SVV Mandatory Resales - now considered unauthorized - Westin Flex as well?

[tschwa2]

My understanding is unless they do away with VSN which they specifically have said that as of now there is no plans to do so, then mandatory VOI's have to be a part of VSN even upon unauthorized resale.

 

[dioxide45]

My understanding is unless they do away with VSN which they specifically have said that as of now there is no plans to do so, then mandatory VOI's have to be a part of VSN even upon unauthorized resale.

I don't even think they can do away with VSN at this point. VSN is the underlying tie between Vistana VIOs and Abound. The ability for Vistana VOIs to be able to elect Club Points is through an affiliation agreement between VSN and Abound.

 

[grrrah]

I asked a second chat agent:

(3/27/2023, 2:46:27 PM): Hi I am buying a Sheraton Vistana Villages Bella phase from a current owner.
Will I have use at other Sheraton properties?
Silvina (3/27/2023, 2:47:33 PM): When you purchase externally you will be able to use the property that you are purchasing only.

yup, again technically correct, even before Abound was a thing. Your SVV Bella phase week is good for SVV, so the agent is not lying.

You would need to join VSN membership and exchange your week for Staroptions to use at other resorts (this is a seamless process when you are a member, but how it works). By contract language, it is "Mandatory" that the Bella and Key West phases be eligible for the VSN network.

as Dioxide mentioned, I would ask if the week would still be eligible for VSN membership. And as mentioned, they may get that wrong, or have a way of saying something deceiving and getting away with it. It should be in the estopple during the purchase transaction if you are worried.

 

[The Colorado Kid]

yup, again technically correct, even before Abound was a thing. Your SVV Bella phase week is good for SVV, so the agent is not lying.

You would need to join VSN membership and exchange your week for Staroptions to use at other resorts (this is a seamless process when you are a member, but how it works). By contract language, it is "Mandatory" that the Bella and Key West phases be eligible for the VSN network.

as Dioxide mentioned, I would ask if the week would still be eligible for VSN membership. And as mentioned, they may get that wrong, or have a way of saying something deceiving and getting away with it. It should be in the estopple during the purchase transaction if you are worried.

@grrrah Great idea I will be sure to ask for the estoppel up front!

 

[baluders]

Hello, is there any follow-on to this discussion? I'm considering buying SVV or Kierland for StarOptions exchange to other resorts, but if they have eliminated the VSN mandatory designation somehow (can they? if this is in a deed?), then those weeks become much less interesting.

This is the first thread I have seen where Marriott seems to be saying that sales of Mandatory resort weeks no longer have VSN or StarOptions.

 

[WatsonC2]

Hello, is there any follow-on to this discussion? I'm considering buying SVV or Kierland for StarOptions exchange to other resorts, but if they have eliminated the VSN mandatory designation somehow (can they? if this is in a deed?), then those weeks become much less interesting.

This is the first thread I have seen where Marriott seems to be saying that sales of Mandatory resort weeks no longer have VSN or StarOptions.

Mandatory resorts have VSN in their deed and that can't be removed. You couldn't buy one resale and do Abound but you could use star options to book other VSN resorts. Never believe anything from sales.

 

[Naniac]

I closed on a WKV resale in December and when it was finally transferred into my existing Vistana account the VSN flag indicated NO with 0 StarOptions but that changed within a day or two and that ownership now shows as VSN = YES. No club points/not eligible for Abound since it was past the August 2022 date, but I didn’t expect to be Abound-eligible.

I would assume the same for all of the mandatory resorts/phases (at least for now).

 

[PhilaMom]

Hi - Is there any follow up on this? We’re strongly considering purchasing an SVV Bella or Key West primarily to trade within VSN at 8 months. Thanks!

 

[celica7101]

Hi - Is there any follow up on this? We’re strongly considering purchasing an SVV Bella or Key West primarily to trade within VSN at 8 months. Thanks!

What follow up are you looking for? Everything in the thread confirms what is written into the deeds at mandatory resorts: that VSN participation is a function/obligation of the deed and should be updated after Vistana transfers ownership in their system.

 

[tschwa2]

My only follow up question would be are they allowing new mandatory resales in Abound? If not are they charging Abound fee or a lower Visatana fee for the non enrolled mandatory Vistana? If not are they putting non enrolled Vistana into the same II account or seperateing those out? Are they allowing non enrolled Vistana points to be in the same account with enrolled Vistana points. Has anyone that is eligible to enroll retail vistana voluntary resort or madatory resale bought before x date, opted out of Abound and what is that like- same questions about fees and co-mingling of any non enrolled units/points.

