Terrible Sheraton Vistana Villages experience.

[Q-man]

Not knowing that there are two Sheraton Vistanas our groceries end up at Villages and not Resort where we are.

We asked that Villages send our groceries over as Resort told us that at Resort they verify the guest is a Resort guest, as this is a common mix up, before accepting Instacart or any other deliveries. Villages also told us this was a common occurrence but they have no verification process for deliveries. The only way to get our food is for us to make the ~30 minute round trip ourshelves as it wasn’t their fault. We pointed out that it is common enough of an issue that Resort verifies so that it doesn’t happen to Villages guests. MOD Margarita at Villages got pretty short with my wife at that point.

I wish I’d gotten the MOD at Resort’s name as after Villages refused to send the groceries over she offered to call her kitchens, it was after they closed, and see if they would make some food for us. Being a POed idiot I didn’t take her up on it. She gets an A for HOSPITALITY.

So, after an 11 hour drive we are driving over to Villages so we can retrieve the groceries and eat something at after 11:30 pm.

Multiple people at both Resort and Villages used the term sister property during the various conversations regarding the issue. Resort is the only one I’d want as a sister.

I do have one issue with Resort. The A/C was completely off. An hour later it is now 79F instead of 80F. As are from the Midwest, we will be roasting tonight.

Please tell me Marriott will be over Sheraton after the merger. We've never experienced anything even remotely close to this with Marriott Grand Vacation properties.

 

[Q-man]

So, my wife just got back from Villages and Margarita did not talk to her but sent an underling to ask for my wife’s ID for verification!

That pretty much officially turns this story into a Seinfeld episode.
[Jerry] Hear’s the thing about the verification ... is doing the verification.[/Seinfeld]

 

[Q-man]

When I got up this morning I thought back to when I worked Front Desk for Hilton in college what would I have done when I was MOD. I would have put the groceries in a cab over and paid for it out of petty cash and written guest relations in the MOD log.

Wish tired and frustrated me with a high jacked amygdala could have thought last night to have Villages put the groceries in a cab to Resort and I’d pay the fare.

 

[4kids4karen]

"Sister Properties" doesn't have anything to do with this scenario. Each hotel is under it's own management and has their own policy, procedures, and budget.

I agree with the idea that it was not the resorts fault, so they were not obligated to PAY to send the groceries to the correct resort. Should they have a verification process? Well, that is probably a great idea for them to implement a policy/procedure to do so; however, you are using a service that has a personal shopper that should also verify he/she is dropping off at the proper location.

I do not use Instacart (I use Shipt) but the address should have clearly been listed, not just the property name. If the address was not clearly listed, then that is problem #1. If everything was listed clearly, it should have been Instacart to absorb the cost to pick-up and redeliver.

I also agree ID verification is required to allow an individual to pick-up the items. That would be a standard practice at all hotels.

Sorry, I don't see the hotel being at fault for anything.

Did you think about contacting Instacart? Did you tip the delivery person? Instacart may have taken care of this for you.

 

[Gina-Gina-Bo-Bina]

It's a stinky way to start a vacation, for sure. That said, it sounds like the error was yours (if I'm reading your post correctly, you didn't realize there were two Vistana properties and gave delivery instructions to the wrong resort) so while it would have been nice if the Villages could have remedied the problem on your behalf, they really weren't obligated to do so. I'm sure the very late hour didn't help: I can't imagine they'd have a ton of extra staff at that time of day that they would be able to send out on a delivery road trip to correct an issue that they didn't cause.

If you have any issues with the air conditioning at SVR, please contact the front desk and report it. I assure you that they will have someone out very quickly to address it. The resort can't fix something if they don't know its a problem. We own there and have stayed many, many times now; and any time we have encountered an issue, we have found the maintenance crew extremely responsive regardless of the hour. Those kinds of issues can happen to any property at any time, so definitely don't suffer with a hot and uncomfortable villa. There's no need to have to endure that.

We, too, have stayed at Marriott Grande Vacation properties, and its our hope that Sheraton DOESN'T change their business practices to match the Marriott model. We've had better customer service from Sheraton than from Marriott, and found that Marriott was lacking in some of the services that we enjoy at SVR (like a complimentary mid-week tidy). Hopefully the balance of your stay will be much less stressful and you'll find lots to love about the Vistana.

 

[HopperFan]

If I had sent my order to the wrong address ... that is on me - would have just gotten in the car and picked it up before heading to my unit. It is not far, maybe 8 minutes, and could have been done in the time it would have taken to argue about it with people. I just wouldn't expect a business to make a delivery for me that was my fault, actually I'd be happy they accepted the order and held it rather than send it back so in a way you did get a courtesy. If sent back you probably wouldn't get it until the next day.

 

[Q-man]

Okay. This is common enough of an issue that Resorts has policies to verify it is a Resort guest and not a Villages guest before accepting delivery and Villages does not. While that differentiation between the two maybe obvious to many of you diehards, and agents, once again Resort has policies in place due to how frequently this confusion occurs and Villages does not.

Everyone at Resort has been awesome this morning. A/C drain line was plugged triggering the float switch. After that was corrected engineering discovered this unit was 2lbs low on refrigerant.

Resort engineering also helped me troubleshoot an auto issue this morning. Disney waived our lunch no show fees due to our car issues. Marty H. is the bomb for A/C and helping get our car going.

 

[Bound and Rebound]

... high jacked amygdala ...

Sorry that happened, horrible way to start your vacation, but I'm going to start using that line in my daily life now!
Hope the rest of your trip is much smoother.

