DanCali
TUG Member
- Joined
- Sep 17, 2009
- Messages
- 4,508
- Reaction score
- 1,812
- Points
- 398
- Resorts Owned
- Vistana, Marriott, DVC
I feel that the best way for Marriott to have done it was to give all platinum weeks at a resort the same number of points rather than the average. If ALL platinum owners had the option based on availability to reserve ALL platinum weeks, why should any week(s) now be out of reach using points?
If your week at your resort is a platinum week, and all platinum owners can reserve weeks 21 to 36, then give all owners enough points to book any week 21 to 36, not just enough points to reserve week 21 or 36 (or as in many cases not enough points to book any platinum week). If Marriott deems those weeks at your resort are worth 3000 points, then give ALL platinum owners at that resort 3000 points. You now can trade for any 3000 point week at any resort, and you also can bank points and reserve 2 platinum weeks in your home resort the following year (one with points, one with home week). That would be fair and a points program I would join. I will not join the current program where they aren't even giving me enough points to reserve ANY week in my season.
The certainly would have been the best outcome but would have prevented the "reseasoning" that they did (I'm not saying the reseasoning was necessary, but just making a point).
If they did do the reseasoning, where they give weeks in the same season different points requirements to exchange into, and then give owners enough points to book any week in the season (i.e., points equal to the most valuable week rather than the average) it would have created a situation where all the owners combined have more points than are available in the system, which is probably an illegal outcome. Giving the owners the average at least would have prevented that outcome. Giving owners less than the average is skimming - which ironically must be legal
What you suggest would have been possible if they did what many, if not all, other developers do with points systems - i.e., require the same number of points to book any week in a season. Then give owners that same number...
You raise an interesting point that was also raised by pipet... many tuggers would be unhappy with even getting the average points required to exchange into their season (which is probably the best we can do given the reseasoning). We are used to calling at exactly 13 or 12 months out, we are persistent, and on average probably manage to book better weeks than the average owners. Many probably wouldn't enroll even if Marriott did give us the average because we'd complain there was "skim" relative to the highest valued week...
However, I think that if Marriott gave owners the average required to trade into their season, they would probably have less of a PR problem on their hand. The discussion would switch to whether or not the reseasoning was fair. While there are arguments for and against, the reseasoning is probably at least more understandable than the skimming, which even now we don't know where all those points go (6%-13% of all the points of people who redeem for points in a given year is a lot of money to follow around).
FWIW, I think that if I got the average of the season I would have probably enrolled as an NCV owner... when you combine getting the average "trading power" of your season for points trades, with the ability to still book any week at your home resort as a week, and do II trades for uptrades it's not such a bad combo. Then getting the average of your season is the cost you pay for the convenience of instant confirmation, but at least you don't feel that Marriott dips its hands in your pockets each time you use points.