Sandy Points Australia Out of RCI Points?

[rnrbaze]

We've recently discovered that Sandy Points Beach Resort in Australia is no longer participating in the RCI Points program. I know they are still in RCI Weeks, II Weeks and a new exchange company called Dial An Exchange, but am really disappointed to lose the flexibility of points to use for plane tickets, car rentals, hotels, etc. As a matter of fact, we bought this resort at the advice of other TUGGERS who had a good experience with using Sandy Points for exchanging purposes with RCI Points. Now, it seems we are out of our favored program with no options other than trading in weeks programs.

So, I guess my questions are: 1) has anybody else been messed up by this change? 2) what experience have you had using Dial An Exchange for trading weeks? 3) what advice do you have to offer as we now consider our options with 2 weeks (what used to be 128,000 RCI Points) at an Australian resort we will never visit?

 

[Carolinian]

DAE (Dial an Exchange) has confirmed weeks for me next summer on the French Riviera and on a UK canalboat. They have also got me summer Mrytle Beach, summer OBX, summer So. Cal., summer Smugglers Notch, Thanksgiving Puerto Rico, and spring Cayman Islands.

For some of the resorts they get, you might want to look at the DAE exchange opportuniies board at www.timeshareforums.com and the Independent Exchange Company sightings board at www.tstips.com

I am very happy with DAE.

A number of the Australian resorts seem to be dumping RCI Points. I believe that there are 8 or 10 that have done so.

As to trading in RCI Weeks, if your resort has floating weeks you should find out if they bulkbank. If they do, then it will hurt your trading power with RCI, although it doesn't impact DAE trades.

 

[caribbean]

Unless something has changed recently, all existing points owners can continue to use it in points. Management of the resort was taken over by a company that also operates it's own exchange company. So they prefer that owners go through them. Obviously for those of us in the US, that has no value. They no longer allow new conversions of weeks to points. But if you are an existing points owner you may continue as such as long as you keep your points account paid up to date. This was the latest information that I have. It has been confirmed by RCI "Ask Madge". I have my points in my account through 2 more years.

 

[SharonD]

I own Sandy Point and have also been able to keep it in RCI Points. Just make sure you renew your RCI points agreement after the 3 years is up.

 

[huestous]

I own at Sandy Point and renewed my RCI Points membership ~6 weeks ago. As previously stated, if you are currently enrolled, you can continue with RCI Points. But unfortunately, Sandy Point is not allowing new conversions.

 

[timeos2]

Resort did not drop RCI Points management did You are still "IN"

A number of the Australian resorts seem to be dumping RCI Points. I believe that there are 8 or 10 that have done so.

As to trading in RCI Weeks, if your resort has floating weeks you should find out if they bulkbank. If they do, then it will hurt your trading power with RCI, although it doesn't impact DAE trades.

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain! Steve makes it seem like the resort decided to drop RCI Points. That statement has been made in other posts as well. The truth is the resort was sold to the company that runs one of the exchange companies that competes with RCI so, as you would expect, they aren't pushing RCI products. But they also can't force you to drop RCI Points any more than they could have forced you to join. It is your call not theirs.

As stated above once you belong to an exchange system through a resort you cannot be forced out by that resort. So if you were an RCI Weeks member you still could be - same for RCI Points. Once you are in you are in unless you decide to drop your membership.

 

[Carolinian]

John, The management company does not own either of the Australian independent exchange companies, Interchange or DAE, and while it has a management contract, I am not certain that it ''owns'' the resort, either!

When RCI Points first went into Australia, they did a hard sell on all of the resorts. The majority of them decided against RCI Points at that time. Now some others that had gone to RCI Points have also broken away. Many of those are managed by the same management company as this resort, which is one of the leading management companies in Australia, but I'm not so sure that all of them are.

Pay no attention to that man behind the curtain! Steve makes it seem like the resort decided to drop RCI Points. That statement has been made in other posts as well. The truth is the resort was sold to the company that runs one of the exchange companies that competes with RCI so, as you would expect, they aren't pushing RCI products. But they also can't force you to drop RCI Points any more than they could have forced you to join. It is your call not theirs.

As stated above once you belong to an exchange system through a resort you cannot be forced out by that resort. So if you were an RCI Weeks member you still could be - same for RCI Points. Once you are in you are in unless you decide to drop your membership.

 

[e.bram]

The way I see it, RCI points is a situation where RCI leases your weeks unit and subleases you someone else's unit which they have leased from them. All RCI points does is indicate the relative value of your leased unit as compared to the rest of the units it has leased from others. A HOA or other managment can't tell you not to lease your unit for RCI points. All they can do(legally) is not promote it. Anything else that inteferes with tour leasing of your unit would by tortuous interference with a contract(ie your lease to RCI, which you have a right to do in a fee simple unit as permitted by the MASTER DEED).
This does that I personally would lease my unit to RCI, I would not.

 

[EdB]

The exchange system in question is called Classic Holiday.

Details about Sandy Point are at this link:

http://www.classicholidayclub.com.au/sp_intro.htm

Details of the exchange program are here:

http://www.classicholidayclub.com.au/ep_intro.htm

I strongly suggest that anyone interested in this subject listen to owners of the resort in question and those who have researched the issue and discount the opinions of those who are ignorant of the actual facts in this system.

