Wyndham Privileges: new Wyndham VIP Levels starting late 2020 [Merged]

[Braindead]

I can easily counter your presumption that you will automatically be able to move points across accounts just like in a bank.

Then there’s no reason to have 2 Wyndham accounts, I’m lost on what good it would do to separate resale points in a separate account

 

[Braindead]

I have IRA and ROTH-IRA accounts and I cannot move money freely across those accounts.

With Chase, I have multiple credit card accounts. The only thing I can move between those accounts is the credit limit.

You can take funds out of an IRA, you don’t want to due to tax penalties. You can put the funds into a savings or checking account & use them to pay on a credit card.
Credit cards can pay another credit card balance. You can get a cash advance putting the funds in savings or checking account or make a contribution to your IRA. I will not go in to savings or checking accounts as we all know you can use those funds for anything including making IRA contributions.

If you have 2 Wyndham membership numbers absolutely nothing can transfer between those accounts outside of transferring a contract.
Again I’m lost on where your coming from. It’s comparing apples to oranges in my opinion

 

[SNA27]

Then there’s no reason to have 2 Wyndham accounts, I’m lost on what good it would do to separate resale points in a separate account

So, Wyndham can administer its rules laid out in the directory that resale points are excluded from VIP Benefits.
I have since learned on this forum that such explicit verbiage has been omitted in the latest directory while implicitly preserving the spirit of such verbiage elsewhere.
I also laid out my 'grandiose' vision of bringing various clubs under one IT umbrella. If I owned Worldmark or Shell or whatever in addition to Wyndham, I would love to be able to reach all of them with a single login under a single membership. I guess you're not ready to buy into my brave new world!

 

[Braindead]

The stripping of contracts is not allowed and contracts are not transferred with future use year points that have been used unless the $12/1000 is paid. Wyndham has tried to stop the trading of contracts to eliminate the competition to Ovations or when they do buy contracts third party. As Jan stated "When Wyndham does stuff like this it is well thought out to serve their purposes, often on a number of levels". Wyndham does not care if current use year points have been used. The negative balance was also to stop the trading of contracts and to help Ovations take back more deeds to feed their sales machine.

Stripping a contract means using points with no intention of paying the MFs on the points used & you’ve done that. OWN IT
You’ve posted Wyndham has told you that it not be allowed again, so don’t say that Wyndham will allow you to do what you’ve done in the past.

 

[Braindead]

So, Wyndham can administer its rules laid out in the directory that resale points are excluded from VIP Benefits.
I have since learned on this forum that such explicit verbiage has been omitted in the latest directory while implicitly preserving the spirit of such verbiage elsewhere.
I also laid out my 'grandiose' vision of bringing various clubs under one IT umbrella. If I owned Worldmark or Shell or whatever in addition to Wyndham, I would love to be able to reach all of them with a single login under a single membership. I guess you're not ready to buy into my brave new world!

We’re talking about 2 different items. If all TS systems you outline could be done with one login fine.
But you’ll still only have one Wyndham Destinations account. Back to if you have 2 Wyndham Destinations accounts under the umbrella & you can transfer points at will between the 2 Wyndham Destinations accounts it serves no purpose. You might as well have 1 Wyndham Destinations under the umbrella

 

[SNA27]

You can take funds out of an IRA, you don’t want to due to tax penalties. You can put the funds into a savings or checking account & use them to pay on a credit card.
Credit cards can pay another credit card balance. You can get a cash advance putting the funds in savings or checking account or make a contribution to your IRA. I will not go in to savings or checking accounts as we all know you can use those funds for anything including making IRA contributions.

If you have 2 Wyndham membership numbers absolutely nothing can transfer between those accounts outside of transferring a contract.
Again I’m lost on where your coming from. It’s comparing apples to oranges in my opinion

I don't know why you're stuck on TRANSFERs. You will have 2 separate accounts you can view with a single login. I like being able to see all my Chase credit card accounts in a single login, no transfers there. I like having all my accounts show up under a single login in BofA. Transfer between accounts is allowed in that particular context.
Wyndham could offer benefits based on the aggregate of all accounts at the member level. There are all kinds of possibilities.

