Beware: Magical Holidays seller on Ebay

[TwylaT]

Magical Holidays is an Ebay seller who sells weeks at resorts. Bought a week from him for the Sheraton Vistana Resort in LBV. The certificate was for a unit with a Full Kitchen, which in SVR units, is the 1-Bedroom Premium. I verified with Magical Holidays that it was a Full Kitchen unit and bought the week. When we arrived (a few months later) we were told the unit booked was a Small 1-Bedroom with a kitchenette -- half the square footage of the Premium unit and no balcony. I contacted Magical Holidays who said the week came from RCI and he would contact them to try to straighten it out. Never heard from him again despite my follow-up messages. I think he realized that it was too late for me to leave negative feedback so he just didn't care.

 

[Brian Noble]

I contacted Magical Holidays who said the week came from RCI and he would contact them to try to straighten it out.

For others reading along, reselling weeks from RCI is a big no no. This is reason enough not to do business with them.

 

[Upatnoon]

The Magical Holidays I am familiar with has been on eBay for decades. It is the eBay arm of Skyauction.com.
They are a travel consolidator that sells excess timeshare inventory, getting it directly from places like RCI.
Anyway, this was the case in past. I see that skyauction.com is still active. The Magical Holidays on ebay is a top-rated seller with 9,600 items sold since 2011, so it would it would make sense they are unloading units for RCI.

 

[Brian Noble]

I sit corrected!

 

[bankr63]

I would point out that a lot of the small 1BR units at SVR are considered a full kitchen - generally the Cascades ones are full kitchen while the Lakes are not. The differentiation is the types of appliances, not the size. A full kitchen will have a fridge, range, microwave and dishwasher (regardless of size, includes apartment sized). A kitchenette does not have all the above; in Lakes it is the presence of a cooktop instead of a range and that downgrades it. If you had an oven (range) in your villa then it was probably considered a full kitchen.

(ETA: just looked at the villas again on Vistana.com and they do now say that Cascades is a kitchenette with only a cooktop, but the photos on that listing clearly show a range. This is probably transitioning as units are renovated.)

Better with Vistana 1BR to ensure that the unit includes a balcony. Even that is not a guarantee as some end unit small 1BR do apparently have balconies/patios too but they aren't common whereas more than half of the small 1BR are considered to have full kitchens.

Regardless, whether their fault, or RCI's, or Vistana's (Marriott property management are the ones that assign the villa) the customer service experience deserves a knock if they didn't follow through.