$5 Package Handling Fee

[MaryLovesPoohBear]

Disagree with members paying for package delivery as part of their dues. If everyone decided to have a package delivered every trip it would get out of hand and fees would have to be increased for the majority to support a minority request.

This should be a use fee for those who want an added service. I don't want to pay for your boxes and you should not have to pay for mine.

Or for someone like who has never had a package delivered. And I don't plan to. We drive and pack everything we need in the car.

I would really prefer that each person pay for their box delivery.

Yes, we could forget something and need to have it mailed, but I would consider the fee the consequences of forgetting.

 

[KAT4DISNEY]

Disagree with members paying for package delivery as part of their dues. If everyone decided to have a package delivered every trip it would get out of hand and fees would have to be increased for the majority to support a minority request.

This should be a use fee for those who want an added service. I don't want to pay for your boxes and you should not have to pay for mine.

That wasn't really the debate as far as I could tell. The debate is that if this is being done then at the DVC only resorts, where all expenses are covered by dues already, the money received from this should be going back as an offset against the dues.

At the cash resorts - well that's the Disney resorts sandbox and they can do with the revenue as they wish although some there ought to offset expenses and thus DVC owners there get some small offset of it.

 

[drusba]

This isn't just happening at DVC; it is happening at all Disney resorts, and for cash guests as well. Things delivered by courier (Garden Grocer, Owners Locker, etc.) are not charged, but things that come in via a standard shipper (USPS, FedEx, etc.) are. I suspect the fact that it applies to all guests on a fee-for-service basis would invalidate any double charging arguments, but IANAL.

It is not an issue of whether it is happening to both cash guests and DVC members. The problem with charging members is that all the employees' hours devoted to the entire day are already paid for by members via dues. Having to deal with and deliver packages does not raise the hourly cost of those employees beyond what the dues already cover. Thus, charging members an extra fee for the delivery is what is called creating a "common expense surplus" over the costs charged in the dues, which legally either should not be charged to the members or should be returned to the members via an offset in dues, and not kept by Disney as a profit. If Disney can charge fees in that situation and keep the money, you could soon have total fees greater than your dues as Disney could do such things as charge a check-in fee, a check-out fee, a fee to use Bell services, a fee to use the pool, a fee to ride a bus, etc., etc., despite that the operating costs of all of those things are already paid for by dues.

When there was free valet, members could not be charged for it because the employee cost of the service was already covered in the dues since the employees wages were paid via dues. But Disney could and did charge non-DVC members for the service. Disney then outsourced all its valet services taking all those employees' salaries out of the DVC dues and thus the valet service could charge members for valet parking because the costs were no longer covered by dues. The same applies to the package deliveries at resorts with convention centers because the handling of such packages is not done by employees who are covered by our dues. In other words, for Disney to charge us the $5 and not have it returned to members via an offset in dues, it has to be able to demonstrate there is actually an extra $5 per package handling cost out there that is definitely not covered by dues, and even if there is some extra cost that can be definitely demonstrated, Disney can charge us for only the cost not some cost plus a profit, meaning the cost actually has to equal $5 per package.

 

[4evryoung]

This should be a use fee for those who want an added service. I don't want to pay for your boxes and you should not have to pay for mine.

But by the same logic, I don't use a car at Disney, so why should I pay for the up-keep of parking lots...

 

[maxiesmom]

But by the same logic, I don't use a car at Disney, so why should I pay for the up-keep of parking lots...

Disney doesn't charge on site guests to park.

 

[Brian Noble]

he problem with charging members is that all the employees' hours devoted to the entire day are already paid for by members via dues.

One could argue that this work, specifically, imposes extra hours of work on the front desk staff, and that is why guests are charged directly for the service for those otherwise un-needed hours (with some administrative overhead to manage the process).

It is even possible that some of this revenue is used to offset the fraction of front desk labor charged to DVC Members. I'm not sure we know either way.

 

[drusba]

One could argue that this work, specifically, imposes extra hours of work on the front desk staff, and that is why guests are charged directly for the service for those otherwise un-needed hours (with some administrative overhead to manage the process).

It is even possible that some of this revenue is used to offset the fraction of front desk labor charged to DVC Members. I'm not sure we know either way.

But the annual budget is supposed to provide an amount of dues based on an estimate of the entire year's total operations and use of employees, i.e., if there are in fact extra hours, they are supposed to be part of the original budget. Then you have two additonal factors: (a) if actual costs during the year are greater than the estimate of the total operational costs, including employee costs, then the only proper way to charge members for the extra amount is via a "special assessment"; but (b) to avoid its having to pay dues for the interests it owns in the resort annually, DVC guarantees to cover any excess costs and make no special assessments except for costs resulting from disasters or higher than anticipated property taxes. In other words, if DVC wants to charge us for any extra operational costs of the front desk or bell services, it needs to do so via a special assessment (which, by definition actually can include amounts charged to specific members and not others ), but it cannot do so because it has guaranteed to make no special assessments.

If the amounts are actually being used to offset dues, then fine, most of us probably would not complain. The problem I am having is that there is nothing to indicate the $5 fee is going back to the association to be used as an offset of dues and it may well be just another profit center that Disney has created.

 

[CMNJ]

I've read previously that all mail and UPS/FedEx packages for Disney hotels is sent to a central processing center that then delivers to the individual hotels. Is it possible that due to the sheer volume of packages now being sent prior to guests arrivals that the cost of administering that internal mail service has significantly risen and the fee is to off set that more so than the actual costs of the personnel at the DVC resorts?

 

[drusba]

I've read previously that all mail and UPS/FedEx packages for Disney hotels is sent to a central processing center that then delivers to the individual hotels. Is it possible that due to the sheer volume of packages now being sent prior to guests arrivals that the cost of administering that internal mail service has significantly risen and the fee is to off set that more so than the actual costs of the personnel at the DVC resorts?

They might be able to justify it that way if they can show the charge is only for the services of local handling and delivery provided and charged by an outside contractor that handles mail for all of WDW and delivers to the resort, making the resort just the collector of a fee that is paid to an outside contractor and the costs of the outside contractor are not included in the budget (e.g., like the business centers at convention resorts). That woud still have a problem though if the budget is supposed to include the costs which it may well do if the outside contractor is a Disney entity, e.g., transportation is a budget item though it is provided by a Disney entity outside of the resort, and if the cost of transportation rises during the year, they cannot assess the members the increase during the year; the administration and front desk charge in the dues is supposed to include the costs of "operational and administrative support provided by the Walt Disney World® Resort" The Walt Disney World® Resort is a reference to Disney entities on site that provide support services to the parks and resorts.

 

[disneynutz]

I've read previously that all mail and UPS/FedEx packages for Disney hotels is sent to a central processing center that then delivers to the individual hotels. Is it possible that due to the sheer volume of packages now being sent prior to guests arrivals that the cost of administering that internal mail service has significantly risen and the fee is to off set that more so than the actual costs of the personnel at the DVC resorts?

We have seen UPS delivering to the resorts so that may have changed now.

Bill