The printer may be a temporary glitch (even new machines can have problems, or be a lemon, and then you have to struggle with the provider to replace it). Also, sending out a replacement membership card for one that is worn (rather than lost) is probably low on the priority list.
Nevertheless, it is a misconception to accept poor service under the belief that it is saving us from dues. It is not. There are two operations: (a) home office operations which include member accounting and things like sending out membership cards; (b) all matters dealing with reservations and the use of points (which would include sending out reservation and transaction statements). Under the controlling documents, the first is officially designated to be in the hands of the "Disney Vacation Club Management Company" (DVCMC), the second in the "Buena Vista Trading Company" (BVTC). For all intents and purposes they are basically the same as senior management is the same.
Most of your dues go to resort specific expenses (e.g., the administration/front desk, employee and equipment costs incurred at the particular resort). The part of the dues that goes to cover home office expenses and related accounting and other mangement services provided by DVCMC is designated as the "Management Fee" in the budget. That fee is 12.5% of the annual total operating budget before adding that fee; the percentage cannot go up or down. The total amount paid can go up simply because the 12.5% may be applied to a higher total amount of other dues each year. Thus, if DVCMC reduces home office expenses by keeping dated and lousy equipment it does not change your actual dues one bit--it only changes the portion of the 12.5% of the dues DVCMC gets to keep after paying expenses.
As to any expenses of MS having to do with reservations and use of points, the only part of your dues that goes to the operating expenses of BVTC (which is commonly known as Member Services) is a $1 per member annual charge paid by the association to BVTC. That charge also cannot go up or down. Thus, if MS is cutting costs by hiring too few peoiple or having dated equipment, it also does not save you one dime in dues. That annual fee actually covers little of any of MS's expenses as the total for all 5 resorts annually is only about $60,000 (assuming there are as reported about 60,000
DVC members). To understand where BVTC gets the rest of its money, requires an understanding of the division of "breakage" income. Rooms left unreserved by members 60 days out can be rented by DVCMC/BVTC (and they go through CRO). That breakage income is then divided 3 ways: (a) first it goes to offset dues but only up to a maximum of 2.5% of the operating budget per resort per year (meaning no more than a few hundred thousand per year or less per resort--the total amount of breakage income that goes to offset dues is likely less than $700,000 for all resorts combined); (b) next the breakage income goes to BVTC to cover all of its operating expenses, plus it gets an additional 5% of its total budgeted costs for the year; (c) anything left over goes to DVCMC (which would be in addition to its 12.5% annual fee that comes out of dues).
As a result, any cost cutting done in relation to Member Services or home office operations has no effect on the amount of your dues. Though the exact amount of breakage income BVTC and DVCMC is unkown, you can take an educated guess. For example, just use a very conservative 5% of the rooms being rented per night under the 60 day breakage. You are going get a lot more rooms on weekends than weekdays available to rent and some seasons will be fuller than others but an overall 95% occupancy rate of DVC available rooms by members (and others through trades) per year (leaving 5% to rented) would be a very high annual occupancy rate. Five percent of all rooms at all of the resorts is at least 70 per night on average for all five resorts. If you assume just an average rental rate of $250 per night, you get over $6 million a year in total breakage income for the resorts. Reality is likely a lot higher as previously reported annual occupancy rates by DVC members (and those using the rooms by members trading out) have been in the less than 90% range (and closer to 80%). Thus, that total breakage income figure could easily be in the $12 to $18 million range.
Bottom Line: Don't assume bad service from MS and home office has anything to do with saving you money in dues. But if those rooms available at the breakage period are becoming more difficult to rent because of the economy and events, you are likely to see cost cutting being done at MS and home office because they are getting less in breakage income than anticipated.
My numbers faded a long time ago, unless I get the light to reflect of it "just right"
