We've all taken the phone
call, whether it was an automated voice message or a real person - "You have been
selected to receive a free airline tickets/vacation/hotel stay… all you have to
do is take a tour of our new property… yadda, yadda … something for nothing!"
I've certainly taken that call, and every time I gave the polite reply: "Thanks but no thanks."
But I recently got to wondering how good these deals might be, and when one such offer to "Take a Fun Tour of our New Property" corresponded with a trip to visit family nearby, I bit.
I dared to go where few travelers dare to go, and returned to tell the tale.
My conclusion: "There is no free lunch" still holds true.
The Phone Call
First, while still on the phone, I pressed for information about the offer. Essentially, it went like this: visit our property, and get free airfare to one of several destinations of the company's choosing. The catch: I pay the hotel rate.
When I asked, the telephone marketer was friendly, cooperative, and forthcoming: she gave the exact destinations, precise rates and minimum stays. I discovered the following:
- The destinations were very precise (X hotel at Y location, no alternative hotels), and all travel arrangements must be made through the company.
- All hotel rates would be charged at rack rate, which is considerably higher than anything you would pay normally.
- Each location had a minimum stay, which kept the hotel costs high enough for the company to recoup the cost of the airfare.
- The better the location, the longer the minimum stay (the stay in Fort Lauderdale was five days; Acapulco and Cancun require eight; Hawaii requires ten).
- The total cost of the hotel would have been very close to what I could have come up with buying both the airfare and a lesser hotel on my own.
60-90 Minute tour: The Gilligan Factor
So on the whole, these packages were neither an outstanding bargain, nor a rip-off. If indeed this was to be a "fun, 60-90 minute tour," I figure I would make out okay.
However, as ye shall see, the telephone marketer wasn't quite completely forthcoming with the nature of the "fun tour." (Cue Gilligan's Island theme here...)
The new property was based in Atlantic City, and I understood it to be a hotel both from some vague language the marketer used, as well as some previous knowledge of my own. I drove into the World's Favorite Playground (as Atlantic City was once called), parked for free in the lot next door, and headed up to the fourth floor as instructed by the phone marketer.
I sat down in a waiting room where I found some soft drinks (that's right... no free lunch) and "You've Got Mail" on the television. An older couple who arrived before me was shepherded off, and my "guide," whom I'll call Sue (not her real name) soon came into the room. With a big smile and a joking tone, she bellowed "Are we ready to talk about time shares???"
"Ah, those dirty words," I laughed. "But this is a hotel, right?"
"Nope, this is a time share," Sue said as we marched into a room packed with similar suckers.
The Three Hour Pitch
The pitch commenced, a tortured, convoluted excursion that tried to avoid all mention of the actual cost of the time share. Along the way, I variously thought the deal would cost me $31/day, then $250,000 flat fee, then some other vague numbers that didn't hold together.
I was asked what kind of credit card I had, how much I had in the bank, if I had a check with me, what I did for a living, if I was married, if I expected to have children. What appeared to be a friendly chat soon was understood to be an aggressive background check.
Now, I personally have nothing against time shares. They're just not for me at this time in my life, and worse, I didn't see it coming.
To her credit, early in the pitch Sue said "I don't think this is for you, but let's take a look."
She was right, and she knew it. We both knew it, and I agreed with her. Why then did the "fun 60-90 minute tour" take two hours and 35 relentless, hoary, excruciating minutes?
Word Problems
We did a pile of calculations to determine how often I travel, how many vacations I take, how much I spend on them, how much I wanted to spend on them, how much that could cost me over the course of my entire life, etc. etc. ad nauseam. It was like a never-ending math word problem. The problem was, I was told how much I could save, but never how much I had to pay.
Now I don't know about most folks, but me, you tell me the bottom line, and I can figure out pretty darn quickly whether or not something is in my budget, my best interest, even my life's plan. So I asked the obvious question: "What's the bottom line? How much does this cost?"
The Seven-Minute Tour
The answer: "Let's go upstairs and look at the rooms."
I didn't get my answer, but here it was… the tour! It took all of seven minutes, including the elevator ride. Then it was back to the interrogation room. After another, briefer wrangle, at the end of which Sue finally seemed to relent and prepare to let me go see my family, a manager was called over for the final shakedown. He made a few more hardball pitches, with a little scare tactic thrown in. All of his offers explicitly available only this one time, not after today, never to be revisited; take them now or forever live in regret. He even advised Sue to "make sure he understands that these special offers are off the table after today."
Don't Let The Door Hit You in the...
As I was curtly escorted to collect my "prizes," I mentioned to Sue that she might have had a better time if someone had told us these were time shares; in fact, I might not have wasted her afternoon. This person who had been so kind, friendly, interested, inquisitive about my entire life had this to say: "Then you wouldn't have shown up. I bet I make more money doing this than you do. Sue takes care of Sue. I don't need any advice."
Nice to meet you, too, Sue.
Of course I have to take some of the blame. I had no intention of buying anything, and was just checking out the whole thing out of curiosity (and maybe to write up in this column). And somehow I had been put on their mailing list as someone who had attended these things before, and who might have some genuine interest. (I hadn't attended any, and had no interest.)
But I still have no idea what I would have been buying, where it was, how often, how frequently, or for how long I could use it, or what it was worth, if I had cut a check that day. And these folks shouldn't tell us we get a free vacation for taking a fun tour, then give us a haranguing and expect us to pull out our gold cards and plunk down a nearly five-figure sum for a vacation time share that we don't even understand.
