RCI Timeshare Complaints, Positive and Negative Experiences
There are a number of sites on the web that RCI members use to voice their complaints about past experiences they have had with RCI. A majority of these issues have to do with the inability to trade weeks once they are deposited. The inability to exchange weeks for vacations at other resorts is exactly the same problem that the class action lawsuit, Murillo vs. RCI (which is currently in the discovery process) is focused upon – the idea that RCI is withholding weeks for sales to non-members or for use by executives as perks.
Personally, my major complaint with RCI is the way that they conduct business using their deceitfully underhanded, high-pressure sales tactics. Their main goal is to prey on the weakness of people and convince them, no matter what their financial situation, that a timeshare is a valuable investment. They are no better than corporate bullies, hustling and ready to say whatever you want to hear in order to get your signature on the dotted line. I do not care how many people comment that “it’s your own fault to give in and buy something you did not really want”, there is certainly some truth to that, but the real truth is that people are trusting by nature, and do not want to believe that there is someone out there trying to reel them in for a scam.
People need to be aware about the truth about timeshares, and I encourage you to post your experiences with RCI below, positive and negative, to help inform consumers as to whether or not RCI timeshare is a good investment.
May 24th, 2008 at 12:52 pm
bait and switch. promises of ease of use. hidden charges. There is no value to the membership with RCI. It was much more difficult to use a timeshare week than to buy a timeshare week! There are never any resorts or dates available that you want. The resorts they partner with are very nice to work with but there are all kinds of problems with making the reservation because you have to go through RCI.
It seems that on each call the rules change or more like they add new rules to prevent you from easily doing something that you want to do. Especially with a service business such as RCI, if you want success you have to be friendly and serve your clients..i have never felt that they are serving my needs when I call. it is always a matter of quoting charges or rules.
Last time we used a week, we had to pay twice to have the reservation made and then pay to switch to another guest checking in. We beleive that they purposefully told us we had booked what we asked for (a Saturday to Saturday stay) but when the confirmation came it showed a Friday night check in! When we called to correct this we were told that there never was any option for a Saturday night stay so it must have been our mistake!?
We will not be renewing our membership and I would suggest that you do not either. If you are looking for the ability to exchange timeshare weeks – do NOT use RCI.
John Long
July 15th, 2008 at 9:29 am
I personally wasted money on it and regret I ever joined. I bought my timeshare from Point To Point Destinations (PTP Destinations, West Coast Timeshare) in Vancouver, BC.
I think this article would be more complete if it distinguished between RCI, the broker and member resorts who actually do the presentations and sell you timeshare, like the one i bought it from: To Point Destinations (PTP Destinations, West Coast Timeshare)
In my experience RCI is not worth it either, but i think it is important to make clear that they are different from individual resorts. Anyway, that does not make me their “deal” any better.
CHECK THE FACTS before you even think of going to any presentation. Never sign anything on the same day. Do not take your wallet with you, give yourself time to check the facts first.
I posted my experience and the facts here:
http://www.TimeshareRevealed.com
July 15th, 2008 at 9:45 am
I forgot to mention about “positive” experience. Many people write to me how happy they are with their timeshare and how much fun it is for their families. I always wanted to comment on this. There is no question that people can be happy with their time spent on vacation. What i do question is at which expense. So there is no question in my mind that the vacation experience may be great. Some people do not even know that they overpaid. Some others know that they lost money, but that does not prevent their families from enjoying the vacation, even if overpriced. Many of those who wrote to me about how happy they are still agreed that they either overpaid or lost money or bought it on the aftermarket for next to nothing from desperate sellers.
Check the facts here:
http://www.TimeshareRevealed.com
July 24th, 2008 at 12:29 am
Incident = I traded a week of my time share that I deposited. The room I deposited was supposed to accomadate a famly of 4. I was given a room in the ghetto in Hawaii at a dump hotel and my two children and I were woken by prostitutes yelling at men coming from m the bar downstairs. I begged RCI to move me several times into a better location but they kept telling me they could not move me. I finally rented a room at the Sheraton that cost 300.00 because they refused to give me a hotel that was not in the slum. They offered me a hotel directly behind the hotel I was in and one that was one block away and told me these were my only options. I repeatedly told them I could not stayb somewhere I did not feel safe with my children. They put me up in the red light district in a hotel with a security guard. The lady at the reception told me she did not blame me for not wanting to stay in the Kuhio Banyan because teenagers had beaten a male turist to death in front of that hotel. The
Kuhio Banyan club did not have a separate bed for my 16 year old son and he had to sleep on the couch. The only bed in the room was a bed that pulls out from the wall. The room smelled disgusting, it was dirty, there was no way to open a window to let in fresh air and there was a seedy bar and a tatoo parlor down stairs from me. The hotel did not have a parking garage but offered to allow me to park my rental car in a garage nearby for 18.00 per night. I was forced to run from my car in the parking garage with my two children to try to get my kids to saftey that evening. RCI was no help, one of the customer service representatives I called for help tried to get me to bank more weeks for more money instead of helping me deal with my emergency. I was not given anything close to amenities of my timeshare week I gave up. The hotel was nasty, the area was bad.
Damage Resulting = After the second night, I stayed at the Sheraton in Wikiki. I was not prepared to stay at other hotels and could not afford to rent another one. It cost me 199.00 to deposit my week with my hotel, 164.00 to book with RCI, 300.00 to stay at the Sheraton and I was ultamitly left scared, in a seedy hotel in a bad part of town. I feel that the money I spent on airline tickets to stay at a resort shoul be refunded. The hotel I was given looked like some place a fugitive running from the law would stay at. My airline tickets were over 1500.00 for me and my children. We expected at minimum a nice hotel if RCI could not find a resort.
August 4th, 2008 at 6:09 am
wow! rebecca, I really feel sorry for your experience. You deserve a refund for sure. We just came from a timeshare meeting, and I sure am glad we didn’t sign anything! We did however get a nice gift for 90 minutes of our time.
August 8th, 2008 at 12:30 pm
We bought into the RCI points scam at Temptations Resort in Cancun . We were told that we could use 240,000 points a year for points partner program (airfare,car rental,whatever)now they tell me that we can only use 60,000 pts.per year because Temptation Members use too many pts. so they have to limit our points. It says nothing in our contract that they can do this.We’ve paid thousands to get a few hundred dollar discount on a weeks vacation.I also posted on The Squeaky Wheel it will send them an e-mail of my complaint everytime someone views it http://www.thesqueakywheel.com/complaints/2008/AUG/complaint40359.cfm please feel free to view as many times as possible . I will let people know of this site as well .
August 20th, 2008 at 3:52 pm
es verdad esos mexicanos son unos ladrones de marca mayor,si no fuera por rci,nunca hubiese ido a isla margarita,santa marta,maine,cuernavaca,covenas,pero me tomo algo de empuje,no es facil conseguir esos sitios y comprendo esa frustracion,lo unico que no me gusta ahora de rci,es que no mandan el libro directorio de los hoteles 2008-2009,estoy hasta el cogote de llamar mendigando por el bendito libro y nada de nada,los operadores solo les interesa ofrecer izque “ofertas” de pagar la membresia hasta 6 anos desde hoy en adelante,para poder coger su comision,una vez que se paga via tarjeta,yuca,si te hable ni me acuerdo,y por supuesto,cuando se llama por la edicion impresa le dicen que todo se puede ver por internet,ojo que a lo mejor si ya no imprimen el resort directory y todos bien tranquilitos,con su plata en el bolsillo
August 29th, 2008 at 7:25 am
I’m also very disappointed. I was lured into a points membership thinking it was easy to use them at other locations. Nothing is ever available and I just keep racking up 80,000 points per year, at the same time paying the monthly membership fees (something like 1000 bucks a year) for nothing. Tried to convert to car rental in Europe and the result: nothing available (“Sorry, the system isn’t allowing me to make the reservation”). Worst investment ever! I’d be curious to know: are they still trying to sucker people in? You’d think they’d at least try to keep their existing members satisfied in fear of negative publicity, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. Still trying on the car rental thing, will re-post if something good happens.
