Westin St John [Master Thread] - Part 2 (June 2014 and forward)

[carpie99]

You may want to check with Vistana about your reservation. I cancelled our reservation yesterday for the middle of October. As of mid day yesterday, they are allowing penalty-free cancellations.

What were you able to do with your options? I don't think I can reuse them this year at this point so if I can't bank them then it may not matter.

 

[lizap]

What were you able to do with your options? I don't think I can reuse them this year at this point so if I can't bank them then it may not matter.

They allowed me to bank the SOs, did not waive the banking fee, only the cancellation fee. My understanding is that 'officially' the resort is closed through the end of October. I imagine this will be extended...

 

[carpie99]

They allowed me to bank the SOs, did not waive the banking fee, only the cancellation fee. My understanding is that 'officially' the resort is closed through the end of October. I imagine this will be extended...

Apparently yesterday I got a non-helpful agent after being on hold for 45 minutes ... I was told exactly "all reservations after 9/29 are still being honored and any changes would be according to standard procedures". I should have asked for a manager. :/

 

[SandyPGravel]

They allowed me to bank the SOs, did not waive the banking fee, only the cancellation fee. My understanding is that 'officially' the resort is closed through the end of October. I imagine this will be extended...

This is totally unfair. You aren't banking your SO because you didn't want to use them this year. What a money grab.

 

[josh2268]

Apparently yesterday I got a non-helpful agent after being on hold for 45 minutes ... I was told exactly "all reservations after 9/29 are still being honored and any changes would be according to standard procedures". I should have asked for a manager. :/

I was told the same thing yesterday, asked for a manager and was able to bank, but still had to pay for the cancellation fee.

 

[carpie99]

Got a more helpful agent this time ... free cancellation. 78,000 of my points were banked points and still good for use into next year. 95,700 for use this year but I have the option to bank them for the standard $99 fee before October 1.

I am trying to figure out what I can possibly do with them this year before deciding to bank them.

Now to call American Airlines .....

 

[Dawnwrey]

We cancelled without penalty yesterday also. We had a 2 week reservation beginning October 28. We converted to starpoints since we don't have another opportunity to schedule additional time with options. Going to Kauai instead.

 

[carpie99]

We cancelled without penalty yesterday also. We had a 2 week reservation beginning October 28. We converted to starpoints since we don't have another opportunity to schedule additional time with options. Going to Kauai instead.

I assume the reason there is no availability to use Staroptions is because the Westin has taken over the open availability in the 60 day window?

 

[lizap]

I was told the same thing yesterday, asked for a manager and was able to bank, but still had to pay for the cancellation fee.

What time did you call? You may have called before the descision to extend was made.

 

[lizap]

This is totally unfair. You aren't banking your SO because you didn't want to use them this year. What a money grab.

And I had already paid a banking fee earlier since I had previously banked SOs this year. I may try to see if I can be reimbursed through Chase's trip cancellation insurance. But I probably won't as I'm tired of fooling with it.

 

[Cornell]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/after-irma-a-once-lush-gem-in-the-us-virgin-islands-reduced-to-battered-wasteland/2017/09/12/b49532e0-9736-11e7-af6a-6555caaeb8dc_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_irmaislands945pm:homepage/story&utm_term=.9d5cd5f8496b

Good / sad article about virgin islands

 

[cubigbird]

Just looked at the Villa Finder. The defaults starts in April but allows you to scroll backwards showing availability and allowing to book as early as November 6th and forward. Agreed with posts above, here's hoping we get a resort update soon.

 

[NNerland]

Caneel Bay Resort just posted on Facebook -- they announced they will be closed for the duration of 2017 and will provide updates for 2018 in the future. They are examining the extent of the damage to the property. Their immediate priority is with their employees and the community on the Island of St John at this time.

They took a pretty big hit, not as protected as St John; however probably a good indication of the true aftermath. We are to go in January, but I just have a feeling this isn't going to be possible. I really hope the Westin is transparent and forthright. People also have decisions to make as airlines have restrictions and you can't just change at the last minute if you need to make alternate plans. We are kind of in a bind as our airline tickets are with Sun Country; which has fewer options for us in the winter to change our plans.

I understand the enormity of the situation for Vistana and the Westin --- however we are all owners and in this together. They need to be honest and transparent. It will be interesting to see in the coming days and weeks what we hear.

