Would you join a lawsuit against DVC to stop/revert the 2020 reallocation?

[Wakey]

There are over 41,000 views on this thread, Disney should be concerned about how this can impact their image. Last time I received a survey from Disney about my trip, this website was at the top of their list for where to gather planning information. Ms Chang, Director, Club Managment and Regulatory Affairs at The Walt Disney Company, who crevetter and Zandor might have spoken with should want this whole mess to get cleaned up in a positive way, so we can all go away happy.

What do you mean at the top of their list?

 

[Wakey]

Yvonne Chang also sits on the board of DVCMC it appears, so works for us in that capacity.

 

[skier_pete]

What do you mean at the top of their list?

I think she means they have a survey where they ask you what web-sites you use to help plan your Disney trip, and the list has DISboards near the top.

 

[tjkraz]

There are over 41,000 views on this thread, Disney should be concerned about how this can impact their image. Last time I received a survey from Disney about my trip, this website was at the top of their list for where to gather planning information. Ms Chang, Director, Club Managment and Regulatory Affairs at The Walt Disney Company, who crevetter and Zandor might have spoken with should want this whole mess to get cleaned up in a positive way, so we can all go away happy.

Well, those aren't 41k unique views. It could be 400 people each viewing the thread 100 separate times. (Assuming it also counts clicks when navigating from one page to the next, I'm probably down for 200-300 views myself.)

While the responses from DVC have been less articulate than expected, I think we're a long way from them saying "never mind about those 2020 point charts...that's our bad." Unless it's made crystal clear that something illegal has occurred, I doubt fear of public embarrassment will drive any reversal. Heck, if Disney doesn't care about the backlash from parking fees and broken Yeti's, a few dozen disgruntled DVC owners is small potatoes.

That said, personally I'm more intrigued than I was a week ago...

 

[Dean]

Yes, a salesperson's job is to sell, but bait and switch is not legal. It is not legal for them to tell people that they are locking in costs by joining dvc and that overall points in the system will not change and then do the opposite, or something different. We attended several dvc pitches over the years and they all said the same thing about points in the system not changing. It doesn't matter what they put in the fine print. It is not legal to misrepresent the product.

We have a different definition of bait and switch. There's no way a guide will be able to tell you every nuance and in reality no way they'd know them. While we've seen a few reports that appeared to be exceptions, guides are usually reasonable and above board. Telling you you're locking in costs is not incorrect even if it's not the entire picture. You signed off that you understand changes could happen and the dues could increase.

I largely agree with you. But there’s are two very important points to consider.

1. It is still illegal to mislead purchasers. Deceptive trade practices act cover this. Relying on the “4 corners” of the POS is not necessarily binding.

2. The reallocations can only be made to even out demand and must be for benefit of the members.

You'd have to prove they had a practice of purposefully misleading the buyer and I don't think one can make that case with DVC. As for the reallocation that's true that they have a mandate to even out demand. In that regard I don't think the benefit of the members wording is particularly applicable per se if the pattern of usage dictates the change. It certainly wouldn't apply to be a majority of the members.

 

[drusba]

DVC keeps claiming the demand for 1BRs is more than 2BRs when we know that cannot be correct, except possibly under one theory, which is the one I suspect DVC is relying on: demand is determined by total number of actual reservations of the different rooms. That is a simple way to view it, it would be very easy to calculate total reservations over a year's period per room size using the reservation system, and DVC is one prone to use the simplest (and least expensive) way to justify its actions.

Doing it that way could make 1BRs have, as now claimed by DVC, a much "higher demand" than 2BRs simply because most of the 2BR lock-offs are reserved as studios, and eventually as 1BRs as 1BRs become the only rooms still available. For example, BWV has 97 dedicated studios, 130 dedicated 1BRs, 149 2BR lock-offs, and no dedicated 2BRs. The biggest demand by far is for studios, which has annually risen in the last 9 years, partly due to DVD's selling 100 and 50 point contracts to new purchasers and adding a fifth bed to the studios. During the high demand season, late Sep to marathon weekend in January, the studios and 2BRs disappear quickly at 11 months out, likely due to studio demand, which is indicated by the fact that the 1BRs remain open much longer even during that high demand season than studios or 2BRs. During the rest of the year, studios, and thus 2BRs, disappear long before 1BRs (studios and 2BRs are often gone at or shortly after the 7 month window opens but 1BRs, including even standard and boardwalk view, often do not fill until five months or less out.

Thus, if you count total number of reservations as the measure of "demand" you could easily get a yearly conclusion that the 1BR "demand" at BWV is triple or more than the 2BR "demand."