September 4th, 2008 at 11:17 am
Yup, just as I figured. They promised to try to sort something out and let me know via e-mail, but obviously no reply. So I called them again and tried to book a rental car. Same story,: “Yes sir, I see that there are cars available, but the system isn’t accepting the booking”. Yeah, right. My advice to newcomers: stay away from these people. Take your 10,000$ investment, put it down somewhere at say 7%, then add your yearly $1100$ “maintenance fees”. With this $1800 per annum you can take your 2 week holiday anywhere you like, whenever you like. Do the math.
September 16th, 2008 at 7:06 am
The staff presenting the Timeshare will tell you anything you want to hear. They knowingly lie to you then claim they were misinformed from management. That’s all garbage. Once your sale is final getting in touch with anyone who sold you the timeshare is almost impossible. I had to email, call, and contact Desire directly before anyone would contact me back. If it’s not in writing DO NOT BELIEVE IT.
We travel quite often and using the RCI points has saved us about $8,000 in airfare in 18 months. WE used our points only for airfare. This was working great until July 2008. RCI now has a new policy only for Premier by Original Resorts (Formerly Blue Bay Premier) members. You can only use 60,000 points per year for Points Partners (airfare, car,etc.). They also changed the points structure so you’re using more points for airfare. Basically what it comes down to is that we can no longer use our points to purchase airfare with RCI. We own 5.6 million points that we will never use in the 25 years we own the timeshare. Premier acknowledges there is a problem but wont do anything to help change this. We’re being robbed of our points and money that we spent for the points. Because RCI is independent from the membership Premier resorts isn’t obligated to do anything to reimburse its customers. They have washed there hands of the whole situation. At the current rate of 60,000 points use per year it will take us over 75 years to use all our RCI points. We only own the timeshare for 25 years.
September 23rd, 2008 at 10:49 am
It all started on jan 23rd 2008 I purchased 5,601,696 RCI(Real Crappy Investment) points at Temtations Resort in Cancun Mexico along with 6 weeks hotel per year for 25 years. The only reason I bought this was because I would be able to use the points on air fare, as many per year as I would like, it was a great deal. Now as of sept 10, 2008 I get a letter from RCI saying that I can only use 60,000 points per year on air fare.
Well I had sent one of my employees on a vacation for a wedding present and used the points for their air fair, it used 200,000 points was worth aprox $2000. I can use the RCI points on other hotels but why would I do that when I have 6 weeks per year at Temtations that I payed for. A deal is a deal now cough up RCI buck up to your mistakes or every one of the people that this happened to will give you bad ratings on the web. Once I see a bad rating I dont use that company.
September 24th, 2008 at 11:06 am
I also got sucked into the points scam going on at the blue bays resorts in Cancun. I just found out that I can only use 60,000 pts. per year because they are through Blue Bay. This turns out to be about one $500 airline ticket. At this rate it will take me about 16 years to use the points I paid for. As far as I am concerned pts are pts. Why are we being singled out and restricted from using pts that we paid for. You have the money. I understand that our contract is with Blue Bay but you allowed them to sell RCI points and are the ones changing your agreement. As someone has already said…. This must be against the law. It will only be time before an attorney picks this up and sues. Also said… I will do everything I can to get the word out about how RCi has treated this situation.
October 9th, 2008 at 3:59 am
We have been contacted by a Law firm that intends on persuing this in court . His name is Clayton Voegtle . His e-mail addy is Clayton@VoegtleLaw.com If anyone is interested in a law suit I would advise contacting him . He is going after RCI but at this time hasn’t said anything about Original Resorts or Blue Bay .
October 11th, 2008 at 8:54 pm
Have traded my time share 4 times and was able to go when and where I wanted trading through RCI. And I do not or have ever worked for RCI or any Time share co. I have owned my time share since 2004
October 20th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
We purchased a 25 year, 3 million point timeshare from the Blue Bay club in Feb. of 2005. We purchased this for the ability to use the points partners program to get flights to Cancun. This year when we tried to redeem our points for our trip to Cancun this coming January we are told that we can only use 60,000 points (which does not even get one of us there.) If we cannot use our points for flights to Cancun we will never get to vacation there and we will NEVER be able to use up our points. This is a scam that needs to be ended. We and many others need refunds. Is a lawsuit in order?
We also were stupid enough to pay $299.00 to Premier Blue Bay to rent out our 2 units any year in which we were not going to vacation there. This was a lifetime contract that they never lived up to. Last year we inquired again and they informed us that they no longer employ the company that handled the rentals. Blue Bay refuses to give us a refund of $299.00.
October 20th, 2008 at 6:57 pm
Do not buy timeshare or points from Blue Bay Club. You will never be able to use them!
December 2nd, 2008 at 8:29 pm
I just purchased timeshare while I was at Temptation Resort last week. I was told that I could rent out my weeks to others and every time somebody stay there on behalf of myself, I would get $500 per week. Also, I was told that everytime my “guest” purchases timeshare from them, I would get free inclusive (free food and free drinks). On my way back from my vacation, I reviewed my contract closely and I was unable to find the sections stating $500 or free “all inclusive”. When I emailed them, I received the following response back from them.
“if you don’t have anything on your contract sign for some one of the sales people about receive any free weeks or something else unfortunately there is nothing we can respect because the verbal arrangements don’t have any value if those are not sign or established on the contract.”
Did I just get sucked into sales pitch or am I missing something on the contracts?
December 15th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
We are in the same situation as everyone else who has a membership with Blue Bay and RCI. Does anyone have any advise? Our membership fees are due and I do not want to invest anymore money into this!
January 4th, 2009 at 8:30 pm
I’ve sold timeshare in Las Vegas for years. Of course it’s a scam. Hasn’t the 80’s and all of the scams taught you anything? People are greedy for the free gifts and think they can say no on a presentation. Geeesh, it’s buyer beware. 1 out of 4 people buy when on mini vacations. Timeshare will always exist regardless of lawsuit. 3 trillion dollars a year in the industry makes sure of it. And never buy in Mexico. Those are leases and there aren’t regulations that cover you. YOURE IN MEXICO FOR GOD SAKES. What were you thinking???? Brad
January 26th, 2009 at 2:41 pm
RCI was in such need of my deposited week in Cancun one of their Reps intentionally cancelled my week. I attempted to complain to a Supervisor who said he listened to the audio tape of the conversation. He came back and stated that since I didn’t accept his offer of a week of thier choice for a one bedroom instead of the two I had it constituted a cancellation. I argued to no avail and to add insult to injury they kept my eschange fee and my guest fee on top of that. This company RCI treats its customers like crap and only tell you of the openings that they want you to have. The week i was denied by RCI the first time, I was able to get three hours later. They are full of crap.
February 18th, 2009 at 9:49 am
IM VERY DISIPOINTED IN RCI. WE EXHANGE POINTS TO RESERVE A CRUISE ON ROYAL CARRIBEAN THREW RCI.WE HAD TO PAY IN A HIGH AMOUNT OFF MONEY PLUS 3500 PONTS. TWO MONTHS AFTER PAYING THE AMOUNT WE LEANT THAT RCI CHARGED US TWICE THE AMOUNT IN YOU CAN PURCHASED A TICKED ON THE WEBSITE OFF ROYAL CARRIBEAN. WHEN WE CONFRONTED THEM THEY HAVE LONG STORIES AND CANT EXPLAIN WHY THIS BIG DIFFERENCE.I WILL NEVER USE AND WILL ALWAYS CALL RCI A BIG RIP OFF.
