"Important News About Your Payment Options"

[Hindsite]

How does everyone else look at the value now that there is this fee? I'd love your breakdown too!

It should balance out as all my weeks have a line in the budget for credit card fees, on which MVC then charge their management fee. I'm expecting the net cost to be stable or lower than previous.

 

[dioxide45]

It should balance out as all my weeks have a line in the budget for credit card fees, on which MVC then charge their management fee. I'm expecting the net cost to be stable or lower than previous.

I don't know that this new fee for Flex owners impacts the line item on the individual resort budgets. The fees paid by the flex trust don't contribute to that fee at all. When Flex owners pay their maintenance fee, Marriott Vacations collects all that and sends it on to the individual resorts HOAs. I doubt the Flex trust owner association pays by credit card. That budgeted line item is from weeks owners who pay their fees by credit card and who, so far, don't appear to be subject to the new 3% credit card fee.

 

[cubigbird]

Probably. I am just curious if Westin Aventuras actually got the same email. As an Aventuras owner, did you receive it?

I have not received any email about this as an Aventuras owner.

 

[Hindsite]

I don't know that this new fee for Flex owners impacts the line item on the individual resort budgets. The fees paid by the flex trust don't contribute to that fee at all. When Flex owners pay their maintenance fee, Marriott Vacations collects all that and sends it on to the individual resorts HOAs. I doubt the Flex trust owner association pays by credit card. That budgeted line item is from weeks owners who pay their fees by credit card and who, so far, don't appear to be subject to the new 3% credit card fee.

Somewhere along the way, all the costs incurred by Vistana/MVC in the operation of the resorts and points systems get paid for by owners. If there was a cc fee paid by whoever received the payment historically, that will have found its way back to the people paying the fees. It may be a lot less transparent with Flex and Club points than it is for resort weeks owners, but if its a cost relating to the ownership it won't have been paid for my MVW shareholders.

 

[5finny]

Just prepaid some Vistana fees with a Chase Saphire Reserve Credit Card

Did not seem to charge the 3% fee
I could cetainly see something pop up later though

 

[dioxide45]

Somewhere along the way, all the costs incurred by Vistana/MVC in the operation of the resorts and points systems get paid for by owners. If there was a cc fee paid by whoever received the payment historically, that will have found its way back to the people paying the fees. It may be a lot less transparent with Flex and Club points than it is for resort weeks owners, but if its a cost relating to the ownership it won't have been paid for my MVW shareholders.

I don't know what the Flex budgets look like. I don't know if they break out the credit card processing fees as a line item, but the merchant fees would have been paid for by the Flex owners as part of their maintenance fees. I wouldn't expect merchant fees paid by the trust to appear on individual resort HOA budgets.

If the Flex budgets have a line item for credit card fees, that should go away and slightly off set the new fees being charged directly to owners who pay by credit card. The thing is, the fees spread across all owners would be less than the 3% fee applied only to owners who pay by credit card as right now all owners are paying credit card processing fees even if they don't pay by credit card.

 

[Negma]

I am excited that since these fees were in the budget we should see a reduction.....OH WAIT!! Never happen
I would be curious to what percentage of owners paid this way, We did. They could have told us how much this was each year, did anyone see it itemized in the budget?

 

[cubigbird]

I don't know what the Flex budgets look like. I don't know if they break out the credit card processing fees as a line item, but the merchant fees would have been paid for by the Flex owners as part of their maintenance fees. I wouldn't expect merchant fees paid by the trust to appear on individual resort HOA budgets.

If the Flex budgets have a line item for credit card fees, that should go away and slightly off set the new fees being charged directly to owners who pay by credit card. The thing is, the fees spread across all owners would be less than the 3% fee applied only to owners who pay by credit card as right now all owners are paying credit card processing fees even if they don't pay by credit card.

FWIW, I went online to look up past Aventuras annual maintenance fee statements, as they typically included the budgets and they have since all been taken down, so there’s now way to tell and I don’t keep printed past budgets.

