Fairfield/Wyndham resorts denial of usage

[thv13 Member Find all posts View Profile Close thv13]

As a FF newbie myself, I appreciate Thom sharing his frustration. When I get an account, Thom, I'd be happy to keep a look out for the reservations you most desire and will give you a quick heads up via email or PM, your preference.

Until then this whole scenario makes me wonder...is Thom being treated differently because he owns Royal Sea Cliff and not a "branded" Fairfield property? Are all Fairfield members treated equally, in other words, no matter where they bought into the points program? I'm curious, because it does seem that Thom has worked awfully hard for three years and still gets a "sorry Charlie" response from FF. I'm wondering if there could be another factor...I just don't believe in chocking it all up to bad luck. RCI and its cousins have been infamous for secret formulas for trade power that we're never made aware of. Could there be some kind of trade power factor coming into play for Thom, even though supposedly "points are points"?

Carol I can only speak from my experience but I will say that it is my opinion that for reservation purposes points are points(maintenance fees are an another issue) . You may reserve at your home resort from 13 months until 10 months in advance and then at any resort that you choose subject to availability. My points are all resale points and I have seen no secret trade power formulas or discrimination from having resale points or points from a particular location except for the limited value IMHO of the VIP benefits which are not obtainable from resale. You must have a sufficient # of points to make the reservations and when I have, I have experienced no problems..it is not like RCI where availability is checked on a broad basis you must search a specific time at a specific resort...at 10 months out (and many times with a much shorter time frame) I have been able to book basically anywhere I desired with the exception of DC and I have not tried Hawaii very often. Good luck in your future use of the FF system.. Tom

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

Hawaii Fairfield Hawai'i at Royal Sea Cliff

FF/W owner since May'03

I'll omit a lot of details for the sake of brevity but i have
played by their rules and gotten nothing in return over
the last 3 yrs. except due bills for approx.$14,000.

bought the 154,000 pt package...deeded " in severality"
@ the Royal Sea Cliff Resort in Hawaii , on the Big Isle

Please explain what you mean by - bills for approx. $14,000?
Is that your total investment including purchase price plus fees?


Fairfield Hawai'i at Royal Sea Cliff - Kailua-Kona, Big Island, HI 96740

Large Units in a Lush Oceanfront Setting. Fairfield Hawai‘i at Royal Sea Cliff,
just a mile and a half from the charming village of Kailua-Kona, offers you
multiple pleasures to make your Hawaiian stay complete: a dreamy oceanfront
setting, larger-sized units and a great selection of water and land-based
amenities and activities.

Resort Details and Video

https://www.fairfieldresorts.com/ffr/resort/details.do

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

Thom,

I am sorry to hear of your frustrations. I became a FF owner in 2006. My account became available in early April 2006. Later that month, I booked a Christmas week stay that was split between FF Flagstaff and FF Sedona. Also, during the last week of July 2006, I booked 2 units, 1BR and 2BR, at FF Pagosa for a March 2007 spring break stay, which I have just completed.

I did look at the point charts for the FF/Wyn resorts and found the smallest FSP point requirements for a week stay are as follows:

Royal Sea Cliff, 189,000 points 1BR
Kona Hawaiian Resort, 203,000 points 1BR
Waikiki Beach Walk, 154,000 points 1BR, weeks 1-4, 35-39, 44-50
Bali Hai, 203,000 points 1BR

None of these units were "prime" weeks. As you can see, to go and stay for a week at most of these resorts, you will have to exchange into them through RCI.

I suggest that you listen to the advice given to you already in this thread, especially about joining the Yahoo Fairfield group. You can also ask to join the FF HOA forum here, which is only for FF owners.

Finally, I, as well as I am sure that other FF owners on this forum, would be happy to try to help you if you want to send an email or PM to us. You have a very good TS product that can be used for wonderful vacations.

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

Carol,
He owns at Royal Sea Cliff, and that is Fairfield. How do you buy Fairfield points at a resort that is not Fairfield?

We have considered buying Fairfield points, now called Fairshare to take the Fairfield name out of it and have it fit better within the Wyndham system. We actually own four PAHIO weeks: We own one, two and three bedroom units at Bali Hai, one week of each size, and we also own at Shearwater. Next month, we will be staying at Shearwater and will attend the owners' update. If they offer us a "deal" to convert, I wonder if we should? What would be a good deal for a conversion? Does anyone even know how many points these weeks are worth?

