Guitarmom
Guest
Thought I'd pop in and let you know about my recent Owner's Update at The Welk in Escondido (San Diego County).
For once, we had a very nice sales person; we'll call her Sally. She really didn't hard sell us at all, for which we were grateful. She sat and talked with us for over an hour without even knowing how many Platinum Points we own. Now how can you sell effectively when you don't know who your customer is?
Here's how that first hour went:
Sally explained the new structure for the old Welk group. Marriott Vacations Worldwide is an umbrella corporations with many mini umbrellas underneath: Royal Caribbean, St. Regis, etc.
One of these mini umbrellas is the Hyatt Residency Club.
One of the mini-mini umbrellas under HRC is the Hyatt Vacation Club.
Welk is now under the Hyatt Vacation Club umbrella.
Within each club, there are "Original" level properties and there are "Luxury" level properties.
Originals within Welk are San Diego, Palm Springs, and Branson.
Luxury properties within Welk are Cabo, North Star and the Four Season properties.
All of Welk is really classed as "White Label" or lower scale properties.
Coming in January 2023, Hyatt Hotels will be available to Hyatt Vacation Club owners. And we will want more points for that. Remember, Sally had still not asked what level of membership we are!
We explained that since we are caring for an elderly mother, we are not traveling at all. We had to stress over and over that we are not traveling AT ALL. Sally seemed to translate this into "only traveling on the weekends." So we'd need more points to be able to use those Hyatt Hotels beginning next January.
Around the end of the first hour, we told Sally that we are Priority IV Platinum owners. She went back to the office area to look at our account. When she returned, she was pleased to tell us that we had an old offer pending from two visits before (when we'd actually upgraded, so how could there be a pending offer?). She spent a bit of time explaining how much better Priority III would be (ooh, one extra month of booking time), and then went to get that pending offer.
Here it is. To upgrade from our current 780,000 Platinum Points:
$27,405 to go to 960,000 points (still Priority IV)
$34,104 to go to 1,020,000 points (Priority III)
$53,592 to go to 1,260,000 points (also Priority III).
When we said that we're very comfortable at our current level, she switched tactics and started asking how we can possibly split our membership amongst our heirs. Rather morbid, eh? I didn't want to say, "I'll sell our points resale before we die." There was no one around us that could have benefitted from hearing that, so why stir up a hornet's nest? By now we were standing up, so the end was in sight. We collected our $150 Visa card and said good-bye.
So, really no new news. Another example of being promised all sorts of new information and finding out it's just another sales pitch. I'm grateful for the $150. If you're wondering whether you'll learn anything at a current Owner's Update, you won't. It's up to you to decide if $150 is worth your time.
And I'm left with one burning question that I forgot to ask: Do we still have an II membership, and how do we access it?
For once, we had a very nice sales person; we'll call her Sally. She really didn't hard sell us at all, for which we were grateful. She sat and talked with us for over an hour without even knowing how many Platinum Points we own. Now how can you sell effectively when you don't know who your customer is?
Here's how that first hour went:
Sally explained the new structure for the old Welk group. Marriott Vacations Worldwide is an umbrella corporations with many mini umbrellas underneath: Royal Caribbean, St. Regis, etc.
One of these mini umbrellas is the Hyatt Residency Club.
One of the mini-mini umbrellas under HRC is the Hyatt Vacation Club.
Welk is now under the Hyatt Vacation Club umbrella.
Within each club, there are "Original" level properties and there are "Luxury" level properties.
Originals within Welk are San Diego, Palm Springs, and Branson.
Luxury properties within Welk are Cabo, North Star and the Four Season properties.
All of Welk is really classed as "White Label" or lower scale properties.
Coming in January 2023, Hyatt Hotels will be available to Hyatt Vacation Club owners. And we will want more points for that. Remember, Sally had still not asked what level of membership we are!
We explained that since we are caring for an elderly mother, we are not traveling at all. We had to stress over and over that we are not traveling AT ALL. Sally seemed to translate this into "only traveling on the weekends." So we'd need more points to be able to use those Hyatt Hotels beginning next January.
Around the end of the first hour, we told Sally that we are Priority IV Platinum owners. She went back to the office area to look at our account. When she returned, she was pleased to tell us that we had an old offer pending from two visits before (when we'd actually upgraded, so how could there be a pending offer?). She spent a bit of time explaining how much better Priority III would be (ooh, one extra month of booking time), and then went to get that pending offer.
Here it is. To upgrade from our current 780,000 Platinum Points:
$27,405 to go to 960,000 points (still Priority IV)
$34,104 to go to 1,020,000 points (Priority III)
$53,592 to go to 1,260,000 points (also Priority III).
When we said that we're very comfortable at our current level, she switched tactics and started asking how we can possibly split our membership amongst our heirs. Rather morbid, eh? I didn't want to say, "I'll sell our points resale before we die." There was no one around us that could have benefitted from hearing that, so why stir up a hornet's nest? By now we were standing up, so the end was in sight. We collected our $150 Visa card and said good-bye.
So, really no new news. Another example of being promised all sorts of new information and finding out it's just another sales pitch. I'm grateful for the $150. If you're wondering whether you'll learn anything at a current Owner's Update, you won't. It's up to you to decide if $150 is worth your time.
And I'm left with one burning question that I forgot to ask: Do we still have an II membership, and how do we access it?
Then too, who pays the price to bring Welk resorts up to the "Hyatt Quality Level". Stand back and watch all the hand-wringing.