I am not trying to justify DVC's concept of higher demand, but just attempting to identify what it likely is. The concept that most of us have for distinguishing "demand" is how many more members actually want 2BRs as opposed to 1BRs, but for determining that kind of demand, one cannot really do a count using the reservation system because you can only see that 1BRs remain available longer and are eventually filled. What you cannot see is the likely large number of members who go online because they want a 2BR but find they are no longer available and decide not to reserve at all or reserve a 1BR.

 

[bigtony777]

It seems they would need to provide data to prove that the changes they are making will not increase the total number of points for this coming year versus previous years. If they were to ask me what I would like, I would ask for data showing how many units of each type at each resort were occupied over the last 3 years. Then one could run calculations to determine the expected impact of the point change.

At the very least it seems that they should be forced to show the total number of points used before and after this change to prove that more points were not accepted. Unfortunately this means that the new point chart will be in force for at least a year before that can truly be determined.

 

[mustinjourney]

DVC keeps claiming the demand for 1BRs is more than 2BRs when we know that cannot be correct, except possibly under one theory, which is the one I suspect DVC is relying on: demand is determined by total number of actual reservations of the different rooms. That is a simple way to view it, it would be very easy to calculate total reservations over a year's period per room size using the reservation system, and DVC is one prone to use the simplest (and least expensive) way to justify its actions.

Doing it that way could make 1BRs have, as now claimed by DVC, a much "higher demand" than 2BRs simply because most of the 2BR lock-offs are reserved as studios, and eventually as 1BRs as 1BRs become the only rooms still available. For example, BWV has 97 dedicated studios, 130 dedicated 1BRs, 149 2BR lock-offs, and no dedicated 2BRs. The biggest demand by far is for studios, which has annually risen in the last 9 years, partly due to DVD's selling 100 and 50 point contracts to new purchasers and adding a fifth bed to the studios. During the high demand season, late Sep to marathon weekend in January, the studios and 2BRs disappear quickly at 11 months out, likely due to studio demand, which is indicated by the fact that the 1BRs remain open much longer even during that high demand season than studios or 2BRs. During the rest of the year, studios, and thus 2BRs, disappear long before 1BRs (studios and 2BRs are often gone at or shortly after the 7 month window opens but 1BRs, including even standard and boardwalk view, often do not fill until five months or less out.

Thus, if you count total number of reservations as the measure of "demand" you could easily get a yearly conclusion that the 1BR "demand" at BWV is triple or more than the 2BR "demand."

I am not trying to justify DVC's concept of higher demand, but just attempting to identify what it likely is. The concept that most of us have for distinguishing "demand" is how many more members actually want 2BRs as opposed to 1BRs, but for determining that kind of demand, one cannot really do a count using the reservation system because you can only see that 1BRs remain available longer and are eventually filled. What you cannot see is the likely large number of members who go online because they want a 2BR but find they are no longer available and decide not to reserve at all or reserve a 1BR.

holy cow. I never understood what the counter argument could be until your post just now. So in the event, let's say 49 2BRs get booked, they might be just looking at the end result and see that 197 studios get booked, 230 1BRs are booked, with only 49 2BRs being booked.

Wow. If that is what they're doing then someone needs to be fired and taught the difference between demand and people taking what is leftover.

 

[Donna M]

Well, those aren't 41k unique views. It could be 400 people each viewing the thread 100 separate times. (Assuming it also counts clicks when navigating from one page to the next, I'm probably down for 200-300 views myself.)

While the responses from DVC have been less articulate than expected, I think we're a long way from them saying "never mind about those 2020 point charts...that's our bad." Unless it's made crystal clear that something illegal has occurred, I doubt fear of public embarrassment will drive any reversal. Heck, if Disney doesn't care about the backlash from parking fees and broken Yeti's, a few dozen disgruntled DVC owners is small potatoes.

That said, personally I'm more intrigued than I was a week ago...

We all realize that it's not 41,000 different people. The point is that the public is reading a lot of negative about DVC. If someone is on the fence about whether to buy at Riviera, they might have second thoughts, second thoughts about buying DVC at all. These dollar signs are much more significant than parking fees, which are pretty common.

 

[DougEMG]

We all realize that it's not 41,000 different people. The point is that the public is reading a lot of negative about DVC. If someone is on the fence about whether to buy at Riviera, they might have second thoughts, second thoughts about buying DVC at all. These dollar signs are much more significant than parking fees, which are pretty common.

Exactly, and this is the first time I am seeing members saying that it might not be a good thing to buy DVC when typically they would have been the strongest advocates of the product.

