DVC Lost Luster, Badly Broken

[pklein09]

What did management do for you?

When we stayed at OKW for DHs 40th birthday, we had issues with soaking (and I mean soaking) wet carpeting - our assumption was a leak from the AC unit. I called the front desk and they couldn't move me (full house for Food & Wine), so they credited me $$$. Not much, but something, and offered to move me the next day. Because we were there for only 3 nights, I asked if they could just extract the carpets as we would be out of the room all day. When we got back, the entire 2BR unit had soaking wet carpeting - they cleaned the carpets, not extracted them. Because we were on points, they gave us a monetary credit on our account equal to one night's rack rate in addition to the $$$ from the night before.

 

[disneynutz]

Just wanted it noted that I am Deb & Bill and not Debbie & Bill.

Sounds like a alter ego to me! Maybe a split personally thing.

 

[DeeCee735]

I was there 1 1/2 weeks ago, and it was as immaculate as the model rooms. Got a picture? I'd taken a picture of this in a heartbeat and posted it all over the place.

 

[bnlbebes]

Then we entered the room, curtains unhooked from the rood, louver door broken to the washer dryer…hanging falling down, light bulbs burnt out and the lighting so dismally lit, the dishwasher shelves missing wheels. The kitchen cabinets grease stained and garbage can’s sharing space with living quarters and the arms on the living area chair so dirty that someone wrote there name in the dirt. I could go on…..internet connector broken Etc.

I guess I feel a need to defend my home turf, but I find these descriptions to be incredible! How could Mousekeeping leave a room like this for a guest? The most suspicious item is the name written in the dirt on the arm of the chair. REALLY?! If this was indeed the condition of the room, then we are all still waiting to hear from OP about any compensation that you received for these unacceptable oversights.

 

[CarolMN]

We just returned May 2 from a 1 bedroom at the BWV - our room was in excellent shape. I actually examined the bathroom quite carefully. Found not one speck of mold or dust or anything else that shouldnt' be there. I also took a pretty good look at the dishes in the cupboard (due to some posts here on the DIS, LOL). Found absolutely nothing that suggested they weren't dishwasher clean and ready to use. I was pleased and did NOT re-wash anything. I didn't notice that the hallway carpets were worn or dirty - they seemed just fine to me.

Now the kitchen sink in our unit did leak. I stopped at the front desk on the way to EPCOT one morning and reported it. By the time we got back for lunch, it had been repaired. The maintenance worker even cleaned & polished the sink afterwards.

I'm a firm believer in taking care of things right then and there, and if at all possible, in person. Writing letters and complaining on the internet may do some good, but IMHO it really doesn't accomplish much.

All that said, we haven't always had a perfectly cleaned / maintained room, so I don't doubt the OP had a bad experience. FWIW, the worst room we had at the BWV as far as cleanliness and wear & tear goes was a Boardwalk view.

Having run a large maintenance organization in one of my past lives, I'm quite sure they keep track of work tickets. Probably use them as part of a formula that decides priorities for room rehabs.

SHAME on the Supervisors who told the OP that the problem was money and compared the Inn side to the Villa side. That is a sign of a very poor Supervisor. Based on that alone, I'm more inclined to believe there is a management problem than a funding problem.

 

[bnlbebes]

What did management do for you?

When we stayed at OKW for DHs 40th birthday, we had issues with soaking (and I mean soaking) wet carpeting - our assumption was a leak from the AC unit. I called the front desk and they couldn't move me (full house for Food & Wine), so they credited me $$$. Not much, but something, and offered to move me the next day. Because we were there for only 3 nights, I asked if they could just extract the carpets as we would be out of the room all day. When we got back, the entire 2BR unit had soaking wet carpeting - they cleaned the carpets, not extracted them. Because we were on points, they gave us a monetary credit on our account equal to one night's rack rate in addition to the $$$ from the night before.

I couldn't help but shake my head in disgust and laugh at the same time in response to your predicament!

BUT

At least you received some kind of satisfaction.

 

[Val]

We have been members since 1999....we have had absolutely lovely stays- and stays from h-e-double toothpicks. Our last trip- July 07- we were first assigned to a room much like the OP describes, and even then we didn't get in until 7 pm after checking in at noon. No, we didn't expect a room by noon, but we did by 4 or 5 or 6....and we were travelling with 4 kids! Answer was that they were busy and understaffed.