 

[jp10558]

I've mentioned this before on this forum, but I find this argument, at least for small businesses, somewhat crazy. I've recently started a small business, and I'll tell you, unless I was going to just NOT CLAIM cash transactions for sales tax and income tax, they have real costs too that are just hidden. Checks are worse - just wait till you deal with fraudulent checks or checks bouncing. I guess the $25 or whatever returned check fee is less than 3% on these larger transactions but you're also out the money too. You also end up out the product. It's like they've forgotten why people went to cards in the first place, and not all the benefit was to the consumer. Holding cash is a PITA and a risk, you're both going to the bank more often, more attractive to robbers or muggers (what can they do with already processed card transactions and a Square reader?) and you've got to worry about counterfeit bills as well. One of the reasons all our stuff is set at flat dollar amounts and often rounded to the nearest $5 is to save on amounts and types of cash we have to replenish or redeposit at the bank. Which is a special trip for us as well, and takes about an hour to go there, deposit, and come right back. Oh, and I need to keep manual records of cash coming in too.

Online as a consumer though, I really have 0 interest in giving more places my ACH details - that's a huge risk to me that credit cards don't have - if my number is stolen or misused I have protections with my card. Now with mail issues, I don't like to send a check through the mail either, except via bill pay that generates a different account number etc. But somehow I've found places that have trouble managing the bill pay checks they get, and I don't have any positive "this was paid" either. Are they mailing back to me a receipt? If they do - and I've had businesses do this, that isn't free either - paper, envelope, a $0.70 stamp and time putting in the outgoing mail or post office. And what about the labor to open my check and then cash it. And track all of that.

I could go on and on, but I super hate the drip pricing mentality to everyone now - if I could, I'd avoid those locations. The problem is "everyone is doing it" now so it can become an issue. It's also not disclosed in a way that is reasonable for me to skip a place - often they "disclose" it at the checkout counter. If it was posted like the Gas station prices I'd keep driving. And they know that, so I think the law should be updated to mandate you disclose this with a large, visible from the road, or on initial website load so people who care can keep on driving/clicking for a place that doesn't do it.

 

[wannagotoo]

So if you prepay with the Marriott card, when the fees are generated for the coming year, can't they just add on 3% regardless of what was prepaid?

 

[YYJMSP]

If the various points trusts own the underlying weeks, wouldn't we expect the credit card charge at the underlying property to be much lower than those properties with mostly weeks VOIs, since I assume the points trust does not use a credit card to pay the actual underlying MFs

And that would mean the points trusts would incur the credit card fees when their members pay the fees on their points ownerships, but that doesn't transfer down to the properties

Or are they passing through the credit card fees to the underlying properties?

Too many unknowns on the mechanics of how the left hand deals with the right hand in these internal transactions...

 

[dioxide45]

So if you prepay with the Marriott card, when the fees are generated for the coming year, can't they just add on 3% regardless of what was prepaid?

No. In the future, based on the letter, when you choose to pay by credit card you will be redirected to a third party website to complete the transaction.

Those who choose to pay by credit card will be redirected to a third-party provider’s secure website to complete their transaction

You will pay the 3% fee when you complete the transaction. It isn't added to your bill.

 

[dioxide45]

If the various points trusts own the underlying weeks, wouldn't we expect the credit card charge at the underlying property to be much lower than those properties with mostly weeks VOIs, since I assume the points trust does not use a credit card to pay the actual underlying MFs

And that would mean the points trusts would incur the credit card fees when their members pay the fees on their points ownerships, but that doesn't transfer down to the properties

Or are they passing through the credit card fees to the underlying properties?

Too many unknowns on the mechanics of how the left hand deals with the right hand in these internal transactions...

I take this to be that the trusts are trying to cover the credit card fees when trust owners pay by credit card. Based on a budget provided to me by @kozykritter for 2026, the trust budgeted about $1.6 million in credit card fees in 2026. They stated in a BOD meeting that about 85% of owners pay by credit card.