 

[SNA27]

Bottom line. One member - multiple accounts each with its own rules. You will be able to view all your reservations by account or by member. Just as I do with my activity/holdings etc. in my Merril Edge account. No inconvenience whatsoever. Just that your resale account will not get VIP benefits as envisaged by the regulations in the directory. That's all.
There is no question of transfers. It's not part of the paradigm.

 

[Braindead]

Just that your resale account will not get VIP benefits as envisaged by the regulations in the directory.

Just when I thought everyone was in an agreement on this matter & it was put to bed.
We don’t know if anything is changing on how resale points work or will even be allowed in a VIP account now or in the future.

One could come to conclusion that the Wyndham decision makers have decided that resale points will get VIP benefits in a VIP account.
They just don’t want to advertise it, so they purposely left it out of the directory.

 

[dgalati]

Stripping a contract means using points with no intention of paying the MFs on the points used & you’ve done that. OWN IT
You’ve posted Wyndham has told you that it not be allowed again, so don’t say that Wyndham will allow you to do what you’ve done in the past.

If I am guilty of selling a stripped contract we would also have to agree Wyndham is also selling stripped contracts. It's no different then Wyndham selling a deed in July and not awarding points until Jan 1st of the next year. When someone buys a developer sold deed after June they have to pay maintenance fees for up to 6 months before they recieve points to use. The key point you have to remember are maintenance fees are paid by the buyer and Mutually agreed to by both parties. Ovations allows the use of current use year points. It is a win for both parties. Wyndham receives a deed for free knowing they have to pay maintenance fees and seller uses current years points for giving the deed back for free.

 

[Braindead]

It’s called bonus points when Wyndham is the seller, they more than make up for it

 

[dgalati]

It’s called bonus points when Wyndham is the seller, they more than make up for it

You threatened to rescind a developer purchase because no points were available until next use year? What did they call it when you received no bonus points? Its has been documented on TUG that many have had this same issue happen to them. Wyndham does not think of it as a stripped contract as you are implying.These new owners were told it all balances out!! ;/

 

[Braindead]

For the sake of this thread I’m not responding & refer to another Ron P statement.
Wyndham sets the rules in the sandbox & if you don’t want to play by Wyndhams rules get out of the sandbox!!

 

[dgalati]

For the sake of this thread I’m not responding & refer to another Ron P statement.
Wyndham sets the rules in the sandbox & if you don’t want to play by Wyndhams rules get out of the sandbox!!

Your opinion of a stripped contract is not what Wyndham thinks it is. They would not be selling developer contracts without points available if your definition was correct. I agree on Wyndham sets the rules and it is their sandbox. I have played by the rules and there are options available other then getting out of the sandbox.

 

[SNA27]

Just when I thought everyone was in an agreement on this matter & it was put to bed.
We don’t know if anything is changing on how resale points work or will even be allowed in a VIP account now or in the future.

One could come to conclusion that the Wyndham decision makers have decided that resale points will get VIP benefits in a VIP account.
They just don’t want to advertise it, so they purposely left it out of the directory.

While I am realistic and do not begrudge that VIP Owners with resale get an unpromised windfall due to the obvious deficiencies in Wyndham's design of its TS management system, I am not in agreement that you should get such a windfall. Moreover, agreement on TUGBBS is irrelevant to what Wyndham decides to do in the future.

The explicit verbiage about the ineligibility of resale points to avail of VIP benefits may have been omitted in the latest directory. But the description of VIP benefits does not explicitly say resale points are eligible for VIP benefits either as you seem to have concluded.

All I can conclude is that Wyndham's decision-makers have decided to put this issue in limbo to be dealt with in the future, if and when they have the ability to do so!

 

[SNA27]

If I am guilty of selling a stripped contract we would also have to agree Wyndham is also selling stripped contracts. It's no different then Wyndham selling a deed in July and not awarding points until Jan 1st of the next year. When someone buys a developer sold deed after June they have to pay maintenance fees for up to 6 months before they recieve points to use. The key point you have to remember are maintenance fees are paid by the buyer and Mutually agreed to by both parties. Ovations allows the use of current use year points. It is a win for both parties. Wyndham receives a deed for free knowing they have to pay maintenance fees and seller uses current years points for giving the deed back for free.