 

[rnrbaze]

As the original poster of this thread, let me tell you more completely my recent experience (as of about 2 weeks ago). We called RCI to purcharse plane tickets for our trip to Arizona this March and were short only 10,000 points from this years usage to complete the deal. I ask the RCI rep to borrow from my next year's points to make up the difference and his reply was that I did not have any 06-07 points in my account. Upon a little research on his part, he stated that I needed to at least agree to re-up my points membership for another three years (said I did not have to pay for it until when my membership actually expired) and then I would have 128,000 points available to borrow from next year. Immediately I agreed to renew and was promised that when I tried again to purchase plane tickets the next year's points would show on my account. They did not. Called RCI again to inquire further and then was told that the problem was that Sandy Points Resort had decided disassociate from the RCI Points Program and that my only option was to wait for RCI to contact Sandy Points and to call back in a week or so for further information. In the mean time, I send emails to Classic Holidays asking them to provide an official response and was told that the Sandy Points was engaged in a trial period with RCI Points at the time we bought in and since have decided not to remain in the program and that my options were at this time to exchange in RCI Weeks, II Weeks or DAE Weeks. As of my last call to RCI I was told that they had not heard back from Sandy Points and could not deposit any more points in my account at this time.

 

[Carolinian]

Thanks for the link to Exchange and Play, Ed.

I think everyone can see now that management has its own mini-system (like some Tuggers seem to really like) rather than owning one of the exchange companies.

The exchange system in question is called Classic Holiday.

Details about Sandy Point are at this link:

http://www.classicholidayclub.com.au/sp_intro.htm

Details of the exchange program are here:

http://www.classicholidayclub.com.au/ep_intro.htm

I strongly suggest that anyone interested in this subject listen to owners of the resort in question and those who have researched the issue and discount the opinions of those who are ignorant of the actual facts in this system.

 

[BocaBum99]

Thanks for the link to Exchange and Play, Ed.

I think everyone can see now that management has its own mini-system (like some Tuggers seem to really like) rather than owning one of the exchange companies.

Yep I believe this is a key trend for timesharing. Who wants to pay exchange fees when you can reserve weeks in your own system for free? And, if you are at the right ownership level in the system, they can even waive housekeeping fees for premium members.

This type of resort group / mini-system will have lots of exchange power with the exchange companies so that they can preserve prime weeks for owners and yet still achieve top trading power. Who wouldn't want that?

 

[timeos2]

Mini are too mini in many cases

Yep I believe this is a key trend for timesharing. Who wants to pay exchange fees when you can reserve weeks in your own system for free? And, if you are at the right ownership level in the system, they can even waive housekeeping fees for premium members.

This type of resort group / mini-system will have lots of exchange power with the exchange companies so that they can preserve prime weeks for owners and yet still achieve top trading power. Who wouldn't want that?

IF the system is high end enough and/or has enough resorts in enough places that can be a great deal. But I don't see much value to mini-systems with 3-10 resorts, often clustered in one or two areas, unless you want to use them as one "home resort" that happens to have multiple buildings. It is the mini-systems with 40+ resorts or one that can take in almost any resort and give it a point value that really offer choices. RCI Points comes close but you do have the added exchange fees and RCI as a group appears to be bent on adding and increasing fees to the breaking point. The closest to ideal I've seen so far are the big mini-sytems such as FF, WM, Sunterra and the like. Even DVC is too small to offer great value for general use but does satisfy a niche market very well.

Long term I don't think the small mini-systems can compete and will have to consolidate to survive. The money paid to join them will be at risk as that occurs (ask the former Equivest owners) as the "new" group will be looking to be paid yet again.

 

[EdB]

Thanks for the link to Exchange and Play, Ed.

I think everyone can see now that management has its own mini-system (like some Tuggers seem to really like) rather than owning one of the exchange companies.

You're welcome.

And yes, your conclusion is absolutely correct.

 

[Bucky]

I strongly suggest that anyone interested in this subject listen to owners of the resort in question and those who have researched the issue and discount the opinions of those who are ignorant of the actual facts in this system.

Well said Ed. There are those on these boards that would rather eloquently try to convince everyone that they know all about the points system when in fact they know squat.

Now on to rnrbaze problem. I'm an owner at Sandy Point and had this exact same problem two months ago. The only difference is that I talked with a VC that knew how to handle the problem. You have to renew your points account. In order to do this the Australian RCI office has to send you the necessary form. They wouldn't email it to me but I had it in the mail in about 10 days. Once I completed and mailed back the form my next years points were credited to my account. Took about another two weeks. Sandy Point doesn't have anything to do with it. It's strictly RCI Australia and their paperwork.

Contact a VC and ask them to contact RCI Australia and have them mail you the necessary form.

 

[rnrbaze]

And now..... the rest of the story!

At Patty's advice I emailed the RCI Pacific/Australia's office and requested a RCI Membership Renewal form. Got a reply in about 3 day's with the current 2006 form attached to the email. We signed the form and faxed it back, and just this afternoon got a email notification that our membership had been renewed for 3 years and the points had been allocated. Checked my RCI Points account and abbra cadabra, there they were!

So, the key here for those of you who are in similar situations is to forget about asking the home resort as well as RCI-USA. Deal with the RCI Pacific office and save yourself the headache we went through.

Thanks Patty!

 

[caribbean]

Would you mind e-mailing me the new form since I wil be needing to re-up again in the near future.

Thanks,

 

[lorribarnes]

PLEASE email me the form also. thanks. lorri.barnes@cox.net

 

[huestous]

The contract that some are seeking can be obtained from Cara Dockerty, the
Enrollment Assistant Coordinator of RCI Pacific Pty Ltd (ABN 46 084 640 933)

E-mail: cara.dockerty@rciap.com

Web: www.rciap.com

 

[catcher77]

I own at Sandy Point Beach Resort and thinking about using my week thru II. Does anyone have experience with how this resort trades (trading power) within the II system? I own a floating week, what is a good week to reserve and deposit? Any other information would greatly be appreciated.

Thanks
Donnie