The trust doesn't pay the individual resort HOAs by credit card, so the HOA credit card line item should go down as more and more deeded weeks are conveyed to the trust. I don't see this as any kind of pass through of resort HOAs credit card fees, just the trust not wanting to pay those fees.

Something in meeting minutes that doesn't make sense is they say the credit card fees are 2.5% of something. I don't know if that is 2.5% of the total budget or something else. My math seems to indicate that the credit card fee expense is about 1.4% of the budget. That means the budget should drop by 1.4% but owners will have to pay 3% when they pay by credit card.

I wonder who this "third party website" is that will be facilitating credit card transactions for Flex maintenance fee payments. Are they keeping some of the 3% fee as profit on top of the merchant fees they pay? How is this really saving owner's money? Or is it just some method to give a third party company a hand in the pot? How is the third party website related in any way to Marriott Vacations or anyone working at Marriott Vacations?

 

[kozykritter]

If you take the 85% of the $110,300,000 in VOI assessments and multiply it by 2.5%, it comes out to be about $500K more than the 1.8 million they listed as the budget for credit card fees. Perhaps the 85% are ones on the lower end of maintenance fees as opposed to those that might have a very large bill and do some kind of bank transfer instead.

 

[dioxide45]

If you take the 85% of the $110,300 in VOI assessments and multiply it by 2.5%, it comes out to be about $500K more than the 1.8 million they listed as the budget for credit card fees. Perhaps the 85% are ones on the lower end of maintenance fees as opposed to those that might have a very large bill and do some kind of bank transfer instead.

Yeah, I can't get to their number of 2.4% (I had it wrong earlier). The total credit card fees are only 1.45%. Really, with a m 85% credit card utilization rate, they should be pushing the other 15% to pay by credit card and save owners money overall vs. letting some third party website in on the deal.

From the meeting minutes of August 2025
Credit Card Expense budget reflects a rate of 2.4% and 85% Owner usage

Talking with AI, it spit out this tidbit.
The Board apparently expects 85% of owners to use a credit card, but those owners collectively account for only about 61% of the assessment dollars.

So, you could be right that owners paying by credit card are owners that have smaller point allocations and thus lower overall fees.

I suppose we should also point out that the credit card fees for the trust won't completely go away as there are some owners where they can't collect the surcharge and also international owners. But perhaps international owners have lower merchant fees anyway due to more government regulations in places like Europe and the UK. Will those international users have to pay the 3% fee too?

 

[wannagotoo]

You have always been directed to a third party site when paying by credit card.

 

[dioxide45]

You have always been directed to a third party site when paying by credit card.

Yes, it seems to go to FreedomPay, will they continue to use the same in the future and only tack on the 3% surcharge, or is a different third party website involved?

 

[YYJMSP]

Yes, it seems to go to FreedomPay, will they continue to use the same in the future and only tack on the 3% surcharge, or is a different third party website involved?

I'm going to bet it's some Marriott related company

A chance to pocket some more monies...

 

[Ken555]

I would be shocked if Marriott did not negotiate a preferred merchant rate on their credit card fees. At least in California, we are now legally able to charge customers for credit card fees (a result of both the antitrust settlement with Visa/Mastercard and a separate First Amendment challenge to California’s own surcharge ban), up to 3% for VISA or 4% for MasterCard but never more than the merchants actual cost. VISA/MCs rules apparently state that merchants may not profit on this fee.

Is the current 1.4% a blend of ACH, debit, and credit cards? If so, then their credit card rate is likely substantially higher though not 3%. Also, that 1.4% has been an association operating expense all along, funded by every owner through the assessment. If it now shifts to those of us paying by card, was the assessment reduced accordingly? If not, we are paying for it twice.

IANAL, but if they currently pay 1.4% and will now be paying 3% that is a deliberate increase in costs, adopted at the moment they start to pass this fee on to consumers. The surcharge may be justified only because the cost was manufactured.

