Has anyone attended a sales tour this week?

[pfrank4127]

We are currently at Marriott's Grande Chateau and were contacted by phone and email to set up a time to attend the presentation. We never did, but they have called and left messages at least 4 or 5 times trying this week to get us to attend. We finally told them we just couldn't fit it into our schedule. I don't use Marriott Reward Points and my time is worth more than a $75 gift card. We're not joining.
I just found it very interesting that they would try so hard to get me; a single week Grande Vista Gold owner.(Orlando!)With the new points system, it would take me 3 years of points to get the 3bdrm unit I traded into through II with a 2bdrm gold. Grande Vista is a sneaky good trader, but the points I would receive in the new system do not reflect that in the least.

we rec'd so many calls for a presentation, everyday at least 2 phone messages to attend. Finally did agree when they offered $250 rental credit(we are staying a couple of extra days on a cash reservation). Phone calls have stopped now LOL

 

[GeezerGreg]

Fees associated for additional point purchases

From what I have seen on average converting to points gives you 80% of the points it costs you to stay back at your home resort. I see that this has two impacts:
1) Creates points inventory for Marriott to sell
2) Creates points demand from existing owners needing more points to get vacations they want.

I have three questions:
1) Are there maintenance fees associated with addition points purchased?, and if so do those fees go towards home resort?
2) With points there will be more shorter stays at all resorts resulting in higher housekeeping / front desk costs. Will weeks owners be responsible for those costs?
3) If you convert to points do you still pay your home resort fees?

Thanks for any responses

 

[pfrank4127]

From what I have seen on average converting to points gives you 80% of the points it costs you to stay back at your home resort. I see that this has two impacts:
1) Creates points inventory for Marriott to sell
2) Creates points demand from existing owners needing more points to get vacations they want.

I have three questions:
1) Are there maintenance fees associated with addition points purchased?, and if so do those fees go towards home resort?
2) With points there will be more shorter stays at all resorts resulting in higher housekeeping / front desk costs. Will weeks owners be responsible for those costs?
3) If you convert to points do you still pay your home resort fees?

Thanks for any responses

#1 yes new points purchased will initially have $0.40 maintenance fees associated with them.

#2 there will be increased costs but that is suppossed to be absorbed with the new point owners maintenance fee (and possibly the "skim" depending on who you ask.)

#3 yes if you are a legacy or deeded owner your mintnce fees are what they re bsed on your home resort which could be a ood or bad thing depending on where you own, how many points your week are allocated, and what your current maintenance fees are.

 

[bw3]

sales presentation on HHI

We decided to attend a sales presentation even though we learned most of what we needed from TUG. I may have deflated the sales reps enthusiasm when I told her that $9.20 per point was too high when she asked if we had heard anything about the program. I tried to keep the mood positive by agreeing that the flexibility of adding days to a stay or getting longer stays by trading a 2br for 2 weeks at a 1br was a good thing.

But then we got to the spread between what Marriott grants vs what they require for the same week. I referred to it as a hidden cost per trade. She first tried to defend the difference by saying that nobody would use the points system to trade back into the same resort. Then I mentioned that 650 points difference at St. Thomas and 300 points difference at Grande Ocean would add up to a huge amount for Marriott for all the weeks in the system. She then stated that Mr. Marriott runs a for-profit company. This was the only answer that would have satisfied me since I believe it is the only honest answer. The cost for us to join would be $1,995 since we own so many weeks purchase outside of Marriott. We told her we would consider it and get back to her. She was not pushy at all.

The incentives for points were the one-time amount of 800 if you purchased 1,000 annual (deeded trust) points. There was another 1,000 on-time points for each additional 500 annual points you purchased. We told her that we already have enough points if we joined the program so we did not see the need. She agreed with our perspective.

She also asked what we paid for our outside weeks ( gold Grande Ocean oceanside). We told her the average cost was about $10k for five weeks (range of $7k - $12k). Her facial expression was one of genuine shock. She said Marriott had been selling those weeks for about $25k in recent years. She was very young and I think it was the first time she realized how much "profit" Marriott was making. She was quite well prepared for all the legal questions of deeds and trusts and maintenance fees.

So that was the summary of the presentation. We are still considering joining the plan.

Bob

 

[gblotter]

We are here at Mountainside this week. Received a last-minute phone call today inviting me to attend a 20-minute information session (group setting). It was sparsely attended (perhaps 10 people). The Marriott rep was a long-time veteran of 15+ years.

Technical/computer problems plagued her presentation. I would have been happy to have her PC crash completely because the computer presentation was simplistic to the point of being insulting. I was wishing for more opportunity for real discussion. As a result, I probably got more aggressive with my questioning than I should have.

The Marriott rep admitted several things up front - including the points skimming. Without apology she said the points skimming was the cost for more flexibility. When I challenged her by saying that other points-based timeshare programs do not skim points, she claimed that Marriott would be more financially stable than others as a result of the points skimming. She acknowledged that many answers were not readily available because of the newness of the program, and that the Marriott reps were learning as they go. I give her full credit for honesty at least, but was disappointed by the lack of details and the complete omission of key facts.

She deflected other questions from me because she promised to limit the presentation to 20 minutes.

There was no opportunity to ask about the proxy voting limitations or Marriott's ability to change point requirements at will. I was not able to ask about inventory pools or increased competition for desirable weeks.

The Marriott rep was clearly annoyed by my questions, and she made a fast exit at the end of the presentation. A few owners lingered to speak with me after she left. I offered them instructions on how to access documents at marriottvacationclub.com and invited them to visit tugbbs for more information.

 

[Tony&Perry]

Phuket presentation

Was in Phuket 4 weeks ago (wonderful stay) and went to sales presentation. They told us about the new USA points program and tried to sell us points in it. But it was too complicated to understand since I had not heard about it before.

They explained the ASIAN points system. Besides Phuket you could use these points to trade into SOME USA Marriotts like Hawaii and Vegas. They also included a number of ASIAN hotels which if I remember correctly were NOT all Marriotts. Some were very prestigious and seemed to need quite a small number of points.

This may be a pointer for how the USA points system develops to include other hotels etc at attractive rates.