 

[timsi]

The only thing that may make it hard to combine with your Flex is that Vistana isn't necessarily combining accounts. So it might make things messy.

Is there a basis for them not combining VSN accounts? Say you have 2 mandatory resorts pre 08/09 and you buy another one now, they should all be part for the same account. @CPNY did they combine the accounts eventually? I think I remember you bought a post 08/09 mandatory.

 

[iowaguy09]

Is there a basis for them not combining VSN accounts? Say you have 2 mandatory resorts pre 08/09 and you buy another one now, they should all be part for the same account. @CPNY did they combine the accounts eventually? I think I remember you bought a post 08/09 mandatory.

I have posted this before elsewhere in other threads. We own Westin Flex and Sheraton Flex, both developer purchases, and both purchased prior to August 2022. We could see both ownerships in our account before the updated Vistana dashboard was rolled out. After the rollout, we could only see the Westin Flex VOI information. We had to create a second, new Vistana login in order to see and access the Sheraton Flex VOI information. During an owner update at Nanea in early February 2023 the rep we were with said this multiple login issue is a major complaint they hear from other owners. His explanation was that MVW is treating the ownerships as 5 separate entities: MVC, SVC, WVC, GRM (Grand Residences by Marriott), and R-CC (The Ritz-Carlton Club). He said there is no plan to be able to merge these under one ownership access portal. When any of these ownerships are converted into club points, then you can see the converted club points in Abound. On a webpage he went to that is the currency converter to Abound, was a drop-down that required you to pick from one of the 5 ownership types above. I’m not sure if that calculator is accessible by any of us owners as I have not found it on my own.

When we converted both VOI’s to Abound club points in late February, we could see both ownerships at their converted club point values listed separately on the Vistana/Abound/MVC portal (e.g. the stripped down MVC website that we Vistana owners get sent to when we select to use our club points from the Vistana Dashboard).

This explanation still makes no real sense to me, but I am relaying what we were told.

 

[The Colorado Kid]

I have posted this before elsewhere in other threads. We own Westin Flex and Sheraton Flex, both developer purchases, and both purchased prior to August 2022. We could see both ownerships in our account before the updated Vistana dashboard was rolled out. After the rollout, we could only see the Westin Flex VOI information. We had to create a second, new Vistana login in order to see and access the Sheraton Flex VOI information. During an owner update at Nanea in early February 2023 the rep we were with said this multiple login issue is a major complaint they hear from other owners. His explanation was that MVW is treating the ownerships as 5 separate entities: MVC, SVC, WVC, GRM (Grand Residences by Marriott), and R-CC (The Ritz-Carlton Club). He said there is no plan to be able to merge these under one ownership access portal. When any of these ownerships are converted into club points, then you can see the converted club points in Abound. On a webpage he went to that is the currency converter to Abound, was a drop-down that required you to pick from one of the 5 ownership types above. I’m not sure if that calculator is accessible by any of us owners as I have not found it on my own.

When we converted both VOI’s to Abound club points in late February, we could see both ownerships at their converted club point values listed separately on the Vistana/Abound/MVC portal (e.g. the stripped down MVC website that we Vistana owners get sent to when we select to use our club points from the Vistana Dashboard).

This explanation still makes no real sense to me, but I am relaying what we were told.

@iowaguy09 great post and re-post thanks! Would you mind keeping us up to date on if you see any changes?

 

[iowaguy09]

@iowaguy09 great post and re-post thanks! Would you mind keeping us up to date on if you see any changes?

Absolutely! In fact, I just checked again last week, and no change.

 

[CPNY]

Is there a basis for them not combining VSN accounts? Say you have 2 mandatory resorts pre 08/09 and you buy another one now, they should all be part for the same account. @CPNY did they combine the accounts eventually? I think I remember you bought a post 08/09 mandatory.

