The we loooooove Club Wyndham Bonnet Creek Part 4

ugh, so so sad to get the email from Tripbound last night. They were a great company to deal with, much better than Vacation Strategies IMO. The email didn't leave much hope for a refund, so I went ahead and called my credit card company and started a dispute. I should be getting a refund from the cc company.
 
I'm booked for early September through Hotwire. Hopefully this won't affect that reservation, but I'll keep an eye on it. So sorry for the companies going out of business and the people whose travel plans ARE affected by this.
 
Also their Facebook page is gone, website down, and phone number no longer works. That basically means no refunds. This was the first time I was going to use this company and they had such great reviews.
Who is "their"? Tripbound?

I got Tripbound's email and was shocked they would have to completely shut down like that. I've used them before and was planning to use them again in 2021.

I guess I don't know the mechanics of "guest reservations" to know why this type of change by Wyndham would mean that Tripbound, et al, could not provide refunds. And, moreover, completely wipe them out. I would have thought Tripbound would pay for the reservation, then if cancelled for some reason, Tripbound would have to get the refund back from the owner, who in turn would have to get it back from Wydham, which would definitely take some time, but am I missing something? Or is it that the owners feel no compulsion to procure the refund, only to forward it to someone else?
 
Who is "their"? Tripbound?

I got Tripbound's email and was shocked they would have to completely shut down like that. I've used them before and was planning to use them again in 2021.

I guess I don't know the mechanics of "guest reservations" to know why this type of change by Wyndham would mean that Tripbound, et al, could not provide refunds. And, moreover, completely wipe them out. I would have thought Tripbound would pay for the reservation, then if cancelled for some reason, Tripbound would have to get the refund back from the owner, who in turn would have to get it back from Wydham, which would definitely take some time, but am I missing something? Or is it that the owners feel no compulsion to procure the refund, only to forward it to someone else?
I don't know how the rental companies work, but as an individual owner I would get the points from a cancelled reservation refunded to my Wyndham account. There isn't a monetary refund, just the points that were used for that reservation. I get an annual allotment of points associated with my contract and for those I pay annual dues (and any upfront purchase price for the contract of course). So I'm not sure if the rental companies actually own contracts or act as brokers for individual owners. If they own contracts for the sole purpose of renting them out, they could be on the hook for thousands and thousands of dollars in dues. So if they can't rent out the reservations they might not be able to meet the financial obligations of the dues payments without the ability to bring in income. Even if points are returned, they do them no good for the time being and if they don't have cash reserves to weather big business interruptions like this, they're sunk.
Maybe I'm over-simplifying, but that's how I'm thinking it is working.

I'm thinking there will be an influx of resale contracts available that have points on them hitting the market soon, if not already. I haven't looked at eBAY or anywhere lately, though. If anyone is thinking of buying in, definitely do your homework. The dues vary at the different resorts, so cost of ownership over time can vary quite a bit.
 


The middleman timeshare rental companies are in bad spot. They have no real inventory or product, thus are in a no-win situation in a crisis.

In normal times, they rent you a stay for $1000, pay the timeshare owner $800 and keep $200.

Then COVID hits.

The renter wants their $1000 back. The timeshare owner already spent the $800 and says "no refunds."
The middleman company already spent its $200 on salaries, marketing, etc.

Then Wyndham says "no more guest reservations" and all the middleman's potential inventory is disappeared. There is nothing to sell and losses can't be recouped.

Some of these middleman companies may survive if they were conservative with how they managed the cash for rentals. When travel heats up again, there will still be timeshare owners out there that want to rent and there will be people who want to rent from them -- but prefer a middleman. New companies may emerge quickly.
 
As a platinum owner and a small time renter I do think that Wyndham has gone overboard with their extreme reduced occupancy. Heck even many owners are getting their personal vacations cancelled, My personal vacation was cancelled. I had only one renter booked at the time all of this happened and I did refund the money.
While this won't cause me to forfeit my ownership it certainly will put a dent in my budget with no rentals to offset the fees.
 
