TS Today - Creating a Vision for the Future of Vacation Ownership Issue #96 Nov/Dec, 2007 | Page 33

TimeSharing Today

Page 35

TSToday
Anywhere
In a photo taken by his
wife Darlene, Bob Boblooch
is seen reading TimeSharing
Today while on an exchange
to the Vacation Village of
Bonaventure in Weston, FL.

(2008) and had the benefit of picking
from two places, neither of which was exactly where we had requested. Because
we didn’t want to lose out completely by
waiting, we chose one of the two places
and although it looks very nice, it is not
exactly in the location we wanted.
Thank you for taking up the “fight”
for us, and we will continue reading and
subscribing to your magazine.
Richard and Olga Parlow,
Forestburgh, NY
****
“Subject to Availability” is the way
the marketers let you know up front that
“you can bet your life you’re not going to
get what you want.” Four months ago we
jumped back on the merry-go-round with
RCI trying to trade our space banked 2006
week through them after they had finally
come up with something for our 2005 week
in the middle of March in the middle of
Nowhere PA! (We took it just so we
wouldn’t lose another week again to RCI.)
This time we wanted to go on a particular week in August of this year to New
Hampshire because we want to attend a
craft show at Lake Sunapee. When talking with the RCI rep back in April and giving him the resort names (three of them)
we’d like them to do a search on, he immediately told us “there is no availability at
these resorts, we should pick different
dates and locations.” Mind you, I just read
a not too flattering report in TS Today by
a couple who recently stayed at one of
the NH resorts we had chosen and their
comment “they had a resort full of unoccupied units” struck home with us. We’ve
found this to be true of all the resorts RCI
eventually coughs up for us.
In the meantime, RCI reps keep calling asking us to space bank our 2007 week

with them and my answer was always the
same – “until you give us our 2006 week, I
don’t even want to discuss space banking our 2007, 2008 or whatever week with
RCI.” They want our weeks but they don’t
want to give any back in return. One RCI
rep went so far as to chew me out for “doing a search at the last minute.” Some way
to run a company, huh. As far as we’re
concerned, timesharing has turned into
one big joke and it’s on all of us who have
bought into it.
CS K, Flemington, NJ
****
We were recently contacted by RCI
about a cruise and land vacation package
their travel department was selling.
For $2495 you would get a cruise for
two with no blackout dates, with options
to cruise the Caribbean, Hawaii, Pacific
Mexico, Alaska, and the Mediterranean.
Plus you would get a 7-day land vacation
for up to six people. You didn’t have to
pay any exchange fees or use a timeshare
week or points.
Since my husband and I have been
considering an Alaskan cruise and I had
checked cruise prices and they were in that
price range, I thought it would be a good
way to insure we would take the cruise. I
was hoping for a family vacation with our
grown children in Vegas, Southern California, or Mexico. So after several questions, I agreed to the package with the 10day return policy. We were allowed to pay
$395 down and make monthly payments
for 1 year.
When I got the information, I logged
onto the website and looked at the Alaskan cruises and land vacations. The
website was a little goofed up. The first
page came up okay, but when I clicked on
the next page, it showed nothing. (I later
learned that when you click on the other

Nov/Dec, 2007

pages, the bottom of the page shows and
you have to scroll up.) Then I tried to look
for a week at Vegas, Southern Californian
and Puerto Vallarta. I checked Vegas and
Southern California every month for a year.
There was nothing available. In Mexico, I
checked February and March next year
since that is when we like to go. There
was a lockout unit for two if you wanted
to pay an additional $700+.
I called the 800 number that night and
left a message that I was having some problems with the web site and asked someone to call me back and left the name of
my salesman. The next day I called my
salesman’s extension and left the message.
No return call. The next day I called both
the main number and the salesman’s extension and left the message.
I tried one more time that afternoon
to the main number and got a real person.
I explained about the cruise website and
he told me about the page problem. I told
him all the messages that I left and that no
one would call me back. Then I asked him
about not being able to find any weeks for
the land vacation. He told me there isn’t
much out there this time of year because

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