Nope, I never agreed to any such thing in 2016. I didn't even have a clue as to how things worked. It never occurred to me I would start paying MF into an escrow account immediately even though my first use year will start on Jan 1, 2017. The same thing happened with a purchase in July 2018 and recently in July 2019. I only raised the issue in July 2019 at my last (and hopefully FINAL) purchase. That's when the most unsatisfactory answer that 'it all balances out' was offered. My spreadsheet tells me that it doesn't balance out. Especially when our travel happens in July.
I guess it's insignificant if you consider the long term as @chapjim pointed out on the thread I had started about this very topic.

 

[dgalati]

While I am realistic and do not begrudge that VIP Owners with resale get an unpromised windfall due to the obvious deficiencies in Wyndham's design of its TS management system, I am not in agreement that you should get such a windfall. Moreover, agreement on TUGBBS is irrelevant to what Wyndham decides to do in the future.

The explicit verbiage about the ineligibility of resale points to avail of VIP benefits may have been omitted in the latest directory. But the description of VIP benefits does not explicitly say resale points are eligible for VIP benefits either as you seem to have concluded.

All I can conclude is that Wyndham's decision-makers have decided to put this issue in limbo to be dealt with in the future, if and when they have the ability to do so!

It can be justified either way to fit ones needs.

 

[dgalati]

Nope, I never agreed to any such thing in 2016. I didn't even have a clue as to how things worked. It never occurred to me I would start paying MF into an escrow account immediately even though my first use year will start on Jan 1, 2017. The same thing happened with a purchase in July 2018 and recently in July 2019. I only raised the issue in July 2019 at my last (and hopefully FINAL) purchase. That's when the most unsatisfactory answer that 'it all balances out' was offered. My spreadsheet tells me that it doesn't balance out. Especially when our travel happens in July.
I guess it's insignificant if you consider the long term as @chapjim pointed out on the thread I had started about this very topic.

What are your thoughts is Wyndham selling a deed stripped of points or just taking advantage of ones lack of knowledge? When I sell a deed I make it clear current use year points have been used and maintenance fees are the buyers responsibility the day Wyndham transfers to new owner. Full transparency and disclosure and very similar to the way Ron P. sold his deeds but with all future use year points available.

 

[SNA27]

I don't care what willing sellers and willing buyers do in a transparent transaction with full disclosure.
I don't like Wyndham charging me MF before the start of my use-year. I wouldn't have minded paying retroactive MF on purchases I made in February when I was awarded points for the current year. Or even if they pro-rated points based on the start month.
I don't like Ovation buying stripped contracts only because it can lead to all kinds of corruption without proper controls and oversight. Ovation employee has no skin in the game and has all kinds of opportunities for corruption.
If you've ever worked in a manufacturing company, you would be aware of all kinds of sops and enticements vendors offer to the Purchasing manager including trips to Hawaii in extreme cases. They were always bringing gifts, souvenirs, and widgets. I have seen it and often wondered about this insidious form of kickback. Vendors will simply justify it as a marketing tool. The purchasing manager will claim that he didn't solicit it and his decisions on sourcing are not influenced by such sops. He will freely hand out these gifts to fellow managers to buy their acquiescence. If I remember right, Ron Parise had an insider who was a facilitator. At one non-profit I was consulting for, the marketing manager had given a lucrative contract to a 'relative'. These kinds of dubious transactions go on everywhere. Not just in Government. My son was recently commenting that there must be big money in supplying coffee, toiletries, etc. to all the Wyndham resorts. I was telling him it must be high-volume, low-margin business. But who knows? One hand washes the other!