We went down to the front desk after taking digital pictures of the room......a picture did indeed say a thousand words. We were reassigned from our filthy "preferred view" room (which by the way, was a view into the neighbor's room- and him sitting in his boxers! If he had been better looking it might have been "preferred"!!!)............we had a room that opened onto the quiet pool by community hall. It did have some issues with rotting around the sink cabinets, but was MUCH cleaner and generally in great repair. The rest of the visit was wonderful.....but I still wonder who got stuck with the filthy "underwear view" room.


We did write a letter after we got back, and got the standard "thank you for your concern" reply. It strikes me that they have enough of these complaints that they have a form letter for responding!

There are frequent enough complaints on this board that we should take this situation seriously. Dirty or damaged rooms are not the norm, but they ARE an increasing event.....I have been on these boards for a very long time, and the complaints are increasing. DVC needs to address these issues unless they are depending on the "new DVC" to maintain sales and customer satisfaction.

We still love DVC and WDW, but we are realistic. BWV is not the best maintained.....but we still prefer it due to its location. Surprisingly, we don't like BCV.....just ambience and we don't know why. We will be vigilant in appropriately complaining.....and hope that y'all will too. Appropriately squeaky wheels will help maintain the maintenance levels we expect and pay for.

My concern about late check ins is that we PAY for the room from the hours of 4 to 11....getting in several hours late and being pestered to check out early is NOT what we paid for.....and if I wanted wet carpeting, broken furniture, dirty dishes and linens- heck, the Motel X is a whole lot cheaper and just down the street.

Don't dismiss complaints too quickly....think of the complaints as the canary in the coal mine.....if we take action on the few complaints, they won't turn in to the many. Sometimes we need to take off our rose colored glasses and stand up for ourselves. We are NOT second rate customers!

 

[TLCDisney]

One other thing I noticed last week at BCV. There was a distinct difference in the carpet, flooring and walls between the Villas and the hotel area. We walked down several of the hotel hallways and the carpet was much cleaner and there were barely any marks on the walls.

I know the DVC is different from the resort hotels but they sold us on the Disney level of service and quality. I've stayed in all the WDW villas except for AKV and I have seen the general upkeep of the common areas go downhill. I can't speak for every room as I've had good and bad myself but it does seem to be a trend.

 

[tjhsr]

Hallways with carpet will get dirty but nice outside concrete hallways are very easy to clean and dry really fast (SSR). Can't do that with carpet.

 

[mr. figment]

We're new DVC owners and have not stayed at DVC resort yet, so I may be a little naive. If we are a community of concerned DVC owners, why don't we post pictures of what we consider to be poor up keep of our home resorts???

 

[Cyndibear]

We have been owners since 2005. I know it is not that long, but we have been going to WDW 2 + times a year since 1997 and stayed at many of their resorts. We have not had any problems since staying at DVC resorts. We love staying at BWV's, its one of our favorites.

I, like several other posters, would love to see pictures of the OP's problems. I sure would have taken some.

Cyndi

 

[minster22]

I just returned from a 9 night stay at BWV....room 2085 (studio). After reading many negative reports here on the DIS over the years, I always enter the room with a bit of hesitation (especially when taking friends or family). Our room was in excellent condition, smelled nice and showed little if any wear and tear. I actually checked the conditon of the hallway carpet after seeing so many complaints on here....very clean and fresh looking. Our worst experience was a stay at OKW many years ago....lots of stuff broken, window blinds broken and hanging crookedly and with many stays in between that and this last trip there have been some great rooms , some not so clean, and on to the OKW experience.If something is not OK with me, I call and it has always been resolved quickly. Though we would all like our rooms to be perfect 100% of the time, I am realistic(and more than a little blinded with pixie dust)and feel DVC does a good job. One other observation on this last stay....twice during my stay and walking down the hallway I saw a very large family checking out of a room around 12:30pm and then later in the stay a family leaving the room (both times taking all their luggage) at almost 5pm. Of course I have no way of knowing if these guests had booked their rooms into the next day and thus stayed that late but if not, it is very difficult for both housekeeping and maintenance to do their jobs.

 

[doconeill]

I remember seeing lots of of similar posts last year about BCV - and it seems that something was done back then.

I too have had some maintenance issues, notably a badly clogged tub drain in a BCV studio that took two complaints and three visits from maintenance (it was a real stubborn clog) to rectify, but I've also had issues at non-Disney locations, both timeshare resorts and regular hotels.

The "supervisors" should have been dealing with the problem, and not complaining about DVC not having money. They are likely not DVC employees, and there are some CMs (and even some upper levels of management) who don't like DVC. Emergency repairs get dealt with first, and worry about the money later. Refurbishing (new carpets, furniture, etc.) is a different issue and usually needs to be budgeted in advance.