They did combine the accounts so I can see them all together but it took a fight to get it done

 

[rcv82]

I have posted this before elsewhere in other threads. We own Westin Flex and Sheraton Flex, both developer purchases, and both purchased prior to August 2022. We could see both ownerships in our account before the updated Vistana dashboard was rolled out. After the rollout, we could only see the Westin Flex VOI information. We had to create a second, new Vistana login in order to see and access the Sheraton Flex VOI information. During an owner update at Nanea in early February 2023 the rep we were with said this multiple login issue is a major complaint they hear from other owners. His explanation was that MVW is treating the ownerships as 5 separate entities: MVC, SVC, WVC, GRM (Grand Residences by Marriott), and R-CC (The Ritz-Carlton Club). He said there is no plan to be able to merge these under one ownership access portal. When any of these ownerships are converted into club points, then you can see the converted club points in Abound. On a webpage he went to that is the currency converter to Abound, was a drop-down that required you to pick from one of the 5 ownership types above. I’m not sure if that calculator is accessible by any of us owners as I have not found it on my own.

When we converted both VOI’s to Abound club points in late February, we could see both ownerships at their converted club point values listed separately on the Vistana/Abound/MVC portal (e.g. the stripped down MVC website that we Vistana owners get sent to when we select to use our club points from the Vistana Dashboard).

This explanation still makes no real sense to me, but I am relaying what we were told.

While no don’t doubt the explanation they gave you, it doesn’t make sense and is not something they are doing across the board. I own WKORV, SMV, and Westin Flex, and they are all in one account working fine. I did originally have to get some support to get them combined just after purchase, but that’s been years ago at this point and no issue since.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[robertk2012]

They did combine the accounts so I can see them all together but it took a fight to get it done

So no additional fees?

 

[sponger76]

I own WKORV, SMV, and Westin Flex, and they are all in one account working fine. I did originally have to get some support to get them combined just after purchase, but that’s been years ago at this point and no issue since.

It's a new phenomenon since the Abound rollout. While for the most part VOIs that were already combined under a single membership have been untouched, they are now stating with some regularity that they can no longer merge 'new' resale purchases into pre-existing memberships, necessitating a separate VSN login account for each additional resale acquisition. I had to call/email numerous times to finally get them last month to combine two recent (post-August 2022) resale acquisitions into my original retail login. But now that they did, it broke my ability to book online via VSN. I can search, but it now gives me an error that I have to call to complete bookings due to having multiple memberships. I've now been calling/emailing about this issue for a month and it still isn't fixed. This is in addition to the fact that I haven't been able to search in Abound since early January (it worked when it first rolled out) and nobody knows how to fix it other than to 'escalate to IT' which of course has produced nothing so far.

 

[dioxide45]

It's a new phenomenon since the Abound rollout. While for the most part VOIs that were already combined under a single membership have been untouched, they are now stating with some regularity that they can no longer merge 'new' resale purchases into pre-existing memberships, necessitating a separate VSN login account for each additional resale acquisition. I had to call/email numerous times to finally get them last month to combine two recent (post-August 2022) resale acquisitions into my original retail login. But now that they did, it broke my ability to book online via VSN. I can search, but it now gives me an error that I have to call to complete bookings due to having multiple memberships. I've now been calling/emailing about this issue for a month and it still isn't fixed. This is in addition to the fact that I haven't been able to search in Abound since early January (it worked when it first rolled out) and nobody knows how to fix it other than to 'escalate to IT' which of course has produced nothing so far.

In the past, this issue was caused by either a new or the previous owners VSN member number being on the newly added VOIs. We had this happen on every newly added VOI (pre merger). I could see it online, but it had that error message about "multiple memberships". Also in the past we had a different number you could call to get it fixed. Unfortunately I don't know an easy way now.

 

[timsi]

It's a new phenomenon since the Abound rollout. While for the most part VOIs that were already combined under a single membership have been untouched, they are now stating with some regularity that they can no longer merge 'new' resale purchases into pre-existing memberships, necessitating a separate VSN login account for each additional resale acquisition. I had to call/email numerous times to finally get them last month to combine two recent (post-August 2022) resale acquisitions into my original retail login. But now that they did, it broke my ability to book online via VSN. I can search, but it now gives me an error that I have to call to complete bookings due to having multiple memberships. I've now been calling/emailing about this issue for a month and it still isn't fixed. This is in addition to the fact that I haven't been able to search in Abound since early January (it worked when it first rolled out) and nobody knows how to fix it other than to 'escalate to IT' which of course has produced nothing so far.

Yet they claimed publicly that nothing changed for those that want to continue to use VSN as in the past. In fact so many things have changed!