I have so many more questions and want to be informed before attending the sales presentation.

Cindy,

I hope this information is helpful to you.

Because you own weeks at Bali Hai, the way you would buy Fairshare Points (FSP) is to assign your week to the FF VOA trust in exchange for points. There is an assignment contract that you sign to pledge the week to the FF VOA trust. You can always cancel the assignment and have your week back. In fact, your 13 month to 10 month reservation (know as ARP reservation) period allows you to reserve your specific week and unit. If you ARP your week, that will consume your FSP points for that year. If you have a float week, you may do an ARP reservation for a week. You may have left over points if you do this. For example, say you assign a 2 BR Deluxe, 308,000 points. You can ARP a reservation at Bali Hai for a 1BR for 203,000 points. That would leave you 105,000 points to use elsewhere at FF/Wyn resorts, including Bali Hai. You could use some to deposit into RCI for exchanges. There are many possibilities of how you could use your points.

Most resorts have various seasons for their weeks. At Bali Hai, FF/Wyn has designated all of the weeks as "Prime" therefore, no matter what week you own, you will get the same number of FSP points as the person who owns the most prime week at Bali Hai.

Here are the Fairshare Points (FSP) designations for the Pahio Bali Hai resort:

1 BR
203k lower view
231k upper view

1 BR Deluxe
231k lower view
266k upper view

2 BR Deluxe
308k lower view
325k upper view

2 BR Presidential
350k lower view
375k upper view

3 BR Presidential
450k lower view
500k upper view

Upper view is 2nd floor and higher
Deluxe rooms include a whirlpool tub
Presidential are upscale furnishings

If you have any questions, I would be happy to speak to you.

[nursetanya1973 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close nursetanya1973]

I bought the 154,000 pt package...deeded " in severality" @ the Royal Sea Cliff Resort in Hawaii , on the Big Isle with the intent and understanding that I could use the pts. every year to reserve time and usage where I wanted and when I wanted ,within the amount of points I had to use.

I am confused. What is "in severality"? I have been a Fairfield owner for a few years, and I have never heard of this. What did I miss?

How did you manage to buy a points package at this resort that is smaller than the smallest points requirement? I didn't think that was possible.

Hope you fare better in the future and at least get a little value out of the money you spent.

Tanya

[Carol C Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Carol C]

Carol I can only speak from my experience but I will say that it is my opinion that for reservation purposes points are points(maintenance fees are an another issue) . You may reserve at your home resort from 13 months until 10 months in advance and then at any resort that you choose subject to availability. My points are all resale points and I have seen no secret trade power formulas or discrimination from having resale points or points from a particular location except for the limited value IMHO of the VIP benefits which are not obtainable from resale. You must have a sufficient # of points to make the reservations and when I have, I have experienced no problems..it is not like RCI where availability is checked on a broad basis you must search a specific time at a specific resort...at 10 months out (and many times with a much shorter time frame) I have been able to book basically anywhere I desired with the exception of DC and I have not tried Hawaii very often. Good luck in your future use of the FF system.. Tom

Tom...I guess we can only speculate whether purpose-built, branded Fairfield resorts would somehow have more trade clout than SeaCliff and other resorts that were bought by Fairfield. But now I'm curious why Thom never got an exchange using FF pts when he bought from a developer's showroom (I would think he would get VIP benefits or something for paying the big bucks).

Thanks again Tom, and Mike too, for your sage advice for newbies!

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

Carol, Not many Fairfields in Hawaii were built by Fairfield. For example, the Kona Hawaiian Village was a private enterprise originally and was "bought out" by Fairfield. I remember seeing the cute video, when I exchanged into the place the first time, done by the guy who developed the resort. He talked on the video about discovering the old village while excavating the property, and he explained why he decided to refurbish the village and build around it, creating an educational experience for owners and exchangers.

The unit we stayed in was not a lockout and I could see that those units were not what Fairfield builds, since we have stayed in several others over the years. I wonder if Fairfield built the newer ones as lockouts?

When the Hawaiian Village resort was independent of Fairfield, the units were going for $12K, but after the resort became Fairfield, the units went way down in price. I fear that will be the result at PAHIO, when Wyndham puts their name in place of PAHIO.

Mike, what do you think they would charge us for a conversion of all of our units to Fairshare points? I imagine it won't just be $3K for all of them. That would be great! But alas, they will probably want $5K for each of them. No way would we do that. We already own the real estate, so why pay that much for points?