February 20th, 2009 at 11:48 am
We like many of the above bought a timeshare at Temptations,Premier Original Resorts, for the points to fly with. The first sign that there was a problem was when RCI cut our members off the web site, RCI blamed Premier for this, Premier blamed RCI. Then the bad news RCI would only allow our resort 60,000 points to use on point partners and we have close to 7 million points. RCI is still blaming Premier(said Premier knew this could happen) and Premier is still blaming RCI. And as far as all that money you where going to make of those rental weeks, that is a scam. Go to http://www.premier-originalresorts.com to find out exactly how this scam works and how those free AI are limited to when you can use them. There is even a copy of the sales training manual there. Terry
March 3rd, 2009 at 3:40 am
If your schedule 3 on your purchase agreement was not completed in full, you must simply take it to court. As simple as that, they will have no leg to stand on bottom line.
If your agreement is not completed in full they will have to cancel, no leg to stand on is considered missrep and illegal by law(NCR)
If we get more people to take it to court eventually the NCR will have to request all the documentation from these crooks and evaluate them, hopefully, maybe even be closed down.
This happened to me in boksburg with lukas miller and a friend in 4 ways.
They are crooks they will try and give you a free holiday to keep you quite but what is one holiday worth when for the rest of your life the holidayclub system will not work as it did in the past with rci.
Is there no way we can get help
Why is my refund taking so long, I warned you lukas but instead you try and miss and postpone all my meetings you leave me with no answer you will hear from my lawyer.
As die boer nie n plan kan maak nie dan sal my lawyer
March 5th, 2009 at 3:25 pm
Hi All
Many people are venting here of the issue with Temptation Resorts Cancun / Blue Bay / Desire / Premier.
Now a website with an expose has recently been shut down – desirenakedtruth.com/ this even contained links to the staff training manuals that we were all sucked in by.
The site was useful in bringing people together and now it has gone, we should all get in touch with the lawyer listed above. [Clayton@VoegtleLaw.com]
Now hopefully anyone else going to this resort will not be bullied into making a purchase.
If anyone knows of a Mexican lawyer, who knows Mexican law in Cancun and can pursue this company please do let us know on this site so that we can get justice done!
Many thanks
March 25th, 2009 at 3:10 am
I have been tempted to accept buying a timeshare from RCI in lebanon as I spend much time working and it would be good to have a break from work. They didn’t mention that the maintainence fees can change from year to year, they just said that they are 250$/year. My wife used to work and stopped now so I cannot afford buying this timeshare, they have taken from me 300$ now I am thinking of cancelling it and forget about my 300$ better than regret it more later. I don’t advice anyone to buy a timeshare. I told them I need time to think (i.e. 3 to 4 days / ask my parents / relatives / etc.) but they refused saying that this is a ’special’ offer which ends in an hour. the atmosphere was not good also, they were putting loud music all the time and i think they put something in the drink / cake.
I am not sure, they were able to convince me that it is a great offer. but it is not. it is a damn offer which makes me loss much for nothing. I will cancel my timeshare this week.
You can be in touch with me: wael.abboud@hotmail.com for more info.
Thanks.
April 9th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
BELOW IS 100 PERCENT PROOF OF RCI CORRUPTION. LIKE EVERY BIG MONEY CRIMINAL,THEY ROB YOU AND DONT RESPOND BECAUSE WHAT CAN WE DO.APPRECIATE IT IF YOU FOLKS COULD GET THIS EVIDENCE OF OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE TO BLUE BAY MEMBERS WHO WERE SCAMMED.
04/09/09 I HAVE BEEN GIVING COMPLAINTS OF FRAUD AND OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE TO RCI FOR OVER 9 MONTHS WITH NO RESPONSE .RCI MADE THE PERSON BELOW,JACK, THEIR REPRESENTATIVE. HE CANNOT RESPOND BECAUSE RCI HAS COMMITTED SERIOUS CRIMES. IF RCI HAS HURT YOU,GIVE THIS PLUS YOUR COMPLAINT TO YOUR AG. RCI HAS A CLASS ACTION AGAINST THEM AND IF WE CAN SHOW HOW BAD RCI IS,WE SHOULD GET MUCH MORE MONEY. I OFFICIALLY OBJECTED TO THE CLASS ACTION,SHOWING THE CRIMES OF RCI. GOOD LUCK. From: “Shaughnessy, Jack”
Date: Thu, 2 Apr 2009 09:35:09 -0400
To:
Subject: RE: Your RCI account
In which court (county and state) will you be filing your charges? I will advise the attorneys.
Jack Shaughnessy
Vice President
Corporate Security & Business
Continuity Planning
Wyndham Worldwide Corporation
22 Sylvan Way
Parsippany, NJ 07054
Tele: 973-753-6597
Cell: 862-812-4055
Fax: 973-753-6543
jack.shaughnessy@wyndhamworldwide.com
04/05/09 DEAR JACK, OVER ONE WEEK AGO YOU BECAME THE SPOKESMAN FOR RCI. THIS HAS BEEN AFTER 9 MONTHS OF FRAUD AND NO RESPONSES TO THE FRAUD BY RCI. YOU ARE ALSO AWARE THAT I HAD THE COURTESY OF GIVING YOU ALL THE EVIDENCE THAT I GAVE TO COURT TO OBJECT TO CLASS ACTION AGAINST RCI. SO THAT THE COURT CAN GET A CLEAR UNDERSTANDING OF THE TYPE OF COMPANY RCI IS, I WOULD LIKE YOU TO ANSWER SOME VERY SIMPLE QUESTIONS.I WILL SUBMIT YOUR ANSWERS OR NO ANSWERS TO THE COURT. WHEN YOU FIRST WROTE YOU SAID THAT IT WAS VERY IMPORTANT FOR US TO TALK. AFTER OVER ONE WEEK AND YOUR 4 LETTERS, HAVE YOU SAID ONE WORD ABOUT THE RCI CRIMES? Date: Tue, 31 Mar 2009 11:27:36
To:
Subject: RE: Your RCI account
I’d really like to have a conversation with you – don’t you trust me? I
am VP of corporate security for Wyndham Worldwide and you have made
allegations of criminal activity by our employees. That is obviously why
I have become engaged. I think we need to talk.
Jack Shaughnessy
Vice President
YOU ARE THERE SPOKESMAN,YET YOU ARE DOING THE SAME THAT RCI HAS BEEN DOING FOR 9 MONTHS AND THAT IS NOT RESPONDING. BELOW IS A LETTER FROM MELINDA KELSEY ON FEB 26. SHE STRESSED THE URGENCY OF THE MATTER BECAUSE AIRFARES AND FISHING CHARTERS ARE PAID FOR. SINCE FEB 26 HAS ANYONE FROM RCI OR YOU RESPONDED TO THE CONTINUED PLEADING FOR A RESPONSE BY ME. HAS ANYBODY IN RCI OR YOU RESPONDED TO THE PROOF THAT MELINDA LIED TO CANCEL THE WEEKS. RECENTLY I HAVE ADDRESSED ABOUT 14 DIFFERENT ENTITIES IN RCI,AND WYNDHAM CONCERNING MY ILLEGALLY CANCELLED HAWAII VACATIONS. HAVE ANY RESPONDED TO CRITICAL ISSUES? IF THEY DID RESPOND LET ME KNOW WHAT THEY SAID. IN THE LAST 9 MONTHS I HAVE 66 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS FROM RCI THAT THEY HAVE RECEIVED MY MESSAGES OF CRIMES. HAS ANYBODY,INCLUDING YOU RESPONDED? I WOULD APPRECIATE IT IF YOU WOULD ANSWER THE QUESTIONS AND SAY ANYTHING THAT YOU HAVE TO SAY. IF NO RESPONSE BY 2300 ON WEDNESDAY MARCH 8, I WILL SEND YOUR NO RESPONSE TO THE COURT. THANK YOU- Your RCI confirmations
Date: Thu, 26 Feb 2009 17:23:55 -0500
From: melinda.kelsey@rci.com
To:
Dear Mr.
