All inclusives

[gwechi Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwechi]

I was excited to see an email from Diamond saying that an all inclusive resort in Jamaica is being added to the directory. I went to check on availability and was floored when I chose a week and saw on the confirmation page that an all inclusive fee of $107 per guest per night is charged for a studio in addition to the 7000 points!!!

So I decided to break down the cost of this stay and compare to an outside booking.
I paid approx. an $1800 maintenance fee (includes the various taxes and fees the put on) last year for 14000 points. So $1800/14000 = .12857 per point.

So the booking would cost me approx $900 (7000 * .12587).
Then it would cost an all inclusive fee of $1498 ($107 * 2 people * 7 nights) for my wife and I.
So the total would be $2398. Bookit.com had the same hotel for $2179!!!

Can someone tell me if my logic is wrong? What the hell is the point of being in this scheme if you can't even make up for the yearly maintenance fees, much less the thousands and thousands of dollars to become a member in the first place!

[Spence Super Moderator Find all posts View Profile Close Spence]

I was excited to see an email from Diamond saying that an all inclusive resort in Jamaica is being added to the directory. I went to check on availability and was floored when I chose a week and saw on the confirmation page that an all inclusive fee of $107 per guest per night is charged for a studio in addition to the 7000 points!!!

So I decided to break down the cost of this stay and compare to an outside booking.
I paid approx. an $1800 maintenance fee (includes the various taxes and fees the put on) last year for 14000 points. So $1800/14000 = .12857 per point.

So the booking would cost me approx $900 (7000 * .12587).
Then it would cost an all inclusive fee of $1498 ($107 * 2 people * 7 nights) for my wife and I.
So the total would be $2398. Bookit.com had the same hotel for $2179!!!

Can someone tell me if my logic is wrong? What the hell is the point of being in this scheme if you can't even make up for the yearly maintenance fees, much less the thousands and thousands of dollars to become a member in the first place!

Not everyone is as savvy as the average TS4Ms member. DRI isn't the only one on this bandwagon, my guess is that they and the several exchange companies that are featuring Palladium
Grand Palladium Jamaica Resort & Spa, Lucea, Hanover, Jamaica | Timeshare | Vacation Ownership
AI resorts get their inventory for nothing or next to nothing, as the resort gets that AI fee that pays their bill and DRI points get used (meaning DRI has extra points they can rent out?) or the exchange fee goes to the exchange company. DRI and the exchange companies may even get a cut of the AI fee for sending customers into the AI!

[kexueli Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close kexueli]

Coming out ahead with this scheme

If you break out many of the bookings you will come to the same conclusion. I do this calculation for all of my bookings. In order to come out ahead you need to book Sunday-Friday vacations, or book during the 50% off time period. There are also certain locations where you can do well with booking a full week at full points. Sedona and Hawaii have been good spots for me. These places can be expensive to book a hotel room so the timeshare often turns out to be a good deal. Las Vegas and Palm Springs have been a couple of the worst, because you can usually get a cheap room in those places. The worst way to use your points (as far as getting the most for your dollar) is to book a weekend outside the 50% window.

However, each year as maintenance fees are increased the value of this timeshare scheme decreases, and I can find fewer instances where booking the same room on some travel website is not cheaper than the maintenance fees. Hotel rates are just not increasing as quickly as our maintenance fees. As soon as I cannot get value from this timeshare, I'm going to walk away and let them do what they will with my credit score, because I refuse to give them money to take my fully paid points back.

[gwechi Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close gwechi]

The more I use and inquire about this thing the more I kick myself and realize that this is just a big scam and waste of money. These rip off schemes should be made illegal but of course that will never happen.

kexueli, if your points are fully paid off, don't just stop paying the fees and kill your credit. You can sign a mutual release form where you basically walk away from all your "privileges" of this scheme. I don't have the number on me but you can call the collections department and give back some or all of your points. I had a lot more points and I gave a bunch back because the maintenance fees were way more than the value I could possibly get from using all the points. Like you, I figured that even though I was duped out of thousands of dollars, I might as well curtail the hemorrhaging.
But we'll see, I think the bottom line will be aside from getting lucky with the 50% deals, you never really come out saving money.

This makes me wanna post to any newbies on this forum to get out of this scheme if they still can!

[kexueli Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close kexueli]

Thanks for the tip gwechi! I'm not ready to unload my points yet, because I still do get many of the 50% deals, but I'm sure it is only a matter of time before it makes sense for me to dump this timeshare.

[longtimer Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close longtimer]

IMO - AI fees only work for people who eat/drink a lot and like to stay on the resort property. Most people I know spend less than that/day for food and drinks. The rest of the amenities would come with a TS vacation anyway (unless you happen to get spa treatments as part of the AI fee).