We contacted our renter yesterday and we discussed our options for our planned/paid September booking. Since we are offsite/tickets from UT, I know there's a good chance we won't get a WDW park reservation even if Wyndham does open back up to guest bookings. We decided for now to leave it in place and revisit when closer. Then if we don't get WDW reservations and/or Wyndham doesn't allow our guest booking we'll reschedule everything for some time next year. We'd like to keep our money with our renter, we want them to still be open at the end of this!
 


A couple years ago, Wyndham changed some of the booking rules, knowing point-renting sites were taking advantage of the 30 day refund/exchange policy, or something like that.

I wonder if this extreme move was done to knock rental agencies completely out of the picture. Not cool, if true.
 
We have an owner reservation at Bonnet Creek Oct 3-10th. We we're told they would notify us 30 days in advance if they needed to cancel it for occupancy reasons. We are AP holders so we have tickets.... hoping everything will work out.
 
A couple years ago, Wyndham changed some of the booking rules, knowing point-renting sites were taking advantage of the 30 day refund/exchange policy, or something like that.

I wonder if this extreme move was done to knock rental agencies completely out of the picture. Not cool, if true.
I don’t know as much about this as I should before running my mouth, but that truly seems like biting the hand that feeds you. Their megapoint renter owners have bought a lot of contracts, keeping at least some reasonability in the resale market. A lot of timeshares go for so cheap - the developer needs some of those resales back to sell more points (foreclosure) but it’s better in the long run for their direct sales to have the resale points/weeks not be GIVEN away. I think it’s truly just panic right now at the low occupancy levels needed for complying with governmental and public health mandates - I can’t imagine the mess the WBC resort would be in if they had full occupancy and trying to enforce social distancing at the pools this summer. Kinda makes me wish I was an owner - but not enough to buy 🙃
 
Its hard to imagine Wyndham sticks to this extreme occupancy reduction for the rest of 2020. Florida is already moving to Phase 2 tomorrow (June 5). The parks are reopening and people are dying to travel and get out. There is too much money to be made to keep the resort at 50% capacity. By September I'd wager it will be business as usual and back to full levels of occupancy.

Guests still may be restricted since they want to give owners first rights and I understand that. But owner dues only go so far. They need people in the resort spending money at the bars, restaurants, etc... They also need to sell people timeshares and they can only perform that "trick" if they have people on site to begin with.
 
Guests still may be restricted since they want to give owners first rights and I understand that. But owner dues only go so far. They need people in the resort spending money at the bars, restaurants, etc... They also need to sell people timeshares and they can only perform that "trick" if they have people on site to begin with.

This only sounds good all points are owned and shouldn't the owner be able to use them at their discretion? Even if that means renting them giving them away. Wyndham should't be able to tell an owner how to use their points.
 
This only sounds good all points are owned and shouldn't the owner be able to use them at their discretion? Even if that means renting them giving them away. Wyndham should't be able to tell an owner how to use their points.

I agree with you. But I'm sure Wyndham has the "final say" on who can and can't book if you read the timeshare contract.

My guess is that Wyndham assumed they would have limited staff to operate the resorts when given the "go ahead" so cutting down the capacity makes sense from this point of view. But the situation is fluid and people are getting out and about. People are ready to get back to work, and more importantly, begin traveling again.

We will see how "limited" their capacity is once their competitors beginning filling their resorts back to max occupancy.
 
They also need to sell people timeshares and they can only perform that "trick" if they have people on site to begin with.
I think this will be the biggest driver to increase capacity, they want the sales team to be back in action! :crazy:
 
I'm wondering how this impacts a trade thru RCI? if it does at all? or is that considered a guest if it's a trade?
 
I'm wondering how this impacts a trade thru RCI? if it does at all? or is that considered a guest if it's a trade?
There is no availability for WBC in RCI until October at the moment. I have not seen any posts on TUG about them being canceled. RCI exchanges could be a tiny percentage of rooms, thus they are letting them continue. I don't know.

