DVC Housekeeping SSR

[kweaver]

I agree...there is no excuse.

I find the best way to get a positive response to problems like these is to get face to face with a manager. I realize that no one wants to deal with anything like this on vacation, but we have to let DVC know that we expect better.

If mold is growing that quickly, maybe the default setting for the AC is too high. (Yes, I know it grows quickly in humid environments, I live in the South! )

 

[tjkraz]

There is no excuse for dirty rooms.

Well, I think that's a little extreme. Face it...things happen. Staff calls in sick. There are miscommunications regarding rooms that need to be cleaned. Supervisors get called to other areas to handle an emergency. The list goes on and on...

Last time I checked, we aren't living in a perfect world. Mistakes will happen. What's more important, IMO, is how the resort handles such mistakes. Problems such as this should be promptly (and politely) reported to give the resort management a chance to address them.

When you've got 500+ rooms at OKW turning over 2-4 times per week, that's an awful lot of guests checking into new rooms in a month's time. Two recent reports at two different resorts...even among a community as small as The DIS...do not necessarily indicate a need for wholesale management changes.

 

[kweaver]

I don't expect perfection either. I do, however, expect a business that I've handed 15K of my money over to...to STRIVE for perfection. There are times when things go wrong. When you are running a business you need to be ready to handle those mistakes and problems that crop up. You need to have a back up plan, whether it's diverting other staff to do the housekeeping job for the folks who didn't show up...or being proactive by streamlining your communication system. If your housekeeping staff can't handle the load of a resort with 100% occupancy, then bite the bullet and hire more of them...or don't take as many reservations. If I was paying $500 a night cash for a room with a "used", dirty toilet and mold growing on the floor, you bet I'd be at the front desk getting something done about it.

If you are running a pizza business and you are open to take orders, you better be able to follow up and deliver those orders properly...or you aren't going to be in business very long.

We've been hearing about housekeeping issues at all of the resorts (some more than others) for a long time. It's not clear to me that even a verbal message to the front desk at the end of a stay generally takes care of maintenance issues for the next guest. If DVC would be proactive and consider member input via a comment card (since housekeeping seems to lack the communication skills to do this on their own), I think some of these problems would stop. The rest is up to the Housekeeping manager and the expectations they set with their employees.

 

[tjhsr]

Just got back today from SSR and our room was fine no problems with anything or anybody.We were there in Oct. also and and it was all good.

 

[vonderbar]

Hey 2 Nuts,

I was there last weekend. The weather was chilly one day and warm the next. Prepare for both, as you never know with February. You will see lots of prep work going on for the Happiest Celebration. Enjoy, wish I was going, but have to wait till May.

vonderbar

 

[Ducky4Disney]

I stayed in a 2bdrm @ SSR in December and I thought they did an OK job cleaning the room. It never felt as clean as when we stayed at CSR. I don't know what it was, but it just seemed like a rush job had been done.

I know that owning DVC is different - we're in charge of our room and can clean it at our will, but when we pay for it to be cleaned for us then the same effort put in to "regular" hotels should be applied.

D4D

 

[Capn Dave]

I realize that things happen, but any successful business is ready to handle the unexpected. I don't believe that the housekeeping issues are something new or infrequent. There seems to be a lot of talk at several DVC resorts about this very problem. The bottom line is nothing seems to change. I have never experienced this problem at a paying Disney resort, ie Polynesian. I have stayed there over 10 times during the last 15 years. Maybe the issue with DVC has more to do with the fact that we are a captive audience. If we continually had issues with any other Disney resort or any hotel for that matter we would not patronize these establishments. DVC "knows" that we are going to return, they already have our money. So maybe there is just no financial incentive for them to get very concerned with housekeeping issues. I guess we could sell our contracts, but that would solve nothing. We would just pass the same problems on to the next owner and DVC would still have the same issues. I don't know what recourse we really have. I guess I am looking for some creative ideas on how we can take DVC to task so that we actually get some consistent changes made.

 

[tjkraz]

I realize that things happen, but any successful business is ready to handle the unexpected. I don't believe that the housekeeping issues are something new or infrequent. There seems to be a lot of talk at several DVC resorts about this very problem. The bottom line is nothing seems to change. I have never experienced this problem at a paying Disney resort, ie Polynesian. I have stayed there over 10 times during the last 15 years.

FWIW...I don't think DVC / cash is a fair comparison. DVC was designed to be near 100% occupancy year round. The cash resorts are lucky if they hit 100% occupancy a handful of times per year, and even then it's only for a few days at a time.

At a cash resort, if a room is found to be sub-standard, housekeeping will probably flag the room and it's taken out of service for 2 or 3 nights while the items are attended-to. Even being at 90-95% occupancy gives each resort dozens of rooms as their buffer.

DVC just doesn't have that luxury. If housekeeping enters a room at 11am to find crayon on the walls, food stains on the upholstery and dirty carpets, they've got exactly 5 hours to get the room ready (for a guest who is probably calling on the hour to ask "is my room ready yet?")