 

[4kids4karen]

Okay. This is common enough of an issue that Resorts verifies it is a Resort guest and not a Villages guest before accepting delivery and Villages does not. While that differentiate between the two maybe obvious to many of you once again Resort has policies in place due to how common this confusion occurs.

Everyone at Resort has been awesome this morning. A/C line drain line was plugged triggering the float switch. After that was corrected engineering discovered this unit was 2lbs low on refrigerant.

Resort engineering also helped me troubleshoot auto issue this morning. Disney waived our lunch no show fees due to our car issues.

Common issue or not, I don't feel they need to accept responsibility. Lots of people may book reservation under one name, then a spouse or relative order groceries in another name.

Sorry, it sounds as if you are having all kinds of issues (grocery deliver, a/c, and now auto) on your vacation. I would have called an Uber and still made it to my lunch reservation, but glad Disney waived a fee for you.

 

[writerguyfl]

When I got up this morning I thought back to when I worked Front Desk for Hilton in college what would I have done when I was MOD. I would have put the groceries in a cab over and paid for it out of petty cash and written guest relations in the MOD log.

Wish tired and frustrated me with a high jacked amygdala could have thought last night to have Villages put the groceries in a cab to Resort and I’d pay the fare.

You must have worked at a remarkably generous hotel. I spent more than a decade working in hotels. I worked Front Desk, Manager-on-Duty, and a long stretch as a Night Manager. There's no way we'd ever accept a deliver for a guest not in our computer. We'd certainly never spend hotel money to essentially re-ship that package to the correct address.

I also think you're expecting too much for the hotel to correct a mistake you made. Personally, I'd own the mistake and move on.

 

[Upatnoon]

Not knowing that there are two Sheraton Vistanas our groceries end up at Villages and not Resort where we are.

We asked that Villages send our groceries over as Resort told us that at Resort they verify the guest is a Resort guest, as this is a common mix up, before accepting Instacart or any other deliveries. Villages also told us this was a common occurrence but they have no verification process for deliveries. The only way to get our food is for us to make the ~30 minute round trip ourshelves as it wasn’t their fault. We pointed out that it is common enough of an issue that Resort verifies so that it doesn’t happen to Villages guests. MOD Margarita at Villages got pretty short with my wife at that point.

I wish I’d gotten the MOD at Resort’s name as after Villages refused to send the groceries over she offered to call her kitchens, it was after they closed, and see if they would make some food for us. Being a POed idiot I didn’t take her up on it. She gets an A for HOSPITALITY.

So, after an 11 hour drive we are driving over to Villages so we can retrieve the groceries and eat something at after 11:30 pm.

Multiple people at both Resort and Villages used the term sister property during the various conversations regarding the issue. Resort is the only one I’d want as a sister.

I do have one issue with Resort. The A/C was completely off. An hour later it is now 79F instead of 80F. As are from the Midwest, we will be roasting tonight.

Please tell me Marriott will be over Sheraton after the merger. We've never experienced anything even remotely close to this with Marriott Grand Vacation properties.

Sometimes when you travel issues can happen. While I can sympathize for your unfortunate string of events, in the end, it was your fault, not the resort.

 

[BigredNole]

So you are upset with the resort because you ordered grocery delivery to the wrong place and/or it was delivered to the wrong place? Then, you are upset for getting in at 10:30PM and the room is at 80 degrees? Electricity costs money. They are better off setting them higher when no one is occupying the room, especially with the heat and humidity that is down there. Did you call the resort on your drive to ask them to lower the thermostat on your room?

Complaining about a resort because of issues that are not their fault is a little ridiculous. This is like complaining about McDonald's over gas prices at Raceway.

 

[jenrose66]

Customer service is a hard job. People have a hard time taking responsibility for their actions and the agent who is tasked to help you becomes little more than a verbal punching bag to the upset customer. Then it becomes a viscous circle because the agent trying to help you is only human and it is very hard to assist someone who only wants to be rude to you. I’m not saying this to make the OP feel bad...we have all had less than stellar moments but it is always a good idea to take a deep breath and reflect on the situation instead of venting steam and looking for others to blame.

 

[bankr63]

I think the difference in policy is likely because the Vistana Resort is about 3 times the size of the Vistana Villages, and is probably better known. If someone orders something to Vistana, without knowing the correct address, it is more likely to go to Resort than Villages. So the problem is probably much bigger (happens more often) at SVR than at SVV.

It is also worth noting that if Villages had the same policy as the Resort, your delivery would have been refused, and you would have been waiting to sort it out with the grocery company the next day. At least this way you actually had access to your groceries the day of.

I do think it is a bit over the top to expect that SVV would pay to send them over. Remember these are ownership resorts that are managed by Sheraton. I'm not sure how I would feel about that management company paying to deliver misplaced goods to people who are not even paying to stay at the resort. Yes Sheraton is a big brand, but the resorts are completely owned by the resort owners and only managed under contract for very large fees. The resort manager is beholden to the owners, and as an owner, I wouldn't want my fees going to this.

 

[Woodview]

No Response from Original Poster ?

 

[hsmamato2]

I think this thread name is misleading.... it's not a Vistana Villages problem at all. It's a user error (or driver error) issue..... it happens.

 

[mckennarose]

I think this thread name is misleading.... it's not a Vistana Villages problem at all. It's a user error (or driver error) issue..... it happens.

I agree. The title of this thread caught my eye as we just stayed at Sheraton Vistana (not Villages) last month and had a really nice experience. The Sheratons are on our list for future stays.

Sounds like OP was tired and frustrated when making this thread; we've all been there on a WDW vacation. But I agree that it was not the resort's fault and the title is very misleading. I'm glad I read all the posts because we are keeping SVR on the "good places to stay" list.