The only thing I see us trying just once is a Bonnet Creek unit. Now that might just be worth trying sometime, but I can always buy points for 1 cent each on ebay. How many points is a Bonnet Creek two bedroom for off-season fall or early winter? That would be terrific.

I guess we will be going to two Fairshare presentations: April 22nd we will be at Shearwater and April 29th, we check into Fairfield (Wyndham) Waikiki Beachwalk. They may not let us do both, but I can always go to a timeshare presentation somewhere else on Oahu, otherwise, what would I do with all that time.

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

Mike, what do you think they would charge us for a conversion of all of our units to Fairshare points? I imagine it won't just be $3K for all of them. That would be great! But alas, they will probably want $5K for each of them. No way would we do that. We already own the real estate, so why pay that much for points?

The only thing I see us trying just once is a Bonnet Creek unit. Now that might just be worth trying sometime, but I can always buy points for 1 cent each on ebay. How many points is a Bonnet Creek two bedroom for off-season fall or early winter? That would be terrific.

Cindy,

In the past the cost to convert a qualified Fairfield fixed/floating week was $2395 for the first week and $995 for additional weeks. There has been a trend to require a minimum separate retail FSP point purchase also. However, with Pahio Bali Hai, I can't even guess what will be presented to you to convert your week. At this point, FF/Wyn does not have very many units available each week. My opinion is that it would like to up the number of available FSP units as soon as possible. If you can do convert a week or weeks at Pahio without a retail purchase of additional points, it could be something to consider. The addition cost will be the FSP annual fee. Currently, for 300,000 or more, it is $.50 per 1,000 points. Less than 300,000 is a different rate which I don't have readily available.

As for FF Bonnet Creek Resort, the points required for a 2 BR Deluxe in its "High" and "Value" seasons are 189,000 and 112,000 points respectively.

High = weeks 1-6, 20-22, 34-35, 40-42 (189,000 FSP points)
Value = weeks 15-19, 36-39, 43-50 (112,000 FSP points)
Prime = weeks 7-14, 23-33, 51-52 (224,000 points)

[Jya-Ning Silver Contributor Find all posts View Profile Close Jya-Ning]

Thom:

In 2005 Summer, two FF owners brought a class action aginst FF with similar reason. It was reported in Tug. I believe it is now in one of their archive sever, their reason are 1. FF denied their usage, 2. FF dilute their ownership.

It got dismissed, and reported in this exact forum.

Not to discourage you, but you mayneed to show more than you can not get a reservation to make the case even in trial.

Don't know where you actually live, but I will guess you are somewhere in West coast. So IMHO, you have 2 disadvantages

1. you only have 154k in your home resort. As Marti points out, it requires 189k for 1 wk even in low season in that resort. Plus that resort is in HI, FF has allow all Outrigger club member to access its HI resort at 12 month, so you don't have 3 month ARP period in your home resort, you have maybe 1 1/2 month ARP period at your home resort. You have no access to other resort during these ARP period. And you can only get 3 or 4 nights in ARP period since you don't have enough point. Does look to me that you need to take airplane to get there, so 3 or 4 days makes no sense.

Thus, you can only seek to get FF internally at 10 month. Unfortuately, that means if you are looking at prime season, you still need to get 3, 4 or 7 days. If not in prime season, you can get any day you like.

It also means since FF has more selections in East at this moment, you may have very limit choices.

However, you have 2 big advantages also
1. you did mention you have tried from May to Nov stay, so you are flexible
2. you did mention you have try 13 month, so you can commit.

For FF, there are several places that it has oversupplies. Don't know bout west part of the country, but in East side, Banson, Orlando, Williamsburg, Glade are places you can try. I believe Las Vagas will be oversupplies in FF.

If you never success before, try to start from these area first.

If you get to Yahoo group. In their file session, there is an Occupancy Statistic, you can look at each region and start with some easy ones. Just get a feeling that you can get some places will be a good start.

my home resort is Kingsgate, I don't believe when I trade with RCI, it workd good in West coast. But there are from time to time, deposit from FF to RCI, and you can get them from 1 year to 2 year time frame with less point. Do that, and then use the rest of points to get a 3 to 4 day trip around it as your 2nd step, so you can get a feeling how to use exchange and internal to extend your points. Las Vagas if you are looking only 1 BD is a good place to try that on.

On 10 month period, you can try to do some stuff like use borrow/cancel points, credit pool, to combine several years' point together, so you can actually get 7 days' vacation. And combine with external exchange, hopefully, you can get something you really like at the time you want to go.