No, this doesn't explain a soiled toilet or some of the other seemingly minor things that slip through. But I've come to the realization that housekeeping at the DVC resorts, as a whole, will NEVER be on par with the cash properties...particularly at BCV, VWL and BWV due to the extremely high occupancy level year-round. It has less to do with staffing or management and more to do with the design of the DVC program as a whole.

My $.02. YMMV

 

[Capn Dave]

I don't recall in any of the DVC sales information or in the contract I signed that we would have to accept or expect less than adequate cleaning practices because we were buying a time share interest in a Disney property.
I do not expect to check in to a dirty room period... This IS NOT ACCEPTABLE!

 

[lllovell]

The unflushed toilet - of course its unacceptable. I am sure something happened and the housekeeper was distracted in the middle of that room somehow. Doesn't make it right - but TJ is right - mistakes happen.

The mold - well, as many here have pointed out, it could happen quickly and maybe the room was not occupied for the several days leading up to your check in (and don't the new rooms have motion activators on the HVAC systems? no one in means no air on).

Truthfully, no one really has anyway of knowing here what happened in your room and I don't believe that anyone is saying it should be accepted. What you should do is call and discuss it (or go to the front dest and ask for a manager) and get things fixed. I think there does need to be a better system for reporting issues that you don't think are major but that need to be addressed.

We all care about these properties. It is obvious from our discussions that we have differing opinions about what is considered acceptable for "clean". There are some things that no one would consider to be acceptable, but for many others, the things that you get upset about I simply pick up and put in the trash or flush the toilet and request a bathroom cleaning please (for example). Do I want to find things like this, nope. Do I understand that they sometimes happen, of course. I also agree with the previous posters that say its not how the situation happened that concerns me as much as how it is resolved.

The real problem here is that it is next to impossible to seperate the "horror stories" from the things that happen that are truly unacceptable. (seems like I have seen references to hiding a Cherrio in some older threads here and seeing how long it takes for it to be found....THAT is crazy to me). Everyone here tends to report EVERY detail, so the bad seems to get a lot of emphasis. I love hearing about good trips! I hate hearing about bad and am glad when people have their problems addressed and fixed. I am also firmly grounded enough to realize that you cannot have perfection, you can only strive for it.

Dave, you should have 1. not found the situation that you did and 2. been treated better when you tried to get it addressed.

 

[DISNEYWORLDBORN2SHOP]

I stayed at SSR in JUne and the room was very clean. Personally I have never had any problems with dirty DVC rooms. The only Disney resort where I have encountered a dirty room was the All Star Sports. Maybe we have just been lucky?

 

[tjkraz]

I don't recall in any of the DVC sales information or in the contract I signed that we would have to accept or expect less than adequate cleaning practices because we were buying a time share interest in a Disney property.
I do not expect to check in to a dirty room period... This IS NOT ACCEPTABLE!

The POS doesn't say anything about the quality of housekeeping services. The quality will always be colored by your own subjective analysis.

Personally, I think you're setting yourself up for a lot of disappointment over the next 40 years. But you're welcome to address that with DVC.

 

[JPC]

I doubt that SSR has even BEEN there long enough to have mold.

good point.

 

[phyllisnnj]

I realize that things happen, but any successful business is ready to handle the unexpected. I don't believe that the housekeeping issues are something new or infrequent. There seems to be a lot of talk at several DVC resorts about this very problem. The bottom line is nothing seems to change. I have never experienced this problem at a paying Disney resort, ie Polynesian. I have stayed there over 10 times during the last 15 years. Maybe the issue with DVC has more to do with the fact that we are a captive audience.

Maybe the issue is that the DVC resorts which are much smaller (ie Polynesian Resort standard room 409 sq ft) receives daily cleaning where they can address different room maintenance issues on a daily basis vs. for example a one bedroom villa which is almost twice the size of a typical DVC resort room (SSR one bedroom 714 sq ft) that receives a weekly full cleaning.

DVC Housekeeping is only given one extra hour to clean the villas between check-in and check-out (5 hours instead of 4 hours at the DVC resort). I wonder if DVC has more housekeeping staff since there is more space to clean in almost the same amount of time compared to a DVC resort? I wonder how many DVC villas are allocated to each housekeeper within the 5 hour turnover period?

If we continually had issues with any other Disney resort or any hotel for that matter we would not patronize these establishments. DVC "knows" that we are going to return, they already have our money. So maybe there is just no financial incentive for them to get very concerned with housekeeping issues. I guess we could sell our contracts, but that would solve nothing. We would just pass the same problems on to the next owner and DVC would still have the same issues. I don't know what recourse we really have. I guess I am looking for some creative ideas on how we can take DVC to task so that we actually get some consistent changes made.

Hmmm.....creative ideas on how we can take DVC to task so that we actually get some consistent changes made

(1) Letter Writing campaign about the maintenance concerns across all DVC resorts?
(2) Pay more in maintenance fees to lower the number of number of villas assigned per housekeeper?
(3) Pay more in maintenance fees for daily full cleaning service to ensure maintenance on par with DVC resorts?