It has been previously stated to you that RCI did not rent out your unit and your alleged credit issues are not with RCI but with your home resort. If you wish to continue to use your RCI benefits you will need to allow the charges to go through for your future exchanges along with the $547.00 to pay for the past vacations which you have disputed with your credit card company. Until this issue is resolved we will be unable to attempt to reinstate your confirmations. Since these confirmations have been cancelled, there is no guarantee the inventory will still be available. You can understand how urgency in this matter is important since inventory changes every day. We do want you to successfully transact with RCI and encourage you to address this issue as quickly as possible.
Sincerely,
Melinda Kelsey
Customer
April 9th, 2009 at 12:47 pm
EVERYBODY SHOULD WORK TOGETHER AGAINST RCI CORRUPTION.
April 12th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
RCI and Fairfield should be ashamed. We bought our timeshare in New Orleans at Avenue Plaza on St. Charles Ave. several years ago. Fairfield assisted us in making one of the biggest financial mistakes my husband and I have ever made. Our Fairfield timeshare is out of Grand Desert in Las Vegas. We did not at any time understand that the unit?? in Las Vegas had to be taken as a trade for whatever destination we wanted. We only understood this to be our ownership or “physical property” for the deed to be issued from. We were told that we could call anytime, set up reservations to use our (points with Fairfield)—(weeks with RCI)anywhere. Tried several times to book destinations, being told that “we don’t have anything there because that’s a very popular destination; wouldn’t you like to take a trip to Williamsburg, VA? It’s a very historical place to visit!!!! ———— I’ve tried on multiple ocassions to get NYC. Little did I know that there is only one (1) NYC destination. I was told only a couple of weeks ago by the RCI lady: “No there’s nothing available in NYC. You will probably never be able to get in that one. I have worked here 8 years and have only been able to book the NYC Manhattan destination for someone 2 or 3 times.” I booked a week in New Orleans because we were about to lose our points. We had a week, but will lose Fri.,Sat., Sun., b/c we could not make it before then (Our fault for booking late.) In addition, the booking fee was $164 for a week’s stay in New Orleans which will cost 154,000 of our points. When arranging this trip,the RCI lady told me they only had the week of April 10th open, OR, if I paid a fee I could extend the date options past April 30. When I asked what was open past April 30, she stated she could not tell me until I PAID the FEE!!! I am constantly amazed by this company. Wish I had never heard of RCI or Fairfield. I never miss an opportunity to express to them how very disappointed I am in my timeshare–$19,000 plus financing— and $60 per month for maintenance. The same day I booked the New Orleans destination, a Wyndham rep called offering a vacation to several places I was not interested in. I told him I had just booked a trip to New Orleans so I had no more time off from work for a while to take a trip. As if he had not even heard what I said, He asked when and where would I be interested in traveling????????????????????????????????? I am totally fed up. If anyone knows of a good way out of this “albatross around my neck”, please let me know.
April 13th, 2009 at 8:25 pm
RCI website is VERY user unfriendly. I felt like a fool when I have tried and tried the dates that I want to travel, and it just came back said that nothing is available and try again. Please… Just show me what’s available within a 3 or 6 months period. I am flexible as far as the travel dates. Just show me the dates that you have available, and I will choose one that fits me the best. Wouldn’t that be easier for everybody?
I am having problems using my RCI points because only a hand full of resorts accepts pets that’s within 6 hours driving distance. Many upscale hotel chains are started accepting pets, and I don’t mind to pay a reasonable pet fee. Why not RCI resorts? Many of resorts are not that upscale anyway.
I also don’t like the way that RCI have changed it’s rule since last year. RCI are now limited only 1/3 of annual allocated points towards the “partners” program. And, if you are so lucky that you can use your points towards some of the partner’s programs before the expiration date, you will have to pay some $ in addition to the exchange fee and the points that RCI are taken from your account.
Does anyone think a $69 guest certificate fee is ridiculus? That’s in addition to the booking fee of at least $29, annual RCI membership fee of $109?, and the home resort annual maintenance fee of more than $600 a year.
RCI is no longer a timeshare exchange club. It’s more like a travel agency that are trying sell everything to its members. What a shame.
April 27th, 2009 at 7:19 am
Please help me!!!
We are in a desperate situation!!!
I went to PV with my wife on March. We end up purchasing a Mayan Palace week there and when we got back and were reading the papers we found out that none of the verbal promises about renting our weeks and selling our other timeshares were in the contract.
We got scared and call them to cancel right away. They told us to relax because they would send the cancellation letter to us but we never received it. Now that I called, they told us that we should have sent a letter of cancellation within our five days cancellation period. We were taken advantage from Mayan Palace twice.
We felt frustrated and taken advantage of. While checking with other victims of Mayan Palace on the web, I found a law firm in Mexico. We were so desperate that we end up hiring their services.
Does anyone have any experience with this company? The name Gonzalez & Gonzalez law firm. Please if you have any past experience with this company or with Mayan Palace, let me know about your case. We are crossing our fingers because we can not afford another timeshare.
April 29th, 2009 at 3:19 pm
Seems to me that none of you had any idea what you purchased. RCI does not sell timeshare weeks nor points at a resort. They are an exchange company that you use only if you wish to go outside your resort. RCI does not have sales people at the resorts. They are a third party. I have several RCI affiliated timeshare weeks and only call RCI if I wish to go someplace aside from my home resort. Actually, I have had very good luck with exchange I suppose because I bought good resorts.
April 29th, 2009 at 10:52 pm
My parents have just asked for my assessment of a problem they’ve had with Wyndham (Branson) for over 2 years. They received a form letter from Wyndham in March 2007, which did contain their contract number, indicating they had completed their payments and that Wyndham would be filing paperwork to have the deed issued to them. My father has talked with Wyndham employees at the Branson property (I’m not sure which Branson property, as I just discovered there are more than one) on several of their visits over the past 2 years, and has repeatedly been told someone would look into it, but they have never received the deed or any follow-up contact, other than to suggest that any problem must be at the Register of Deeds’ office. My father wrote to the Register of Deeds for the County in which Branson is located, and the Register’s office wrote to say they have no record of any deed being issued for/to my parents. My parents have generally enjoyed their Fairfield/Wyndham visits, but are aging and want to attempt selling their timeshare but cannot until they have a deed (as far as they/I understand, at this point). I’ve been scanning Internet complaints related to Wyndham for similar situations. Has anyone else been dealing with this?
May 2nd, 2009 at 11:40 am
We have just returned from our vacation in Mexico and we are canceling our contract with Mayan Palace Regency immediately. We were deceived and lied to in order to illegally and unlawfully obtain $25,000.00 U.S. dollars from us during our vacation. We attempted to cancel our contract at the resort within the 5 day cancellation period but our request to cancel was not accepted. we are triying. canceling our contract with the Mayan Palace and we are demanding a full refund of $25,000 to our accounts immediately.
We were told that the Mayan Palace would purchase our two timeshare weeks from us. They promised to pay us a total of $27,800 for the two weeks. They had a contract with the prices they would pay for our weeks but we were not given a copy. We were also not given copies of our credit application and we were not told that we were applying for Bank of America credit cards.
Upon review of our paperwork, we realized that copies of important papers had mysteriously been left out of the notebook that we were given. We also researched the Mayan Palace, their rental rates and sales practices on the internet at the resort. We spoke with our sales representative and asked him for the missing paperwork. He told us that he did not have the papers as they were already sent to Texas but in the same statement he said that we would be dealing with a company in Florida who would be buying our timeshares from us. This same company, Luxury Resort Management insisted on charging our credit card account for $399 in order to process the listing of our two timeshares.
