Why is it "illegal" to take pool towels back to your room?

[BeckyV]

We own at two other timeshares that allow a towel pickup time each day. It is so easy just to go by and exchange our towels. They both have it in the same location where the washing takes place so no additional staff is needed. One resort has studios like DVC, but the other only has one, two, or three bedrooms all with washer and dryers. When we stay in a one or two bedroom, we always wash our towels. I can see where someone would be frustrated when there is no towel exchange, etc, and they are staying in a studio. At Disney they probably have one area for all of the washing, though, and it would not work.

I also find that DVC does not put as many towels in the unit as other timeshares like Marriott. I use two bath towels because I need one for my hair. We never have enough.

 

[4formickey]

Okay...maybe this is weird but I can't stand having one skinny wet bathmat! So, on one of my trips driving down, I stopped at an outlet and picked up some generic white mats and facecloths - there are never enough of those! Check into my lovely BWV one bedroom and decorate the floors in both parts of the bath with mats in front of the toilet, shower, sink and jacuzzi tub so my tootsies don't ever have to touch that cold tile. I'd already packed our Mickey pool/beachtowels as well, so we are doing great - just like home! Trash and towel day comes and we return from the parks - you guessed it - all my new linens have been gathered up and replaced with the standard issue! So, now I bring pink extras - no mistaking what belongs to us versus DVC. Since we drive, it is easy to pack a 'comfort' suitcase - the fitted sheets, extra towels, a small, thin comforter for the sofabed, and if we have a third or fourth person we bring an aerobed...those things are surprisingly comfortable!

now if you stop by the pool onthe way to your room, you could pick up extra towels for those areas that you need the floor mat for.On the trash and pick up day, you will take the frist set of towels back to the pool and pick another set for the rest of your stay. Just return the towels to the pool and you will be alright.

 

[PatMcDuck]

My taking pool towels to water parks does not increase dues, there is no way to know I am a DVC guest doing this, or a hotel guest, for one thing. My bringing towels TO the water parks counteracts all the guests taking towels FROM the parks back to their rooms. We actually usually bring some back with us, use them to sit on in the car for the ride back. Then toss them back in the pool hampers on the way back to our room....... they all get laundered together anyway. (not the room towels, the pool and water park towels)

And, I must agree that the huge extra room towel expense was in labor, having a person hand deliver extra towels to a guest's room. I always thought they should have a "towel exchange" instead, maybe in the recycling areas or something. Having DVC guests do the "work" of bringing dirty towels to a central location, and taking new clean ones back to their room seems cheaper than running all those individual washer/dryers in the rooms.

We need that guy from "NUMB3RS" to crank out some calculations. LOL. In 10 days I am staying at All Star for $59/night, and I can have a cast member bring me all the towels I want, seems odd, doesn't it.........

 

[greenban]

I suppose room towels and pool towels are paid from different accounts. Otherwise I don't see why it would make a difference to anyone. (the old "a towel is a towel" principle)

It won't take long for an observant person lounging at a DVC pool to notice folks taking armloads of towels and leaving the pool area for parts unknown. It's not exactly a rare occurance. Personally, it's nothing that tightens my jaws, but for the "my dues are going up because people are using too many pool towels" crowd, I can understand why they might object.

Here I must politely disagree with you.

If you booked your vacation at less than 7 months, I'd agree that a Towel is a Towel is a Towel. But if you booked at more than 7 months in advance, then each towel *HAS* a home resort advantage, and that is where it becomes unfair, illegal and immoral to 'steal' a pool towel.

That's right, due to a flaw in the DVC Towel Laundry Program (DTLP Version 2.1), towels can be morphed from one resort to another by Owners. An old, ratty OKW towel could be used the same as a BCV towel from Stormalong Bay!

And I hate to say this (fear of copycats, but....) Some Owners are Commercial Towel Renters, renting towel packs of both stolen and morphed towels for $3.00 a pack. You think this isn't serious? I have it from an insider, way high up DVC source (whom I can't name for obvious reasons) that DVC Compliance is sending letters of warning to obvious Commercial Towel Renters.

In fact one family has been renting towel packs on ebay for years and has rented more than 1,000,000 sets since 2002. That is a $6,000,000.00 dollar direct loss to the DVC and raises all of our costs.

Also as pointed out, the pool towels have a different texture and uses a more expensive laundering/sanitizing process. A quick use of the search function shows a thread where one Astute DVCer staying in a studio at BWV found a pool towel insread of a resort towel, and went to the front desk and complained directly to the on duty manager (instead of using the phone to get shuffled to the call center) and was so upset, they were given a BWV GV for Easter Week to compensate them!!!

Also pool towels can be dangerous, many of you remember the thread about the SSR Towel & Toaster disaster, (thankfully no one was hurt).