If you really have problem, joint Yahoo group, rent out your points. You have enough to cover your MF and with some change, so you can rent from others, it maybe as easy too.

In the meantime, if you still want to sue them, you can still keep it, and may found some people willing to try. But it takes time to gather people, collect evidents that can really make the case, and time in the court, may as well try to use your point at the ame time.

Let me know.

Jya-Ning

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

Thanks, Mike!

It will be fun to see what they offer us as current owners, but we still bought all of our weeks resale and the PAHIO salespeople would not let us convert to RCI points, so I would imagine if the same salespeople are now selling Fairshare points, we will run into the same problem. Resort developers sure look down on resale buyers. Gee, I wonder why?

Fairshare has always been a temptation for me, but there are so many temptations in timeshare. I want a Summit Watch Bronze week, some Bluegreen points, lots of DVC points, some Fairshare and a few additional Colorado ski weeks for trading. The problem is that we already own 15 weeks and I am not willing to get rid of any of them. I am too attached!

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

hi .update to previous FF post

Hi All.....I'll try and clear a few things up ..1st....I had a choice between a 154,000pt package for $12 G or a 210,000 pt package for approx $22 G. in 2003. After the sales person explained the differences between them , I choose the 154 G package .. I was assured this package would get me 1 week at MOST resorts, which seemed to fit my plan at the time I had no idea how the whole thing worked at the time and thru my ignorance, I bought into the system having no clue I would not have enuf pts for most places.. The sales person , in this case Vicki Hines/ hawaii, in my opinion...outright lied to me about the true worth and value of the 154,00 pt package, just to get a sale and the commission. A claim she will no doubt deny to her last breath . Only after studying the paperwork/directory/books in the weeks afterwards did I realize the ramifications of my decision. I , like probably a lot of people, was on vacation, in this instance , in Hawaii, when i bought in..Bad decision....part of my argument with FF/W is I was given a tour of Kona Hawaiin Village and thats where the deal was made and when i got the paperwork it said ..Royal Sea Cliff. At that time I truely believed I was signing papers for Kona Hawaiian Village and the Royal Sea Cliff name was some sort of "trade " name for it .. I believe i was suckered by a "bait 'n switch " deal. the "in severality" in the deed @ RSC , i believe , refers to a person who owns points towards time instead of a fixed week at a specific resort ...kinda like a " owner-at-large" and probably since each "owner " has to be assigned a "home "resort ...RSC was mine .
another replyer asked ...What was the $14 g for ? That amount is all the monies I have spent since May '03 when i bought in...this amt includes the monthly mortage and all maintenance fees since 5/03. the final price of the 154,000 pt package will figure out to around approx.$ 21-22g w/ interest, by the end of the 7 year "loan", which FF holds. now I hope you all understand why i bought the $12 G package and not the $22 G one. i imagine that one would be in the area of around $50 G payback on a loan.
interesting , the comments about the internet service quality being questionable and i now wonder if it wasn't the web site that was really the cause of all my problems since i tried exclusively to reserve thru the website. Also Sedona, Az was the last place i tried to reserve time at and got refused and yet another patron here was able to reserve time in 2006...very frustrating.

[Sydney Contributor - Bronze Find all posts View Profile Close Sydney]

Thom, one of the things, amongst the replies from Fairfield owners here, that struck me which will probably work better for you is to bank some of your points with RCI and then exchanging back into Fairfield resorts with the Fairfield preference that RCI gives owners.

Do you know about the RCI exchange company? I've seen a few posts on the forums about people getting good trades, especially after an exchange opportunity sighting. These ExOps get posted every morning on our site to give people an idea of what's available with a number of exchange companies. If you are a Fairfield owner, RCI allows you to see all/most FF deposits? Does someone who knows more about it, expand on this? It sounds like a good perk which could help Thom get some of the holidays he hopes for.

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

RCI exhanges

Thom,

I'd be willing to do some RCI searches for you. If you can travel in the spring or fall, FF will have a variety of locations available during those times. Send me a private message with some dates and preferred resort locations. I will also search for non-FF locations if you'd like (Hawaii, Myrtle Beach, etc).