We told them that we wanted to cancel our contract since we could not afford to pay for the Mayan timeshare without the money from the sale of our timeshares
The Mayan Palace refused to allow us to rescind our agreement. We were told that we could not cancel and we would lose all of our money that we paid to the Mayan Palace and that the cancellation period had passed, which was not true.
May 5th, 2009 at 9:03 am
i contacted profeco and they said they will help me, also i contacted a lawfirm in mexico called gonzalez & gonzalez, does anyone know anything about this firm?
May 7th, 2009 at 1:07 pm
Basically we fell for the same scam as others on all these different blogs. Ours was perpetrated at Club Velas Vallarta in PV which is like a rash on the internet when you Google their name with timeshare scam. We thought we were pretty savvy to the TS deal so we went in very lackadaisical. Huge mistake! The depth of their psychosis can’t be measured. I read the following quote in an article about Bernard Madoff that made us better understand:
“What is important to understand is that criminals come from every walk of life,” said Stanton E. Samenow, the author of Inside the Criminal Mind. “They may be highly educated, they may have family and friends and to all outward appearance not only seem normal, but superlative. They commit a crime not because they need the money or they hate humanity or they had a terrible childhood or a smothering mother, or because they are Jewish or Catholic or Christian. What connects them is basic: Their self-esteem rises or falls at the expense of another. Bernard Madoff shares personality traits with embezzlers and serial killers.”
We feel the bottom line is not only do the TS salespersons make a lot of money doing what they do but part of them actually gets off on screwing people. Our sales rep actually took us out to dinner at an excellent restaurant in PV with his family. He has his family involved! We’d passed emails for many months, talked on the phone and exchanged Christmas cards. This is the length they’re willing to go and the best thing to do is to not even go to the presentation. The presentation is not mandatory! The problem is how do we get the message to the unwitting traveler going to PV? We’re all here because we realize we’ve been scammed but most likely they have no idea what they’re about to get themselves into. Maybe somebody on this blog has some ideas.
I to have been in contact with Gonzalez and Gonzlez and would like to know more from anybody who has worked with them.
May 9th, 2009 at 10:38 am
Hi, well I hired the services of gonzalez and gonzalez.
So far, when i called the resort nobody answered either responded my e-mails, now they called me ,and somehow they want to negotiate. I guess gonzalez is doing his job, but will see.
I will keep you inform of the situation.
May 11th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
Thanks for the update. We’re really on the fence but I think we’re going to go with G&G also. I’m happy that you’re seeing some response so quickly. Please keep posting with updates and if we finally decide to go with G&G, we’ll do the same.
May 12th, 2009 at 8:04 pm
We just spoke to Gonzalez tongiht. Even though it has been 2 years since our Velas Vallarta Scam, Gonzalez seems to think he can recover some of our money. Of course he wants money up front to handle the case. While it seems legit and the retainer resonable we are very gun-shy of putting out even one more cent after we lsot so much to Velas. Has anywone worked long enough with Gonzalez tyo get some favorable results? please…we realy don’t want to spend any more money unless we have evidence that Gonzalez is on the level.
May 13th, 2009 at 9:34 am
hi stephanie, well so far everything is working for me, Gonzalez already cancel my contract, now they are fighting to get my downpayment back, the advice i can give you its to act now!!
May 19th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
I bought a time share unit in patriot resorts in berkshire, MA. I was given one bonus week every year for RCI membership. And like every one else found it is just gimic, you can never get a week using this. I have done my wors financial decision by buyin time share with RCI. I will advice stay way from such organization. Now i am trying to sell the unit, i am not sure how much i will loose.
May 24th, 2009 at 6:00 am
This firm contacted us on February 24th of this year. They claimed to “have a buyer for our timeshare”. The buyer was willing to pay top dollar (almost $15,000), and all we needed to do was pay $1250.00 for a “title search, document preparation, and closing fees”. We paid the $1,250.00 and were told to expect the completed closing documents once the title search was done. We were told the buyer had already committed to the sale.
After waiting the 2 weeks and hearing nothing, we called Premier (several times until we were finally able to get someone on the phone) only to be told the buyer had backed out last minute. We were also told that our “title search” funds were non-refundable and they abruptly brushed us off. We realized at this point we had been taken. We have since been given the run around by Premier Representatives, and no sale or follow up whatsoever.
So we began to do some research on this firm and found many others on line who have had same or similar experiences with this same firm. It turns out this company was just incorporated 2 weeks before the call we received from them. We have also searched all the addresses on the corporations of C&G Marketing Associates and the many other corporations under similar names with the same officers, and they are either private residences or mail boxes. After looking further we believe this firm was not even a licensed marketing firm in the state of Florida.
It appears (at least to us) that this is nothing more than a scam which takes advantage of people like us who wish they had never even bought a timeshare to begin with. To add insult to injury we are now scammed for another $1,250.00 which we truly cannot afford in this economy. It is heartbreaking!
June 15th, 2009 at 4:21 pm
Same scam here…so stupid. Anyway, I have a consultation with Gonzalez&Gonzalez tomorrow. Is everybody pretty happy with their services, anybody received any money back? What kind of fee are they charging? I can not afford to lose any more money on this scam. Thank you.
June 19th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
I used to work at the RCI centre in Ireland. I quit after 6 months because I could see members being ripped off all the time! The staff always complained to management that it is so hard to get an exchange the customer wants and have to sell sell sell or get fired. The database is rigged somehow to favour members who spend more. Quite easy to do and also very few people would need to be in on it. The floor staff definitely aren’t in on a scam and in general are frustrated they cant give people the holidays they want. The sales tricks are used to full effect on the staff also. Its regarded as being a very good place to work but I just couldnt leave my soul at the door every day I went in.
My advice; cancel your membership in writing by registered post, forward a copy of this to your lawyer then sell the timeshare as soon as you can. The whole timeshare industry is a pyramid scheme and is designed to rip people off. AVOID!
June 22nd, 2009 at 10:56 pm
Point 1: Timeshare is not an ‘investment’ in the conventional sense. You will never, ever get back what you paid for it. Over 50% of what you pay goes in marketing costs, and you will be very luck to get back 20% should you try to sell on the secondary market. The sales people talk about ‘equity’ like you were buying a house, but it is not remotely comparable.
Point 2: Timeshare can still be a good deal, if, and only if, you want to return to the resort where you own, and where you are of course guaranteed to be able to use your weeks or points every year – and you don’t need to be in RCI to do that. It then works out much cheaper than renting at the same resort, once you’ve been more than 3 or 4 times, and you are protected against inflation, apart from the maintenance fees (and check the contract carefully to see what options the resort has to increment these).
Point 3. You have almost no chance of exchanging into anything comparable to what you own. This is for two reasons: people who own good weeks at good resorts simply use them, rather than banking them for exchange; and there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that RCI manipulates the exchange process, which of course they control completely, so that good weeks never become visible to ordinary exchange-seekers. Let’s hope that the current court case exposes the shady practices by RCI that many of us suspect, such as selling banked weeks for cash, rather than putting them in the exchange pool.
Point 4: The whole Points Partners system is a scam. The exchange value of points is pitiful. You will waste thousands of points getting $100 off a car rental. Like airmiles, you can use them except when you really want to.
So in summary, stay away from timeshare altogether unless you know you want to keep coming back to the resort where you are buying; and stay away from RCI unless you have total flexibility on time, don’t really care where you may end up, and are prepared to jump on the phone or website the very day that any inventory does become available.