 

[dgalati]

I don't care what willing sellers and willing buyers do in a transparent transaction with full disclosure.
I don't like Wyndham charging me MF before the start of my use-year. I wouldn't have minded paying retroactive MF on purchases I made in February when I was awarded points for the current year. Or even if they pro-rated points based on the start month.
I don't like Ovation buying stripped contracts only because it can lead to all kinds of corruption without proper controls and oversight. Ovation employee has no skin in the game and has all kinds of opportunities for corruption.
If you've ever worked in a manufacturing company, you would be aware of all kinds of sops and enticements vendors offer to the Purchasing manager including trips to Hawaii in extreme cases. They were always bringing gifts, souvenirs, and widgets. I have seen it and often wondered about this insidious form of kickback. Vendors will simply justify it as a marketing tool. The purchasing manager will claim that he didn't solicit it and his decisions on sourcing are not influenced by such sops. He will freely hand out these gifts to fellow managers to buy their acquiescence. If I remember right, Ron Parise had an insider who was a facilitator. At one non-profit I was consulting for, the marketing manager had given a lucrative contract to a 'relative'. These kinds of dubious transactions go on everywhere. Not just in Government. My son was recently commenting that there must be big money in supplying coffee, toiletries, etc. to all the Wyndham resorts. I was telling him it must be high-volume, low-margin business. But who knows? One hand washes the other!

Below is a good read from the Worldmark Forum. Enjoy the thread it will give you another prospective of many topics on this Wyndham thread .

On Megarenters - and why hasn't Worldmark fixed this...

I purchased Worldmark recently, and from the short experience I have had with the online system, it's pretty clear that whatever Worldmark has done with housekeeping fees and guest certificate fees - it may have impacted the bottom line of megarenters, but they are just as active now (concluded...

tugbbs.com

 

[CCdad]

I don't care what willing sellers and willing buyers do in a transparent transaction with full disclosure.
I don't like Wyndham charging me MF before the start of my use-year. I wouldn't have minded paying retroactive MF on purchases I made in February when I was awarded points for the current year. Or even if they pro-rated points based on the start month.
I don't like Ovation buying stripped contracts only because it can lead to all kinds of corruption without proper controls and oversight. Ovation employee has no skin in the game and has all kinds of opportunities for corruption.
If you've ever worked in a manufacturing company, you would be aware of all kinds of sops and enticements vendors offer to the Purchasing manager including trips to Hawaii in extreme cases. They were always bringing gifts, souvenirs, and widgets. I have seen it and often wondered about this insidious form of kickback. Vendors will simply justify it as a marketing tool. The purchasing manager will claim that he didn't solicit it and his decisions on sourcing are not influenced by such sops. He will freely hand out these gifts to fellow managers to buy their acquiescence. If I remember right, Ron Parise had an insider who was a facilitator. At one non-profit I was consulting for, the marketing manager had given a lucrative contract to a 'relative'. These kinds of dubious transactions go on everywhere. Not just in Government. My son was recently commenting that there must be big money in supplying coffee, toiletries, etc. to all the Wyndham resorts. I was telling him it must be high-volume, low-margin business. But who knows? One hand washes the other!

With the great mega points owner freeze in August 2016 and even since, I don’t know how WD passes an external IT audit. Their IT controls should allow the auditors to reconcile total points, HK credits, VIP benefits, and GCs activity year over year, broken down by transaction categories. So that stat samples of each transaction category can be audited and assessed for weaknesses. But that would require an audit team that truly understands the TS industry and WD in particular; turnover is common and knowledge retention in the audit work papers can be sketchy at best.

I don’t think all the points generations issues of 2016 have been eliminated with Voyager. Different issues may crop up after their frequent overnight upgrades. WD doesn’t want to publicize its own lack of IT controls to their external auditors.

With respect to WD passing on discounts or marking up their volume discounted supplies, IT services and furnishings for renovations; I doubt that the HOAs are even looking into that. Another WD profit generation opportunity.

I know that one TS vendor paid itself a 15% management fee in 2018 for “managing” the resort repairs from the recent storm damage (in a self assessment to existing owners). And no owners challenged them; but that should have been part of their management contract for that resort.


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[Jan M.]

With the great mega points owner freeze in August 2016 and even since, I don’t know how WD passes an external IT audit. Their IT controls should allow the auditors to reconcile total points, HK credits, VIP benefits, and GCs activity year over year, broken down by transaction categories. So that stat samples of each transaction category can be audited and assessed for weaknesses. But that would require an audit team that truly understands the TS industry and WD in particular; turnover is common and knowledge retention in the audit work papers can be sketchy at best.

