Question: "I have a fixed week that was converted to points before we acquired the week. If we plan to use the fixed week do we have to maintain the RCI account or can we simply pay the RCI membership fee those years we plan to deposit the points associated with the week?"
You seem to be very confused about your options. I'll explain what I believe to be the current rules. Others, more experienced than I, will undoubtedly chime in.
If you wish to use your "underlying" fixed week in a given year, you need to call the RCI Points desk 13 months in advance of the check-in date and tell them you want to use the unit instead of receiving RCI Points that year. Find out from RCI the exact date by which your notice is due. Or, if you register to do your own on-line searches and transactions at the RCI web site (highly recommended), the date will be listed in the "My account" section.
Since it seems that you are already an RCI Points member, you are expected to remain in the program for 3 years and must pay the annual fee or you will not be able to reserve a week nor receive Points.
At the end of your 3 year Points membership period, you can either remain in the Points program by renewing your membership, or you can drop out of the program altogether. However, if you don't re-up, your RCI Points membership will cease to exist. You will revert to owning just the "underlying fixed week". It would probably cost you big $$$ to re-convert the week back to RCI Points.
If you revert to owning the fixed week, you could use it every year, or rent it out, or gift it to someone, or let it sit empty and go to waste, or exchange it with a private party. You would have nothing to do with RCI.
But if you revert to fixed week ownership, and wish to do any exchanges, you would have to join the RCI "weeks" program (which generally has higher annual and exchange fees than the RCI Points program), or you could join Interval International if your resort is affiliated with it. Or you can use one of the alternate exchange companies such as Platinum Interchange, SFX, Dial-an-Exchange etc...
You need to take the time to learn and understand your options before deciding to drop out of RCI Points. Once you're out, you're out forever. And the price of re-admission can be exorbitant (thousands of dollars, usually).
That said, we did remove one of our converted weeks from the RCI Points program because we are certain we want to use the fixed week every year, or rent it out, or allow a family member (not on the deed) to use it. We did not want to have to pay RCI a "guest certificate" fee which we consider to be a "rip-off". We bought the week (already converted by the prior owner) at a great low price on Ebay so it came to us already converted.
But in most cases it does not make sense to drop out of RCI Points, once you are a member.