Finally, I have heard if you wrap a wet pool towel around an old refillable mug, that you can reuse that mug at ANY resort, ANY year without getting caught.

Extra Finally, all of us here really know that people walking back to their rooms with an armful of towels probably have 15 or 16 adults in a studio room!

Even more finally, fourteen unionized towel folding mousekeepers were laid off, since they had no towels to fold, they had no work!

This is not a victimless crime people, please think before you become a DVC Pool Towel Fellon!

-Tony

 

[OKWMom]

 

[bobbiwoz]

Here I must politely disagree with you.
...

This is not a victimless crime people, please think before you become a DVC Pool Towel Fellon!

-Tony

I was going to pass on this thread until Tony posted. This is classic!!! Thank you.

Bobbi

 

[BCVOwner2002]

Here I must politely disagree with you.

If you booked your vacation at less than 7 months, I'd agree that a Towel is a Towel is a Towel. But if you booked at more than 7 months in advance, then each towel *HAS* a home resort advantage, and that is where it becomes unfair, illegal and immoral to 'steal' a pool towel.

That's right, due to a flaw in the DVC Towel Laundry Program (DTLP Version 2.1), towels can be morphed from one resort to another by Owners. An old, ratty OKW towel could be used the same as a BCV towel from Stormalong Bay!

And I hate to say this (fear of copycats, but....) Some Owners are Commercial Towel Renters, renting towel packs of both stolen and morphed towels for $3.00 a pack. You think this isn't serious? I have it from an insider, way high up DVC source (whom I can't name for obvious reasons) that DVC Compliance is sending letters of warning to obvious Commercial Towel Renters.

In fact one family has been renting towel packs on ebay for years and has rented more than 1,000,000 sets since 2002. That is a $6,000,000.00 dollar direct loss to the DVC and raises all of our costs.

Also as pointed out, the pool towels have a different texture and uses a more expensive laundering/sanitizing process. A quick use of the search function shows a thread where one Astute DVCer staying in a studio at BWV found a pool towel insread of a resort towel, and went to the front desk and complained directly to the on duty manager (instead of using the phone to get shuffled to the call center) and was so upset, they were given a BWV GV for Easter Week to compensate them!!!

Also pool towels can be dangerous, many of you remember the thread about the SSR Towel & Toaster disaster, (thankfully no one was hurt).

Finally, I have heard if you wrap a wet pool towel around an old refillable mug, that you can reuse that mug at ANY resort, ANY year without getting caught.

Extra Finally, all of us here really know that people walking back to their rooms with an armful of towels probably have 15 or 16 adults in a studio room!

Even more finally, fourteen unionized towel folding mousekeepers were laid off, since they had no towels to fold, they had no work!

This is not a victimless crime people, please think before you become a DVC Pool Towel Fellon!

-Tony

 

[crisi]

My taking pool towels to water parks does not increase dues, there is no way to know I am a DVC guest doing this, or a hotel guest, for one thing. My bringing towels TO the water parks counteracts all the guests taking towels FROM the parks back to their rooms. We actually usually bring some back with us, use them to sit on in the car for the ride back. Then toss them back in the pool hampers on the way back to our room....... they all get laundered together anyway. (not the room towels, the pool and water park towels)

And, I must agree that the huge extra room towel expense was in labor, having a person hand deliver extra towels to a guest's room. I always thought they should have a "towel exchange" instead, maybe in the recycling areas or something. Having DVC guests do the "work" of bringing dirty towels to a central location, and taking new clean ones back to their room seems cheaper than running all those individual washer/dryers in the rooms.

We need that guy from "NUMB3RS" to crank out some calculations. LOL. In 10 days I am staying at All Star for $59/night, and I can have a cast member bring me all the towels I want, seems odd, doesn't it.........

Of course it has a cost. They don't track it to YOU, they allocate the cost for the hotel side and the DVC side probably based on room capacity, then divide out pool towel cost across the resort. Room towel cost they track seperately because its much more expensive on the cash side. If nothing more, its the cost of stocking additional inventory of towels. One thing is for certain though, there is an accountant involved and he or she has given that towel a cost.

Is the cost worth quibbling about - possibly not. But it does have a cost.

 

[jarestel]

In fact one family has been renting towel packs on ebay for years and has rented more than 1,000,000 sets since 2002. That is a $6,000,000.00 dollar direct loss to the DVC and raises all of our costs.-Tony

Good points, each and every one, Tony! I must admit I have often wondered why some folks seem to have a need for so many towels, more than most people could ever use strictly for themselves. Of course, the answer is towel renting! As always, you've shined your light into a dark corner and illiminated the scurrying rats. I will consider myself henceforth, wised-up!

Nice job!