August 4th, 2009 at 12:52 pm
It comes down to simple economics. A dollar is worth a dollar, and an ounce of gold is worth an ounce of gold, but if someone can get you to trade your dollars or gold for some other “unofficial” currency, like points … then they set the rules. Once they have your money, they no longer care what quality service you can buy for your points. Pre-paying for any service is a risk, even if you pay an hour before you get the service. But paying 25 years in advance is a huge risk. It is easy to see how a resort would rather rent out the best rooms to a current cash paying renter, than to take “worthless” points.
Even a floating timeshare week (not points) is risky. Who is to say that the resort will make available to you a week that is even half-desireable? What is to stop them from offering the floaters only the bad weeks, hoping you’ll “bank your week till next year, and lose it”, so they can rent the best weeks out for cash?
Even the safest timeshare (fixed week) seems risky. Who is auditing the books to see where the maintenance fees go. And when other owners become deadbeats and don’t pay, who foots the bill?
I am not a timeshare expert, so I may have raised some irrational fears here. I hope others can clarify with their experiences.
August 23rd, 2009 at 1:43 pm
I had purchased a timeshare through RCI at the vacation village at weston about five years ago with a friend. To this day neither one of us has been able to use our week for anything, evrytime we try to get information on trading of using our timeshare we are always given the run around by all their representatives and they continually try to get us to spend more money to convert to points. We tried to market our timeshare and get rid of it for we can no longer afford to keep paying for something that we have never used. I fell victim to a marketing company called world wide marketing out of florida. They told me they would market our timeshare on several websites for a fee of $999.00 which would be added to our asking price so we would get our money back when the timeshare sold. They contacted me saying they had found a preapproved buyer and where waiting for the title work from the resort. When I contacted them and asked when to expect the paperwork for final sale they gave me the same excuse for two weeks about the resort and title company where holding everything up. I contacted the title company to verify and see what the problem was with the paperwork, my resort informed me that they had never received any request for a sale of our timeshare. I tried to contact the marketing company to see why they were giving me the run around and all of the phone numbers that I had previously used were disconnected and since have not been able to find or contact the marketing company meaning they left with my $999.00 and no services were rendered. I am recently found The Owners Advocate Grp which said they could help me cancel my timeshare and get our money back for an up front fee of $500.00, but after being scammed once I am not sure about giving them money up front or that they are even a legitimate company. Has anyone else heard of or worked with the owners advocate grp. I am to the point that I am willing to do almost anything to get out of my timeshare but at the same time cannot afford to spend money with no positive end results.
October 18th, 2009 at 9:29 am
I love RCI. Sorry everyone but I love RCI. I bought 2 seperate resale timeshares for a resort we go to every year for a total of $4000+maintenence. Actual value $25000. It previously cost us $4000 to rent for a week. Good score!! The weeks are not the actual times we want to go and have a higher point value through RCI therefore we are able to go for 10 days to that resort and we’re going to The Crane (reg.$1300 per night) for a week for our second time. This is livin! Through our RCI points membership we are always able to find something even in March. You just need to check very often for new trades.
October 19th, 2009 at 9:48 pm
Rci grandview at las vegas is the biggest scam in the world when i asked the salesman if we could sell back our timeshare she told us oh yeah we can buy back your timeshare no problem. LIARS!!!
October 20th, 2009 at 7:50 am
I have just returned from using a timeshare in Europe. When I booked the unit, I was told that there were no units available for exchange.
I was told that I could rent a unit close to where I want to exchange for over 800 US. When I arrived at the RCI unit, I was told that my unit was an exchange. Furthermore I could have booked it direct for less than one half of the price that RCI was charging.
When I arrived back in America, I had received a notification from a law firm that there is a class action suit against RCI for taking what should be exchanges and charging rental fees. I have never been so ripped off by an organization such as this unethical crowd. I did receive a partial refund, but feel I should only be charged for an exchange. This organization is a money factory and will continue to deceive its members until they are held accountable. NEVER rent from them under any circumstances!
October 21st, 2009 at 5:04 pm
I have owned my timeshare since about 2003 and have points with RCI. I have to say that overall I have had a very good experience. I have been able to exchange my point each time that I have needed going to the bahamas, mexico, and florida. Just last night I used 25,000 point to get a discount on airfare for my mother which saved her about 200 dollars. My only concern now is when I tried to purchase the ticket my credit card company wouldnt approve it and they actually called me this morning needing to check if I was authorizing the charge due to the fact that they had fraud complaints against the company who handles the reservations. So now I’m in a panic if the plane ticket will be OK. Has anyone had any problems with exchanging their points for plane tickets? Please let me know thanks.
November 7th, 2009 at 1:38 pm
Due to busy schedules, we find it difficult to find time to travel outside of our kids’ school vacations, and rarely are we able to plan more than six months in advance. We have been RCI weeks (as opposed to points) members for about 15 years and have NEVER received an equal quality exchange for our timeshare in Maui, and most times we are told nothing is available in the location or date range we request. This is completely the opposite of what the salesman told us in the sales presentation. We were told our Hawaii timeshare on the beach was the most desirable in the inventory, we would have no troubles at all trading for whatever we wanted, and even that our one week would equal two weeks at other resorts. None of this was true, unfortunately.
In addition, availability of units to you is extremely poor once they have your money. I was told recently, when trying to exchange my week in Maui, that there was nothing available on the beach or on a lake in California. Yet I live near the beach in California and went to a local RCI affiliated resort to find out if they had units available, and they quite enthusiastically said they did and that we could even stay at a reduced rate if we were willing to attend a timeshare sales presentation. What?!?!? Needless to say, I am one of the many involved in a class action lawsuit against RCI and am allowing my membership to lapse.
I do not understate the case when I say they provide the worst customer service of ANY organization I have ever been associated with. EVERY time you call to make an exchange, they will aggressively try to take more of your money in fees by trying to extend your membership. Even after I explain how unhappy I am with them, they STILL try to get me to extend my membership for additional fees. It’s almost comical, really, as if they have no ability to listen to their customers at all.
You may want to believe I am just a disgruntled RCI member trying to slander
RCI, or that RCI may work for you in your individual circumstance. But this is the first time I have ever been unhappy enough with a company to complain about them on the internet. If you are able to plan your vacations a year in advance outside of holiday and school breaks, and you are able to look at a unit in advance to ensure the quality, you may have an “OK” experience with RCI. But there are so many better companies and options out there, why even bother with this bureaucratic, dieing dinosaur?
November 10th, 2009 at 8:36 am
I just came from a “presentation” made by a very nice but competent sales person and her rude supervisor. After I told them that I wanted to check on the RCI-member resort (Balai Isabel in Tagaytay, Philippines) that is sponsoring the presentation and on RCI itself prior to signing-up, this sales supervisor promptly told me that “nobody who says they are interested but will come back ever comes back!” She reiterated that I do have an option to back-out within 15 days after signing up and paying a “deposit” but unless I can provide substantial proof of deceitful claims on their part, I’d have to pay around USD500 for legal fees related to my backing out. What??? I am thankful that I was able to keep my cool and that I did not allow my self to be bullied into signing-up. Too bad, I actually found the concept very attractive and the resort itself as quite good. The sales supervisor put me off and this website (and the comments in it) made me glad I was able to walk away with my dignity–and wallet–intact.
November 16th, 2009 at 1:23 pm
RCI sucks and I feel they are running some kind of scamm. We are leaving for Puerto Vallarta and I checked our reservation with the hotel. What RCI calls sleeps 4 and 4 privacy turned out to be 1 bed and 2 sofas. I know the resort well and what they call a sofa is a hard banquette attached to a wall. Where is the privacy?????
My daughter would have to sleep on one of those. We will end up spending more money upgrading so the poor kid can have a bed.
Too much aggrevation and I know we will sell our timeshare. Anybody want a time share in Sedona, AZ??? RCI is running some kind of scam. I can never get any location I want.