Also, while you can pay to add a guest certificate for an RCI exchange, you are not allowed to rent exchanges (not that it doesn't happen, I see it all the time for Saratoga Springs).

The bulk of renting at WBC comes from Wyndham owners, and with guest certificates being canceled, that is stopped for now.
 
hi all. New here and never stayed at Wyndham Bonnet Creek before. We are NOT Wyndham owners, but have bought/rented weeks for other Wyndham resorts in other areas, off ebay. We are looking to come down in July (12-19) and I do see this available on ebay. Should I have any concerns? I haven't read all pages here, but I see talk about limited capacity and cancellations and not allowing "guests" of owners? Can someone fill kn tne newbie??? Thanks!!

Note, we are NOT looking to go to the parks, just a resort vacay.
 
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hi all. New here and never syaed at Wyndham Bonnet Creek before. We ard NOT Wyndham owners, but have bought/rented weeks for other Wyndam resorts in other areas, off ebay. We are looking to come down in July (12-19) and O see this available on ebay. Should I have any concerns? I haven't read all pages here but I see talk about limited capacity and cancellations. Can someone fill kn tne newbie??? Thanks!!

Note, we are NOT looking to go to the parks, just a resort vacay.
Welcome to the thread! I'm sorry to say, but yes, you should have concerns. Wyndham is cancelling reservations that have a guest certificate on them (which basically means that the reservation is in the name of someone other than the owner). From what I understand, even if the reservation is made in the owner's name and then the guest certificate is applied closer to the check-in date, it will still be cancelled. I personally wouldn't rent a Wyndham reservation until they announce that guest reservations are back to being honored. The thing is that nobody knows how long this phase will be, maybe it will vary resort by resort, not sure. My guess is that the eBay reservations that you see available are people that maybe started the listings before Wyndham made the announcement on reduced occupancy, or maybe they're hedging their bets that the first wave of reduced occupancy will be lifted by July. As an owner, I'm even unsure of whether or not our July 18th reservation will be cancelled or not. If their reduced occupancy goal is not met by guest cancellations, they will start cancelling owner reservations based on when the reservation was made.

Here's a link to the COVID-19 Resort info from Wyndham: https://clubwyndham.wyndhamdestinations.com/us/en/covid-19-information/list-of-impacted-resorts
 
Welcome to the thread! I'm sorry to say, but yes, you should have concerns. Wyndham is cancelling reservations that have a guest certificate on them (which basically means that the reservation is in the name of someone other than the owner). From what I understand, even if the reservation is made in the owner's name and then the guest certificate is applied closer to the check-in date, it will still be cancelled. I personally wouldn't rent a Wyndham reservation until they announce that guest reservations are back to being honored. The thing is that nobody knows how long this phase will be, maybe it will vary resort by resort, not sure. My guess is that the eBay reservations that you see available are people that maybe started the listings before Wyndham made the announcement on reduced occupancy, or maybe they're hedging their bets that the first wave of reduced occupancy will be lifted by July. As an owner, I'm even unsure of whether or not our July 18th reservation will be cancelled or not. If their reduced occupancy goal is not met by guest cancellations, they will start cancelling owner reservations based on when the reservation was made.

Here's a link to the COVID-19 Resort info from Wyndham: https://clubwyndham.wyndhamdestinations.com/us/en/covid-19-information/list-of-impacted-resorts
Thank you for the quick and informative response!
 
hi all. New here and never stayed at Wyndham Bonnet Creek before. We are NOT Wyndham owners, but have bought/rented weeks for other Wyndham resorts in other areas, off ebay. We are looking to come down in July (12-19) and I do see this available on ebay. Should I have any concerns? I haven't read all pages here, but I see talk about limited capacity and cancellations and not allowing "guests" of owners? Can someone fill kn tne newbie??? Thanks!!

Note, we are NOT looking to go to the parks, just a resort vacay.
Its such a gorgeous property! I'd hold off for now but definitely keep on your list for when this settles out.
 

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