On pages 248 and 249 of the 2006-2007 FF Member's Directory, it explains briefly about exchanging via either RCI or II. In RCI, you can deposit your FF points for an equivalent "week" - for example it costs 28K for Blue studio, 42K for a White studio or 70K for a Red studio. FF's VC will put these "weeks" into your RCI account. These RCI deposits are available to search for two years from the month you make the deposit. There's an issue of whether the deposit is "visible" - in that you can search online without requiring an RCI VC to check where you want to go and the dates you're interested in traveling. A "generic" RCI deposit will require a phone call to the RCI VC to search for you. Generic deposits seem to have better RCI trade power than a "visible" deposit (they may pull more resorts), but that's just a FF owner's opinion.

Your need to determine how many weeks you'd like to travel each year. If you split your 154K FF points into RCI deposits of two 42K White studios and one 70K Red studio, you can get three exchanges in RCI for the cost of your FF MFs plus three RCI exchange fees at $164 each. I'm guessing this would cost about $2,000 per year, or a little less than $100 per night if you find exchanges for all three weeks each year (cheaper than a big city hotel).

After being notified of bulk RCI deposits of FF weeks at Kona and Waikiki Beach Walk, I've been able to confirm weeks in either a 1Br (Waikiki) or 2BR (Kona) with the 28K RCI deposit of the Blue studio week - plus paying the $164 RCI exchange fee. An all in cost of $304 for each unit, if factoring in the approximate cost of the Maintenance Fees and FSP program fee for the points. Not bad.

Let me know. We are here to try to help one another. Keep posting here until you get to 15 and then you can look at the RCI Exchange Opportunities forum on this group.

[GrayFal Silver Contributor and supermoderator Find all posts View Profile Close GrayFal]

Thom,

I'd be willing to do some RCI searches for you. If you can travel in the spring or fall, FF will have a variety of locations available during those times. Send me a private message with some dates and preferred resort locations. I will also search for non-FF locations if you'd like (Hawaii, Myrtle Beach, etc).

On pages 248 and 249 of the 2006-2007 FF Member's Directory, it explains briefly about exchanging via either RCI or II. In RCI, you can deposit your FF points for an equivalent "week" - for example it costs 28K for Blue studio, 42K for a White studio or 70K for a Red studio. FF's VC will put these "weeks" into your RCI account. These RCI deposits are available to search for two years from the month you make the deposit. There's an issue of whether the deposit is "visible" - in that you can search online without requiring an RCI VC to check where you want to go and the dates you're interested in traveling. A "generic" RCI deposit will require a phone call to the RCI VC to search for you. Generic deposits seem to have better RCI trade power than a "visible" deposit (they may pull more resorts), but that's just a FF owner's opinion.

Your need to determine how many weeks you'd like to travel each year. If you split your 154K FF points into RCI deposits of two 42K White studios and one 70K Red studio, you can get three exchanges in RCI for the cost of your FF MFs plus three RCI exchange fees at $164 each. I'm guessing this would cost about $2,000 per year, or a little less than $100 per night if you find exchanges for all three weeks each year (cheaper than a big city hotel).

After being notified of bulk RCI deposits of FF weeks at Kona and Waikiki Beach Walk, I've been able to confirm weeks in either a 1Br (Waikiki) or 2BR (Kona) with the 28K RCI deposit of the Blue studio week - plus paying the $164 RCI exchange fee. An all in cost of $304 for each unit, if factoring in the approximate cost of the Maintenance Fees and FSP program fee for the points. Not bad.

Let me know. We are here to try to help one another. Keep posting here until you get to 15 and then you can look at the RCI Exchange Opportunities forum on this group.

It is great to see all the help other FF owners are giving here....and FF sounds like a great product.
You certainly get quite a gang for your buck with your ownership CC_dad.

Carol C, are ya listening

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

I am sure doing some listening!

I added up the value of my weeks in Fairshare points:

1 bedroom (never seen this unit): Upper level worth 231,000 (maybe a deluxe, which would be worth 266,000)
2 bedroom deluxe, upper level: 325,000
3 bedroom deluxe, upper level: 500,000

I think upper level is a pain in the back, lugging suitcases up a flight of stairs, but hey, if they give more points, what the heck?

Those are the Bali Hai
2 bedroom Shearwater is worth 308,000 because it is a lower level, but it is a Shearwater, so maybe it is presidential?

That is a total of about 1,364,000 points. That is a lot of points, but we won't do it anyway. If I resold all those points, I would not get what we paid for the weeks at the 1-2 cents per point they go for on ebay. Add in the cost of conversion, and it is a much worse deal for us. Gee, I feel so badly that we will have to let down another salesperson.