November 17th, 2009 at 12:30 pm
My wife and I were recently in Las Vegas and got involved in what we thought was just a 2-3 hour tour of a new resort to give them our input over lunch. Sounds simple..doesn’t it? All in the sake of (2) FREE tickets to a show. Don’t even waste your time with this one folks! After boarding the bus we headed off to what I can best describe as a “Cult”! Once we arrived, we were greated with over anxious and overly excited people, where we made our way into the movie chamber and had their so called lunch. After about an hour of listening to their cult like pitch about how “time shares are such a great investment”, we headed off for a tour of two sample rooms…why I still can’t figure this out! There pricing starts @ $42,000 for 1 week for life, then after we expressed no interest it dropped down to $29,990 followed up a visit from our reps “Manager” which then cut it to $19,990. After we told them we weren’t comfortable with a decision at this point in time they said, o.k., we’ll have you exit interview with so and so down stairs. Finally, I thought we were getting out of this Hell Hole of high pressure sales and lying tactics! Then our exit strategy with the closer was nothing more than another feable attempt as trying to crack us again. this time the price dropped to $5,490. One of the most annoying aspects of this whole entire day…yes I said entire day (6 hours), was how the just lie to your face. Why couldn’t we think about it for a few days, you know, sleep on it? After I asked the upstairs manager this, she said that once we leave this part of the presentation, they could not offer this deal to us for an entre year. But, after we listened to all of the B.S. down stairs on our exit interview, then he said we could get back to him in a few days in case we changed our minds! What a bunch of B.S.! After listening to these boobs… for hours I cannot believe they haven’t been investigated and shut down! Folks…you are gaining absolutely nothing by buying into this hogwash…if you thisnk it’s such a value…go see it for yourself @ the Grandview in Las Vegas! BTW – they push thru over 300-400 tours/day of couples trying to buy into this idea…what a bunch of losers!
February 2nd, 2010 at 11:59 am
Hi All,
I worked for RCI for 6 years, and it is the biggest rip off out there. Not joking. They take your week, and if it’s a good one, they will sell it as a cash vacation. So, when you go to exchange your weeks (or points) with RCI, don’t expect to really ever get a good resort-those one’s they will sell to you for a couple of grand, but they won’t be available to trade.
As for their guides, there are so many guidelines they make us go through to even meet our stats. If you call in looking for Hawaii on the beach, we must try to sell you Arizona or Boise Idaho instead. We are recorded, and if we don’t meet our stats, we are in big, big trouble.
Most guides start out there very friendly and enthusiastic, but a few months there, knowing you can never give the customer what they want, and deserve, it gets a little old and tiring, causing most of us to lose interest in the job.
I would never recommend RCI to anyone. They really do rip you off in a big way. I could go on and on, but I don’t have a week to write it all down!!
March 17th, 2010 at 8:36 am
I, as a ten plus week owner, have decided to bycott RCI and to use sites like redweek.com, trading places, private rentals, Timesharing Today, owner to owner exchanges and rentals, and owner organizations, etc. I have successfully used all of these tools to by pass RCI, as I had long believed they were using our units, they did not pay for, to rent out. They used to get 10 units a year or more from me as well as trade fees. They call me all the time now telling me how valuable my weeks will be if I give them early, They are right they would be very variable … to RCI and their rental revenue.
We owners pay RCI them to take our units so we can be screwed, and so they can earn substantial revenue from our assets without recompense. They make us pay a fee to belong to an entity that we allow to screw us. How many landlords would allow their tenants to sub-lease leased space at a profit with not even a rent being received back by the landlord. Effectively that is what we are doing.
However, what we really need is an formal advertised “RCI-boycott” internet site where we would soon have enough hits and enough members for this site to be high on the list people see as soon as they type RCI. This site should be sure to have only accurate information as shown by the court case and its totally ridiculous outcome, and that is my intent here.
As I understand it, RCI can and will rent out your banked week within 30 days if they are able to. If I am incorrect in that understanding please advise me of the correct interpretation. If RCI are able to rent out all banked weeks there will be no weeks left for exchange. At least only less or totally unattractive weeks are left.
If all members stopped giving them weeks, resigned their memberships and paid no dues, and stopped renting weeks from them they would be forced into higher advertising cost to rent their weeks and would run out of weeks to rent that they do not own them selves. The executives might even have to start living like the rest of us.
I would actually like to see an international “not for profit” company created with each private time share unit owner becoming a voting shareholder for some nominal amount (less than a membership to RCI, and charging reasonable transfer fees to hire management and staff to operate this entity. A singe transaction fee whether you or a guest is using the unit, or at least only the cost of preparing and sending such a certificate, when necessary.
We could all vote by internet for a volunteer board of directors, to set and enforce owner beneficial policies, to be carried out by our employees. It would take an initial infusion of capital through the initial share offering to legitimate unit owners to start up. The amount per owner small in relation to years of fees for little real benefit. The shares could have restricted sale, by requiring them to be transferred with unit ownership. Further we could restrict maximum votes per owner to a reasonable number, to avoid creation of a controlling block owned by developers or corporations such as RCI. With voting by internet, security password controlled, we could decide not allow proxy voting to further limit a voting block control developing.
The owners of time share exchange companies, management companies, etc. make huge money. See how they live and where they live. Do they live better than you?
That why they are in a business where the asset owners have no power. There are immense profits made at our expense. If we had all individual unit owners participating, we could negotiate from strength with developers, management companies to limit the immense profits being removed from owners and to, not just put a hold on maintenance fees but to, begin to reduce them. Imagine taking all of the profits from all of the parasites that live on we owners and putting those profits towards maintenance fee reductions, reduction of trading fees, banking fee and other fees.
I, as a professionally certified accountant, would love to see some lawyer time share owners, some private business person time share owners, other finance orientated time share owners and any one with appropriate business skills, that would like to start such an entity to get together and take on the parasites.
Lets hear it owners, are we going to just roll over, stick our legs and arms in the air and keep taking it, or can we all put a few bucks where our mouths are and start the boycott and put together a founding committee for our own non profit trading entity.
interested? norcen@hotmail.com
April 1st, 2010 at 6:05 am
This whole RCI point system is a joke. I am on what is called a test drive. Have 25,000 pts to use in 2 years. Tried this winter to go to Puerto Rico, waited my 45 days prior to fine there was nothing left. Your only option is constantly Domincan Republic. Heck then tried Collingwood Apr 16 & 17 (nice quiet time of year), again it would cost 16,000 pts or $350 for 4 ladies in a 2 room unit. In order to use only 9,000 pts, you have to stay a week. Therefore I said, put me for a week and I’ll come for the weekend…that no longer worked either for some strange reason. When I said it cost me $3000 to test drive the program for 25,000 pts and that one weekend would be equivalent to $1200 dollars, the subject was over. There has to be away to use these points without the constant restrictions. This is more trouble then booking online, and more expensives I should add. So chances are my husband & I will probably be kissing $3000 goodbye. Please think twice before buying into RCI….they say alot in 90 mins, but leave out the important “in between the lines stuff”.
May 2nd, 2010 at 12:01 pm
tried to extend my vacation time at the wyndham boardwalk in hawaii before i got there but was told there was nothing available When i arrived i noticed there did not seem to be very many people their. I went to the front desk and asked casualy where everyone was. They said it was not very busy about half full and that part of the hotel was shut down so as not to incure expences. What a great way to say nothing is available at this time.
May 2nd, 2010 at 7:07 pm
We also foolishly bought into Temptation Resort (formerly Blue Bay Premier). This place is such a scam, they said they could rent our additional weeks (3) for $500 a week and this would cover our deposit. Big lie. They said that we could easily get a week from RCI for 9000 pts. Not on your life(even in the 45 day short notice!) They made us sign a waiver that rescinded our rights to our 5 day rescission period. They actually have the nerve to say that they did have us sign it (they can’t lie because I have a copy), but that it is not part of the contract! (Illegal by their own laws!) They didn’t include the cost of airfare in the whole breakdown. Its gonna cost us more money to fly to Mexico and pay for the all inclusive that it would be to buy a package including hotel from a travel agent! Disgusting! With all the fees and charges RCI requires your next family vacation will cost 3 x’s what it should have.