 

[mustinjourney]

You'd have to prove they had a practice of purposefully misleading the buyer and I don't think one can make that case with DVC. As for the reallocation that's true that they have a mandate to even out demand. In that regard I don't think the benefit of the members wording is particularly applicable per se if the pattern of usage dictates the change. It certainly wouldn't apply to be a majority of the members.

Regarding misleading practices -- if it actually came to a lawsuit, that's the beauty of discovery in America. You'd be amazed at the stuff that is discovered in e-mails and sales memos.

 

[DVC92]

Regarding misleading practices -- if it actually came to a lawsuit, that's the beauty of discovery in America. You'd be amazed at the stuff that is discovered in e-mails and sales memos.

Exactly, the so-called proprietary information will no longer be locked in the safe behind the picture at DVC headquarters.

 

[Johnny D]

We have a different definition of bait and switch. There's no way a guide will be able to tell you every nuance and in reality no way they'd know them. While we've seen a few reports that appeared to be exceptions, guides are usually reasonable and above board. Telling you you're locking in costs is not incorrect even if it's not the entire picture. You signed off that you understand changes could happen and the dues could increase.

I think most of us have a different definition of nuance. The agent for disney is just that, Disney’s agent/ representative. You seem to be belittling their role and persuasiveness in this process. I do not believe it is a small thing or they did not know that in their interpretation of the contract, they could raise the total points in individual unit catagories. Imagine saying to a customer, Mr. and Mrs Middle class buyer, the $$ you are scraping together for your studio 5 nights a year, may only be enough for 2 nights down the road. Think that honesty would have changed some minds. They new what they were doing and manipulated people in their sales presentation to show the peices of the pie they wanted you to see. That may be alright with some, but not me. To assume that the well trained disney salespeople are innocent in this is naïve.

 

[DVC92]

Further, as I previously stated, I believe the point and price increases might have a lot to do with the Riviera, and little or nothing to do with demand. With the increases, they can make the Riviera look like a bargain with a lower sales price as well as lower points for booking studios and 1BRs.

 

[freediverdude]

I think that, whether this is legal or not or allowed via the contracts or not, Disney would be smart to get ahead of this before it becomes a common talking point about DVC in the timeshare community. Right now they still have time to fix it and say whoops we made a mistake we'll go with the 2019 charts again, sorry about that. But if this goes on longer, the talk when people discuss timeshares will go "DVC? Oh, they do that point creep stuff, so not worth it, you have to keep buying more points to reserve the same thing." Disney does not want to get a reputation like that, or at least I would hope they wouldn't.

Disney, get out in front of this while it is still small and cut it off at the pass!

 

[DougEMG]

I think that, whether this is legal or not or allowed via the contracts or not, Disney would be smart to get ahead of this before it becomes a common talking point about DVC in the timeshare community. Right now they still have time to fix it and say whoops we made a mistake we'll go with the 2019 charts again, sorry about that. But if this goes on longer, the talk when people discuss timeshares will go "DVC? Oh, they do that point creep stuff, so not worth it, you have to keep buying more points to reserve the same thing." Disney does not want to get a reputation like that, or at least I would hope they wouldn't.

Disney, get out in front of this while it is still small and cut it off at the pass!

And this is how I think we can have the most impact on Disney.

 

[MommaBerd]

Regarding the sales pitch and point reallocation - I tend to think the Guides said what they *believed* to be true at the time. Now, things have changed. If they were to continue stating that points will not change across unit types (balanced within a unit vs. across all unit types) THEN that would be misleading.

 

[bigtony777]

I am not sure that the sales reps knew that this was a possibility. I believe they had the same understanding as we did. I think someone came up with this idea and they are gettry du slide it by to reap some extra profit.

 

[miTnosnhoJ]

I have in my mind that we should write something called “The Real DVC Product Understanding Checklist”.
It should be very factual, but it should highlight the new facts on the ground. For example:

Disney Selling Point: you are locking in a lifetime of vacations at today’s prices.
Fact: This is a true statement if two conditions are true. 1] you buy enough points for a 2BR. 2) you only use your points to stay in 2BRs. Your price for studios and 1BRs is not guaranteed to stay at today’s prices and can in fact go up 20% per year without a member vote. And without a corresponding decrease elsewhere on the points chart.

I’m sure that could be word smithed to be more on point, but that is the idea.

 

[Novakm]

I’m sure part of the problem is talking to someone “very high up”.

Think about where you work. How well does senior management understand what you do or why? In most places, they know almost nothing.

If Y had answers to all your questions, I would find it suspicious.

The person who knows is the one who did the calculations. That’s the person we need to hear from.