I am curious if MVC hired FreedomPay to process all of their resort charges, as well as maintenance fees. If so, did they receive a preferential rate for those fees due to the volume they brought the company from our MFs? In other words, are they paying the same 3% or less? Note that credit cards at point of purchase typically have a significantly lower merchant rate due to the reduction in fraud anyway, but it would not surprise me if MVC corporate benefits in other ways due to the increased volume processing MFs, which costs them nothing. But then, it's probably been this way for a long time.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[Ken555]

I'm going to bet it's some Marriott related company

A chance to pocket some more monies...

They've had a relationship since 2019, and claim to service 70% of top hotels in North America.

FreedomPay Announces An Agreement With Marriott International For Commerce Technology Innovation - FreedomPay

The award winning FreedomPay Commerce Platform™ has been widely recognized for driving innovation, transformation and growth across a wide range of industries Philadelphia, Pennsylvania November 6, 2019 FreedomPay, an innovative leader in commerce technologies, today announced an agreement with...

corporate.freedompay.com

Hotel and Lodging - FreedomPay

Offer guests a frictionless experience with 24/7 reliability, support, and PCI compliance. Leverage our library of worldwide hospitality partners.

corporate.freedompay.com

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

 

[dioxide45]

They've had a relationship since 2019, and claim to service 70% of top hotels in North America.

FreedomPay Announces An Agreement With Marriott International For Commerce Technology Innovation - FreedomPay

The award winning FreedomPay Commerce Platform™ has been widely recognized for driving innovation, transformation and growth across a wide range of industries Philadelphia, Pennsylvania November 6, 2019 FreedomPay, an innovative leader in commerce technologies, today announced an agreement with...

corporate.freedompay.com

Hotel and Lodging - FreedomPay

Offer guests a frictionless experience with 24/7 reliability, support, and PCI compliance. Leverage our library of worldwide hospitality partners.

corporate.freedompay.com

Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk

I wonder if they will still use FreedomPay in the future. From what I read about FreedomPay, they don't actually add a fee themselves. They are more just a passthrough between the merchant and the payment processor. It would be up to Marriott to include the fee. I am curious what payment system Hyatt Vacation Club uses as Hyatt went to a similar system in 2024 and started adding the credit card surcharge.

 

[Ken555]

I wonder if they will still use FreedomPay in the future. From what I read about FreedomPay, they don't actually add a fee themselves. They are more just a passthrough between the merchant and the payment processor. It would be up to Marriott to include the fee. I am curious what payment system Hyatt Vacation Club uses as Hyatt went to a similar system in 2024 and started adding the credit card surcharge.

It would be up to MVC whether they charge consumers the fee; FreedomPay and other similar merchant providers charge their customers (MVC). As an example, my current business invoicing system now offers me the option to charge customers my direct cost for ACH/Debit/CC processing (I use Stripe) on invoices as an additional fee in order to recoup my cost - I'm not doing that since it's not appropriate (yet) for my business, but others will no doubt do so.

ETA: Once MVC starts, I doubt they would ever reverse this fee. It doesn't matter which merchant provider they use (FreedomPay, Stripe, other) - the processing costs will be paid by someone, and once they start passing on the fees to the consumer, I can't imagine them stopping.

 

[Bird01]

I'm not a lawyer, but ... it seems disproportionately unfair to charge owners different fees (credit card charge) based on which state they live in. Not a good business practice imho.

 

[iowaguy09]

Email received yesterday regarding availability of the "Maintenance Billing Statement". Statement was accessible from the Vistana Dashboard. The included BOD letter confirms the 1.5% fee reduction is due in part to implementation of the 3% credit card fee. Letter and budget are attached.

 

[iowaguy09]

I wanted to see if the 3% fee was in place yet for using a Bonvoy credit card. I went ahead and paid, and no fee was assessed. I will advise if anything changes with regard to this, as the payments only show as "pending" on the Chase website so far. So my advice: "pay early and pay often".