I don’t think all the points generations issues of 2016 have been eliminated with Voyager. Different issues may crop up after their frequent overnight upgrades. WD doesn’t want to publicize its own lack of IT controls to their external auditors.

With respect to WD passing on discounts or marking up their volume discounted supplies, IT services and furnishings for renovations; I doubt that the HOAs are even looking into that. Another WD profit generation opportunity.

I know that one TS vendor paid itself a 15% management fee in 2018 for “managing” the resort repairs from the recent storm damage (in a self assessment to existing owners). And no owners challenged them; but that should have been part of their management contract for that resort.


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My husband was president of our hoa where we live and learned a lot more than he previously new about audits during his years on our board. There was something that had some homeowners demanding an audit. He and the other board members were all set to agree to having an audit done. I had to explain to him that the type of audit they wanted was not the same kind of audit that is done at the end of each year and presented with the next years budget. What they wanted was what I called in my explanation to him an in depth or a forensic audit, although neither is probably the correct term. The type of audit the homeowners wanted is very expensive to have done as the board soon found out. Thankfully they hadn't agreed to anything before my husband talked to me about what was going on. I had him get me the relevant seven years worth of figures from the treasurer and spent a considerable amount of time working them up for the board to understand and be able to explain what was specifically being questioned and determine the needed action.

All the normal hoa or timeshare audit shows is that the numbers add up on what the auditor is given to go over. It is a very cursory audit. It doesn't look at the accuracy or legitimacy in how those numbers are labelled, determined, etc. My old boss loved to say that numbers don't lie but liars know how to use numbers. There is an old joke about the accountants being interviewed for a job. They are all asked what several numbers add up to. The last one, the one who gets the job, closes the door and whispers what do you want them to add up to?

I see you saying pretty much the same thing for an IT audit.

Edited. I want to explain that I was trying to put it in a way that more of us can understand a little better because we don't have the IT background.

 

[CCdad]

@Jan M LOL, yes indeed.

For the most part my post is about the audit of WD ... which because it’s a publicly traded company, should certainly involve more than just cursory reviews.

Having dealt with them throughout my career, they’re persistent Big5 firms and at times a royal PITA. Requesting screen shots for the process to generate a system report from a 3rd party vendor’s software.

As to the HOA, they tend to summarize their comparative annual budget to fit it onto one page to send to owners. If they don’t detail the extent of the related party transactions with WD, then it leads to more questions. But I doubt the individual HOAs really scrutinize all the WD charges.


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[ecwinch]

I understand your point CCdad - especially in light of the Sarbanes-Oxley requirements (and CEO sign-off) that publicly traded companies have to go thru. Jan's observation about the HOA audits is accurate, but a significantly higher standard of audit is required for SOX.

Internal control processes to prevent fraud is usually an area of emphasis. For instance the internal controls on how the mgt side of the house manages account balances for their own account.

 

[SNA27]

SOX has a higher standard? No, it just has more BS paperwork! What good is paperwork, if people go through it mechanically affixing their signature. Just more paper to CYA!
Humans are lazy and ingenious, we will find a way to defeat all these nonsense, make-work, feel-good control procedures! Yes, Epstein's guards cooked their documents! Did he kill himself? Idk!

 

[SNA27]

In the late 1980s and early 1990s, I worked for and later consulted for a small manufacturing firm in SoCal and I was in charge of their IT. Every year or so, the E&Y audit team wanted to include a page about IT audit. They always sent their junior person to interview me. She was nervous as hell because she had no idea of the subject matter. She just wanted to write her page and get out.
I could have told her COBOL74 stood for Cool Business Language invented in 1974 and the latest and greatest. It's so cool that nothing can go wrong. The whole concept of IT Audit was complete nonsense! They were not even qualified to do it!

Ok, I didn't actually do that! I thought they were serious and I used to describe the 2 different business systems and the daily and monthly processes involved. She used to furiously write down stuff without even bothering to grasp any of it. Just write a report and be done with it. That was her idea of IT audit. IT audits should be done by IT professionals. Otherwise it's meaningless.