 

[LadyTrampScamp&Angel]

Yikes, if the unit truly looked that way I'd be upset too. We just returned from our first trip as DVC members, we stayed at the BWV's and VWL and our rooms were immaculate. We were in a studio (5019, I think it was) at BWV and a one bedroom at VWL. The only problem I had was at VWL the washer and dryer were extremely noisy. I don't know if that's the way they are or if it was a maintenance problem but I did let them know. It wasn't anything that was going to ruin our stay though.

Our studio at BWV was beautiful and I looked at it closely after reading some posts on these boards. The only thing I could see were a few minor nicks in the paint around the mirror. I did take lots of pics of the room.

Sorry OP that you weren't so lucky?

 

[DVC Eric]

We love dvc we go often and love BWV, of course we have had some minor issues with all the resorts some are worse than others but none would keep us from going or adding more points if we would want to.

 

[tjkraz]

I haven't read the entire thread, but will quickly throw my hat in the ring.

Although I sympathize with those who have had a string of poor quality rooms, I find it hard to believe it's anything other than the luck of the draw. In five years worth of stays, the worst we've had was a single OKW room with a broken toaster and dishwasher. The dishwasher broke mid-week (was functional when we arrived), and both problems were addressed within hours.

If / when we do have problems, they will be promptly reported to resort staff and I'll expect to see them resolved.

Whether you're staying in cash rooms or DVC, not all are going to be in pristine condition. And the fact that there isn't a vocal outcry from a large contingent of the 100,000+ DVC member families tells me that these instances are still few and far between.

IMO, attempts to prevent problems are nearly as important as how well the resort responds when problems DO occur.

 

[Debbie & Bill]

We like many of you have been to Disney many times, we visit about five times a year and have thousands of pictures, so we don't bring a camera with us much anymore. But reading the many posts with regards cleanliness and maintenance, its a mixed conscious. The Boardwalk is our my home resort's and we love it, just like all the other DVC resorts. What we found was disturbing, what we heard confirmed from management was honest as far as we're concerned. But another fact that the supervisors explained was that the condition of the rooms sometimes after people get through is disgusting trashed and filthy. Who knows the whole story of room 2033 but for our liking we don't like this and as I explained to the supervisors that's non negotiable. The members bought this building and if having owner dedicated rooms is the answer keeping others away then that's what's needed. We also belong to the Marriott Vacation Club and Marriott has just that owner rooms in perfect condition. Marriott reserves the newest or recently renovated rooms for the home resort owners, great policy and idea. Be great to see Disney learn a lesson from a very successful hotel company. What we found is that Disney is best at giving a experience and not the best at timeshare compared to Marriott. We do own the place or hold the lease for 30 or so years and DVC works for us.

 

[Island Mouse]

FWIW I find the OP's description of the room too "bad" to be true. I can't honestly grasp how a room could be in that bad of shape and that they allow someone to stay in it. It sounds like the room was neglected for a long time, not cleaned after guests departed, etc. for weeks. I take bad posts with a grain of salt because usually everyone has differing expectations when it comes to Disney (what one person considers a crowded park, another considers empty, lol). But if the room were really as bad as was reported, there needs to photos taken to accompany letters written to Disney, DVC, etc (as well as to be posted on resort bashing threads like this one to back up the story ). Without the photos, the description of how bad the room was doesn't carry any weight, IMHO.

 

[smjj]

Just wanted it noted that I am Deb & Bill and not Debbie & Bill.

Thats funny, I was just wondering. I have read many of your posts and when I saw this one I had to do a double take. Ha Ha....smjj

 

[Starr W.]

FWIW I find the OP's description of the room too "bad" to be true. I can't honestly grasp how a room could be in that bad of shape and that they allow someone to stay in it. It sounds like the room was neglected for a long time, not cleaned after guests departed, etc. for weeks. I take bad posts with a grain of salt because usually everyone has differing expectations when it comes to Disney (what one person considers a crowded park, another considers empty, lol). But if the room were really as bad as was reported, there needs to photos taken to accompany letters written to Disney, DVC, etc (as well as to be posted on resort bashing threads like this one to back up the story ). Without the photos, the description of how bad the room was doesn't carry any weight, IMHO.

I bring my camera on every trip, yes, and my last 4 DVC trips are still on my memory stick.

If I saw anything that even remotely resembled something I read on a thread like this I would take a picture and post it on here.

What's the saying "A picture can speak 1,000 words". And yes a copy would accomany any letter to DVC.

I did ask some BWV owners we ran into at SSR at Thanksgiving about their resort. They did say it could use some new carpet and it does show wear & tear because of the colors, but they never had a dirty room. We actually started talking about KT.