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Bed Bugs at Marriott's OceanWatch

dioxide45

dioxide45

TUG Review Crew: Expert
TUG Lifetime Member
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Location
NE Florida
Resorts Owned
Marriott Grande Vista
Marriott Harbour Lake
Sheraton Vistana Villages
Club Wyndham CWA
Well, either these people are looking to "get rich quick" or else the management at OceanWatch really mishandled this pretty badly. I tend to lean towards the former as I have to imagine they'd be offered a different unit, a thorough cleaning, and maybe credit to another stay or a refund or something before getting to a lawsuit.

That all said, I've noticed that at Hilton hotels and many timeshares it seems like they don't proactively do any kind of checks of a room anymore - things that I have to imagine you'd notice in a 5 minute walk through (as I noticed them in the ~3 minutes first entering) need me to call and get maintenance. The other 2 minutes would be things like making sure the toilet flushes right and the dishwasher isn't moldy.
 
What I really want to know is why it took them almost a year to file the lawsuit.
 
amycurl said:
What I really want to know is why it took them almost a year to file the lawsuit.
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I didn't catch that detail - my guess is then maybe somehow MVC dicked them around for a while on a promised "refund of points"? Though I still lean more they've decided this is a "get rich quick" scheme...
 
I didn’t comment when I read this post yesterday because I kinda figured it was a scam from some disgruntled people. It appears they rented a room for 2 nights during the busiest week of the year! Those 2 nights probably cost them $1200-1500. Probably took them a year to file because they had to find an ambulance chaser that would take the case on a contingency basis! I belong to the Oceanwatch Facebook group and have not heard a peep about this from anyone. If it had any legs to it it would have been all over that group because people just love to complain about things. Too bad snopes doesn’t check this one out.
 
It wouldn't ever surprise me to hear of bedbugs at any resort because there's always the possibility that previous or incoming guests can bring them in, so I won't automatically opine that this didn't happen. I just hope that if Marriott decides to settle this suit rather than fight it, the people bringing the suit have at least a minimum amount of proof. I hate lawsuits where the primary driver of any mediation or settlement is simply whether it costs more to defend than to settle.
 
SueDonJ said:
I hate lawsuits where the primary driver of any mediation or settlement is simply whether it costs more to defend than to settle.
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MVW has a reputation among those I have spoken to for not only not settling cases where it costs more to defend than is at stake, but actively litigating cases they have no chance of winning up to the point that the opposing party has to spend more to recover what they are legitimately owed than is legitimately owed.

In my opinion, this has been quite effective for MVW on various fronts. I have not studied every litigation involving MVW, but those where I have seen them settle, my personal opinion is that the settlement occurred when their case was weak and after they and the plaintiff had already spent likely more than was at stake in the matter to begin with. This definitely makes anyone contemplating suing them think twice before suing them. As such, whenever I now see a suit actually filed, unless the filing attorney is a complete neophyte, I tend to believe that where there is smoke, there is fire. However, that does not mean that every case filed against MVW has merit by a longshot.
 
rcdcowner557 said:
MVW has a reputation among those I have spoken to for not only not settling cases where it costs more to defend than is at stake, but actively litigating cases they have no chance of winning up to the point that the opposing party has to spend more to recover what they are legitimately owed than is legitimately owed.

In my opinion, this has been quite effective for MVW on various fronts. I have not studied every litigation involving MVW, but those where I have seen them settle, my personal opinion is that the settlement occurred when their case was weak and after they and the plaintiff had already spent likely more than was at stake in the matter to begin with. This definitely makes anyone contemplating suing them think twice before suing them. As such, whenever I now see a suit actually filed, unless the filing attorney is a complete neophyte, I tend to believe that where there is smoke, there is fire. However, that does not mean that every case filed against MVW has merit by a longshot.
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It's not just Marriott who settles instead of defending because of cost; every insurance company does it. I understand why, but that doesn't mean I like it when it results in people being rewarded for bad behavior.
 
SueDonJ said:
It's not just Marriott who settles instead of defending because of cost; every insurance company does it. I understand why, but that doesn't mean I like it when it results in people being rewarded for bad behavior.
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My point was that Marriott has a reputation of not settling in spite of cost.

FWIW, the press blurb on this lawsuit that is at issue in this thread makes the lawsuit sound preposterous. I don't care enough to look up the actual complaint, but again, the linked blurb does not inspire sympathy for the plaintiffs from this reader (who knows nothing about the situation and is admittedly basing his entire opinion on that little blurb, which means my opinion has no solid foundation).
 
SueDonJ said:
It's not just Marriott who settles instead of defending because of cost; every insurance company does it. I understand why, but that doesn't mean I like it when it results in people being rewarded for bad behavior.
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Some insurance companies tried to defend every meritless claim a decade or so ago. They took a bath.
 
We had an incident at MOW. Once reported, we were happy with the way the resort handled it.
 
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