2021)

VAlegacy said:


> View attachment 37884HB


You're killing me Smalls


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