June 6th, 2010 at 7:33 pm
Just arrived home from a RCI sales event.
We thought it would be interesting to experiance the sales techniques that are used as we are both in sales.
Wow these people are insane and will do just about anything to rip you off.
Our sales rep used a walker to get around and used that disability to gain our trust. We are really not sure that he even was disabled.
He took us on a very calculated ride which increased the pressure to buy slowly over the hour.
Although we were aware of what was happening, when it came time to say yes or no, it was hard to say no.
We were snapped out of the trace when I pulled out my laptop and googled RCI on their wireless network. Needless to say the salesforce was not impressed by what I found. Scam over.
These people appear to be normal people trying to make a living but they are snake oil salespeople who’s only goal is to separate you from your money.
Buyer beware
June 10th, 2010 at 8:14 pm
I decided to read these comments because I work at RCI and know how it is for the customer and the employee. Most say that the RCI practices are not ethical and you can’t get what you want. Even saying the employees don’t care. Well I’ll address this. I work there. They try to make it seem like it’s the “Greatest Place to Work” by baiting you with multiple vacations and contests to make it seem like a “fun” environment. We get treated worse than the customers at times. We had a tent day that “appreciated the employees for three hours”, during this time you would have thought wow, they really love me, but the intent was to impress the CEO and previous owner so she doesn’t know how the “family oriented and quality service company she sold” is now full of management that treat you horrible. Call Center work EVERY weekend, Most don’t have two days off in a row, and you don’t have leniency for family emergencies. While they do have days where they go out their way to appear like it’s a fun job, the everyday, weekly, monthly meetings say it all. They say they want you to give customer service, but they tell you that your call MUST average no more than 5 minutes. Is that RCI rep rushing you or pushing you?? Yes, why?? not because we don’t know how to treat you the customer, but because we are mandated to get you sold and push you off the phone on to the next call. The managers there do not care about the individuals, they tell you that there is inventory in there, that we aren’t searching but really, honestly…there is none. Yet they’ve increased not decreased our expectancy levels. Think I’m lying.. I invite you to call and ask for ANY PLACE in the USA for the Summer and you may find a STUDIO in Branson, Absolutely nothing on the entire east coast, nothing at all west except Las Vegas or spots in Arizona. You better want to go to Mexico cause that’s IT! They’ll tell you that you should have called sooner which is true but that hold us the reps responsible for hitting goals OR ELSE. They have it set up in now FOUR areas that hit these marks or you are fired in three months. That’s that good ole “Greatest Place to work” ethics. So while you the customers are feeling, we are feeling the rath as well and probably won’t have a full center within five months… You will see something new about those “WEEKS” you have. Nothing is ever in NYC, nothing is EVER in Puerto Rico UNLESS you purchase it.. So most of these statements are accurate just remember that rep that’s pushing you off the phone, is doing so not because they want to, it’s because they have to, it’s monitored and if they don’t meet their standards of pressure, they’re out the door and to the unemployed world
June 16th, 2010 at 5:35 pm
I’ve heard most, if not all of these stories many times. Just different folks. Remember the old saying(s). “This sounds to good to be true” or “Stupid is as Stupid does” Well………? As some have said, always buy on the resale market, buy low and search for resorts with low maintenance (hard to find). I own 4 red weeks, in a small timeshare in Washington State. I pay low fee’s and have a fantastic group of people to work with at our resort. We also have excess to extra weeks with our resort.
We have been members of RCI weeks for almost 20 years. We learned from the gitgo, if you want a certain resort and you are not flexible with planning out 12-24 months (weeks only) you more then likely will not get it. Do I always get what I want? No. Close, Yes. I have traded all over the US and Canada with only a few glitches.
Like most all of you, I have my own issues with RCI. Maybe I’ve been lucky 150+ times.
One thing I have learned to do is put a resort on “Hold” check it out on the internet before I confirm my reservation. For those of you who are sticking with timesharing, I’m looking into other sources as, DAE, Platinum Exchange, Redweek, etc; Good Luck!
June 22nd, 2010 at 8:00 pm
Hi Everone,
I appreciate this forum to learn more on RCI and timeshare and your negative experiences with this. I am glad that i did not agree to buy the timeshare that was being offered to me last night (a resort here in the philippines that is affilliated with RCI). The sales agent was urging us to accept the offer on the same day. Probably so that we would not know any negative experiences that other had experieced with it. I almost sign in and paid the downpayment fee that they were asking me. Thanks.
Anthony
August 6th, 2010 at 7:35 am
I just came back from St Martain which I stayed one week at my time share and was disgusted. They take your deposit of $150 for sure.BUT WAIT FOR IT?—- only would give one key—when there was two of us,– and pool towels wern’t available untill that evening.— Bareing in mind we did not bring our own towls and wanted to go to the pool right away Then when I got to my studio only to find –white bathroom towels were on. the floor? rack was broked also second clothes rack was hanging down also broken..The door it under the sink was laying on the floor– toilet wouldn’t flush—-Tv was so noisy on several channels we didn’t bother using it. Stove? what a joke we couldn’t regulate it- S0 So dangerous.. No teaspoons etc etc — And no orientation to talk to anyone – So what if it rains? – or only a few people show up. – HAVE IT IN THE LOBBY—-One person is as inportant as 100.. Plus they make sure on arrival that the least helpful person assists you —all we were told over and over WAs come back later- and when we did do that — then the night staff said OH come back in the morning…Terrible Terrible What are we paying our money for– And the manager I did speak with the next day — Had no interest wehat so ever. Something needs to be done about this. after all we go to get a nice vacation and relax and al it was was stress “SHAME ON YOU ” for not making sure before people arrive that there hotel or time share is maintained especially when you know the time and day they are coming..Where is our money going Disgusted
mgb.
August 18th, 2010 at 11:15 am
RS Says:
October 18th, 2009 at 9:29 am
I love RCI. Sorry everyone but I love RCI. I bought 2 seperate resale timeshares for a resort we go to every year for a total of $4000+maintenence. Actual value $25000. It previously cost us $4000 to rent for a week. Good score!! The weeks are not the actual times we want to go and have a higher point value through RCI therefore we are able to go for 10 days to that resort and we’re going to The Crane (reg.$1300 per night) for a week for our second time. This is livin! Through our RCI points membership we are always able to find something even in March. You just need to check very often for new trades.
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Be careful folks. Usually when you read a positive comment such as the one above it is considered a online troll. Probably someone from the company trying to make an otherwise useless comment to deter others from cancelling their contracts.
On another point I’d like to make. We, as Americans, are very ignorant when it comes to contractual obligations and contract law. Do yourself a favor such as what I did. I studied for a term at school of Contracts I and Torts I at my local law school. It was amazing what I learned about what Contract Law is about. It is NOT what YOU THINK. Contracts are NOT WHAT YOU THINK. We do not really know anything about contracts like you think you do until you have a law professor teach you what Contract Law is. These RCI folks play on your ignorance and you end up thinking that you cannot do anything after the fact. That is not true. I am not an expert, but I know far more than I did and I also come up with better questions to ask before signing. I am also better suited to argue the terms and I am much more direct and expect them to follow through with the terms. I decided to quit after one term because I want to get a paralegal certification instead of the spending the money for law school because I decided that I do not need a JD, but only a cert to enhance my current career, but my term was worth every penny. Find a local college or online school and take Contract Law and learn. You won’t regret it, but businesses will regret it because you’ll become wiser and informed and that is NOT what they want. They want suckers!