 

[dvc_john]

I actually prefer the way Marriott Vacation Club resorts do it.
They don't have towels at the pool, but rather have pool towels in the room, enough for the occupancy for that unit. You use those towels for the length of your stay. These towels are larger and better than the normal pool towels, and have a color different than the room towels.

Some of the benefits of this system:

Less towel theft
Less leaving towels on pool chairs when people leave the pool
Less laundry expense
Pool crashers more easily identified since they won't have 'official' pool towels

 

[Dean]

I actually prefer the way Marriott Vacation Club resorts do it.
They don't have towels at the pool, but rather have pool towels in the room, enough for the occupancy for that unit. You use those towels for the length of your stay. These towels are larger and better than the normal pool towels, and have a color different than the room towels.

Some of the benefits of this system:

Less towel theft
Less leaving towels on pool chairs when people leave the pool
Less laundry expense
Pool crashers more easily identified since they won't have 'official' pool towels

They are variable from one resort to another for Marriott but I agree this is the most common approach I've seen at Marriott and elsewhere.

 

[BCVOwner2002]

I actually prefer the way Marriott Vacation Club resorts do it.
They don't have towels at the pool, but rather have pool towels in the room, enough for the occupancy for that unit. You use those towels for the length of your stay. These towels are larger and better than the normal pool towels, and have a color different than the room towels.

Some of the benefits of this system:

Less towel theft
Less leaving towels on pool chairs when people leave the pool
Less laundry expense
Pool crashers more easily identified since they won't have 'official' pool towels

What a good idea! We usually bring our own beach towels from home - especially when we stay in a 1-BR or 2-BR villa since it's so much easier washing towels right in the room rather than having to go to the laundry. This system would eliminate the need to have towels by the pool and could reduce costs since the resorts/DVC wouldn't need to pay for extra towels to be picked up and delivered to the pools saving man hours as well as gas (or whatever mode of power their vehicles use). This would also reduce the cost of laundering since each guest would only be entitled to one towel for the length of stay or replacement during trash/towel pick-up.

 

[fishermouse]

Your making me feel like a slob! You get clean towels on the third day and maid service on the 5th day. There are always plenty of towels when I arrive, enough for everyone, unless you have more people in the room than you should. Why would you need more towels? I do wrap up in a pool towel when returning from hot tubs at night, but usually take them back the next time we go to the pool. Do people normally use a new towel everyday at home? I don't, hopefully I'm clean when I dry off so one exchange a week is plenty.

 

[Sammie]

Your making me feel like a slob! You get clean towels on the third day and maid service on the 5th day. There are always plenty of towels when I arrive, enough for everyone, unless you have more people in the room than you should. Why would you need more towels? I do wrap up in a pool towel when returning from hot tubs at night, but usually take them back the next time we go to the pool. Do people normally use a new towel everyday at home? I don't, hopefully I'm clean when I dry off so one exchange a week is plenty.

I don't take towels from the pool, if we need them we wash ours, but I do use a clean towel after each shower at home.

 

[crisi]

Your making me feel like a slob! You get clean towels on the third day and maid service on the 5th day. There are always plenty of towels when I arrive, enough for everyone, unless you have more people in the room than you should. Why would you need more towels? I do wrap up in a pool towel when returning from hot tubs at night, but usually take them back the next time we go to the pool. Do people normally use a new towel everyday at home? I don't, hopefully I'm clean when I dry off so one exchange a week is plenty.

The case where I've wanted more towels is when staying in a HC Accessible room. The roll in showers take a while to learn to work without having a flooded bathroom - one bathmat really isn't sufficient for the learning process. After a week in the room, we were pretty good at keeping the water in the shower.

 

[greenban]

Bump, by popular demand...

-Tony

(Okay, so it was one person........)

 

[byoung]

My family is guilty!

 

[kimberh]

You guys are killing me. I am buying beach towels and forget the pool towels.

 

[PinkTink63]

I have noticed on our last couple of trips in the spring and just last month in October, that several times while we were at the pool at Turtle Pond at OKW people were coming over to the pool area and taking an armful of towels and going back to their rooms. That to me, is totally wrong. Either pay for the extras or wash the ones you have.

Must be those darn renters!

 

[starbox]

It never even would have ocurred to me that you were not supposed to take pool towels back to your room unless I read this thread!

I've taken pool towels everywhere I've stayed - the Ritz, Westin, Four Seasons & always took them when we stayed in pre-DVC mods. In fact, the one and only time we stayed at POP, I innocently went to the lifeguard and asked where the towels were and he said I had to bring my own from the room and I looked at Dh and told him that was it - we were not staying in a value again. I love the warm, fresh pool towels and really love not having to bring my own towels or keep damp pool towels in the room for re-use.