brianfox
TUG Member
- Joined
- Apr 14, 2007
- Messages
- 798
- Reaction score
- 446
- Location
- Thousand Oaks
- Resorts Owned
- Marriott Waiohai x3
I have rented my weeks on Redweek Full Service quite a number of times - most recently last year.
They way it worked last year was clear to owners:
I pay $59 for the rental listing
I will pay $99 when the week is rented.
I set the rental price as, say $4000
Redweek lists the rent as $4000.
Customer begins rental process, and learn at that time that there is a 10% renter service fee above the rental to complete the purchase.
Apparently they have changed their model to show an "all-in price" for the rental (it includes the service fee).
Here's the problem:
As an OWNER they don't inform you when you se the listing, so what happens is:
I pay $59 for the rental listing
I will pay $99 when the week is rented.
I set the rental price as, say $4000 - the lowest asking price, to make sure my listing gets customers
Redweek lists the rent as $4400!!! (adding the renter service fee into the bundle)
I only notice this when I go to check a few weeks later why no one has made an offer...
When I set the rent at $4000, Redweek has a pop up stating that I am asking $571 a night.
The problem is that they do NOT tell me that customer will see "$571 a night, $4400 total"
Had they been upfront with me, and said "You are asking $4400. After our customer service fee, customers will see the listing as $4400", I would have priced my listing accordingly.
To make matters worse, They don't just charge a straight fixed % to the customer. As a result, I need to GUESS what the fee will be, set my asking price, then check to see how much potential renters will actually see. So if I want to be, say, $100 below the lowest asking price, I need to change my asking price several times, even using a freaking spreadsheet - because the renter service fee is all over the map.
While they have the right to do this, they have made the rental process hell for owners.
Clearly they must have had pissed off customers, complaining about hidden pricing until checkout. I get it.
But they passed off the problem to piss off owners by being unclear to them. I am a customer of Redweek, too.
Not understanding their new "all-in" pricing model, I first sent them a "WTF" Email stating they screwed up all of my listings.
Then a second Email saying how opaque their model is to owners.
All they need to do is make it crystal clear what prospective customers will see when an owner tries to set a rental price...
They way it worked last year was clear to owners:
I pay $59 for the rental listing
I will pay $99 when the week is rented.
I set the rental price as, say $4000
Redweek lists the rent as $4000.
Customer begins rental process, and learn at that time that there is a 10% renter service fee above the rental to complete the purchase.
Apparently they have changed their model to show an "all-in price" for the rental (it includes the service fee).
Here's the problem:
As an OWNER they don't inform you when you se the listing, so what happens is:
I pay $59 for the rental listing
I will pay $99 when the week is rented.
I set the rental price as, say $4000 - the lowest asking price, to make sure my listing gets customers
Redweek lists the rent as $4400!!! (adding the renter service fee into the bundle)
I only notice this when I go to check a few weeks later why no one has made an offer...
When I set the rent at $4000, Redweek has a pop up stating that I am asking $571 a night.
The problem is that they do NOT tell me that customer will see "$571 a night, $4400 total"
Had they been upfront with me, and said "You are asking $4400. After our customer service fee, customers will see the listing as $4400", I would have priced my listing accordingly.
To make matters worse, They don't just charge a straight fixed % to the customer. As a result, I need to GUESS what the fee will be, set my asking price, then check to see how much potential renters will actually see. So if I want to be, say, $100 below the lowest asking price, I need to change my asking price several times, even using a freaking spreadsheet - because the renter service fee is all over the map.
While they have the right to do this, they have made the rental process hell for owners.
Clearly they must have had pissed off customers, complaining about hidden pricing until checkout. I get it.
But they passed off the problem to piss off owners by being unclear to them. I am a customer of Redweek, too.
Not understanding their new "all-in" pricing model, I first sent them a "WTF" Email stating they screwed up all of my listings.
Then a second Email saying how opaque their model is to owners.
All they need to do is make it crystal clear what prospective customers will see when an owner tries to set a rental price...