 

[dsmrp]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/after-irma-a-once-lush-gem-in-the-us-virgin-islands-reduced-to-battered-wasteland/2017/09/12/b49532e0-9736-11e7-af6a-6555caaeb8dc_story.html?hpid=hp_hp-top-table-main_irmaislands945pm:homepage/story&utm_term=.9d5cd5f8496b

Good / sad article about virgin islands

Thank you for the link. So sad, but glad they finally got some help with enforcement and transportation off island(s). From the article it did seem to take awhile, and the grass roots effort from Puerto Rico was awesome.
Can anyone recommend a reputable organization that will direct contributions to USVI relief efforts?
I should go find that GoFundMe page of the guy from Puerto Rico in the article.

BTW, I heard on Good Morning America this morning about a cruise ship which Marriott chartered to pick up guests from St Thomas.
But only Marriott guests were allowed to board, in spite of many other tourists needing to leave St Thomas.
Marriott responded it was because the St Thomas port staff-officials only allowed those named on the manifest to leave. OMG!

 

[Jamie4Maui]

We had a trip scheduled for St. John arriving October 7th. I called today to cancel and was able to bank my Star Options without a cancellation fee and also without the $99 banking fee. She almost charged me the $99 fee, but had put me on hold to talk with another department, who informed her that as of today a new policy had been issued that they were not going to charge the banking fee for those having to cancel at St. John. If you were charged this fee I would call back to get it refunded.

 

[canesfan]

I'm glad that Vistana finally made the right decision and is waiving the banking fee. It's definitely the right thing to do at this time.


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

 

[lizap]

We had a trip scheduled for St. John arriving October 7th. I called today to cancel and was able to bank my Star Options without a cancellation fee and also without the $99 banking fee. She almost charged me the $99 fee, but had put me on hold to talk with another department, who informed her that as of today a new policy had been issued that they were not going to charge the banking fee for those having to cancel at St. John. If you were charged this fee I would call back to get it refunded.

Thanks for letting us know. I'm calling now to try to get it refunded.

 

[SMHarman]

Caneel Bay is done for 2017

 

[josh2268]

We had a trip scheduled for St. John arriving October 7th. I called today to cancel and was able to bank my Star Options without a cancellation fee and also without the $99 banking fee. She almost charged me the $99 fee, but had put me on hold to talk with another department, who informed her that as of today a new policy had been issued that they were not going to charge the banking fee for those having to cancel at St. John. If you were charged this fee I would call back to get it refunded.

awesome tip, i just called and got refunded my banking and cancellation fees

 

[lizap]

awesome tip, i just called and got refunded my banking and cancellation fees

Yes, they have now refunded ours as well. Thanks TUG!

 

[letsgomets]

So upset to see what's happened to St. John but looking forward to returning. Since BV is not a mandatory resort and we bought a # of years ago via resale, I wonder if there are any options that are available to us if the resort is closed for our upcoming arrival dates or if we just lose out since we aren't allowed in the Vistana exchange program. Would love any insights.

 

[Helios]

The repairs will be funded by insurance ... I can only say that for the three units I own there I will pay the required SAs and MFs until I can continue visits to the property. That is the inherent risk of property ownership. They only owe you what you agreed to when you purchased, nothing more or less. I haven't reviewed my documents yet to see what guarantees of use I have. What I can tell you is that I have a nine day reservation in 29 days that use 168,000 star options ($4000+ in MFs) and have been told that my reservation is still valid. So I have plenty of skin in the game and still feel fortunate that I have the backing of Vistana rather than having to somehow deal with insurance and repairs by myself.

Sorry, I didn't realize you owned at WSJ.

Good luck with the reservations. Please post pictures once you get there.

 

[amycurl]

Thankfully, things have improved, but is is still very unfortunate that these things happened. My heart breaks for her reading this account. We are planning to donate to relief efforts. Any recommendations?

Can anyone recommend a reputable organization that will direct contributions to USVI relief efforts?

I would recommend the Community Foundation of the USVI.

 

[SMHarman]

Marriott just screwed over a bunch o peeps on St Thomas

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...on-guests-on-the-dock/?utm_term=.870cfe43d80f

 

[dsmrp]

Marriott just screwed over a bunch o peeps on St Thomas

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news...on-guests-on-the-dock/?utm_term=.870cfe43d80f

Hope Marriott gets much more bad PR from this (ala United's passenger dragging incident) than any liability from accepting extra passengers on the ship.