The Bottom Line (Finally)
My take:
1) Two pairs of round-trip airline tickets, good for two years, to a choice of more than a dozen different hotels in Florida, Canada, Hawaii, the Caribbean, Mexico, or several stateside destinations.
The tickets must be used within two years, but may not be used concurrently or within a single year. They are transferable to friends and family, but not for resale.
My expense:
1) Hotel rooms ranging from $70/night (Orlando off-peak season) to over $300/night. In some cases, you are required to stay at least part of your trip in the higher priced hotels - for example, in Maui, you may stay three nights in a $189/night hotel, but the other seven you must stay in the $260/night hotel.
2) There's a bunch of other stuff that you need to watch for when making your reservations. For example, if you go to Acapulco from an airport that is east of the Mississippi, you pay a flight surcharge.
3) Three deeply painful hours of my life. Now that it's all said and done, it doesn't seem that bad, but I'll tell you, when I was in the belly of the beast, it was horrific.
To Be Continued...
And then I saw this in the fine print: "While on vacation, you will be offered exciting vacation opportunities in the resort area by the Host Resort in the hopes that you will vacation with the Host Resort in the future."
Arrggghhh... it's déjà vu all over again.
To discuss this and other Traveler's Ed articles, visit the Traveler's Ed Message Board.
Go Anyway,
Ed Hewitt
TravelersEd@aol.com
Features Editor
The Independent Traveler
I've certainly taken that call, and every time I gave the polite reply: "Thanks but no thanks."
But I recently got to wondering how good these deals might be, and when one such offer to "Take a Fun Tour of our New Property" corresponded with a trip to visit family nearby, I bit.
I dared to go where few travelers dare to go, and returned to tell the tale.
My conclusion: "There is no free lunch" still holds true.
The Phone Call
First, while still on the phone, I pressed for information about the offer. Essentially, it went like this: visit our property, and get free airfare to one of several destinations of the company's choosing. The catch: I pay the hotel rate.
When I asked, the telephone marketer was friendly, cooperative, and forthcoming: she gave the exact destinations, precise rates and minimum stays. I discovered the following:
- The destinations were very precise (X hotel at Y location, no alternative hotels), and all travel arrangements must be made through the company.
- All hotel rates would be charged at rack rate, which is considerably higher than anything you would pay normally.
- Each location had a minimum stay, which kept the hotel costs high enough for the company to recoup the cost of the airfare.
- The better the location, the longer the minimum stay (the stay in Fort Lauderdale was five days; Acapulco and Cancun require eight; Hawaii requires ten).
- The total cost of the hotel would have been very close to what I could have come up with buying both the airfare and a lesser hotel on my own.
60-90 Minute tour: The Gilligan Factor
So on the whole, these packages were neither an outstanding bargain, nor a rip-off. If indeed this was to be a "fun, 60-90 minute tour," I figure I would make out okay.
However, as ye shall see, the telephone marketer wasn't quite completely forthcoming with the nature of the "fun tour." (Cue Gilligan's Island theme here...)
The new property was based in Atlantic City, and I understood it to be a hotel both from some vague language the marketer used, as well as some previous knowledge of my own. I drove into the World's Favorite Playground (as Atlantic City was once called), parked for free in the lot next door, and headed up to the fourth floor as instructed by the phone marketer.
I sat down in a waiting room where I found some soft drinks (that's right... no free lunch) and "You've Got Mail" on the television. An older couple who arrived before me was shepherded off, and my "guide," whom I'll call Sue (not her real name) soon came into the room. With a big smile and a joking tone, she bellowed "Are we ready to talk about time shares???"
"Ah, those dirty words," I laughed. "But this is a hotel, right?"
"Nope, this is a time share," Sue said as we marched into a room packed with similar suckers.
The Three Hour Pitch
The pitch commenced, a tortured, convoluted excursion that tried to avoid all mention of the actual cost of the time share. Along the way, I variously thought the deal would cost me $31/day, then $250,000 flat fee, then some other vague numbers that didn't hold together.
I was asked what kind of credit card I had, how much I had in the bank, if I had a check with me, what I did for a living, if I was married, if I expected to have children. What appeared to be a friendly chat soon was understood to be an aggressive background check.
Now, I personally have nothing against time shares. They're just not for me at this time in my life, and worse, I didn't see it coming.
To her credit, early in the pitch Sue said "I don't think this is for you, but let's take a look."
She was right, and she knew it. We both knew it, and I agreed with her. Why then did the "fun 60-90 minute tour" take two hours and 35 relentless, hoary, excruciating minutes?
Word Problems
We did a pile of calculations to determine how often I travel, how many vacations I take, how much I spend on them, how much I wanted to spend on them, how much that could cost me over the course of my entire life, etc. etc. ad nauseam. It was like a never-ending math word problem. The problem was, I was told how much I could save, but never how much I had to pay.
Now I don't know about most folks, but me, you tell me the bottom line, and I can figure out pretty darn quickly whether or not something is in my budget, my best interest, even my life's plan. So I asked the obvious question: "What's the bottom line? How much does this cost?"
The Seven-Minute Tour
The answer: "Let's go upstairs and look at the rooms."
I didn't get my answer, but here it was… the tour! It took all of seven minutes, including the elevator ride. Then it was back to the interrogation room. After another, briefer wrangle, at the end of which Sue finally seemed to relent and prepare to let me go see my family, a manager was called over for the final shakedown. He made a few more hardball pitches, with a little scare tactic thrown in. All of his offers explicitly available only this one time, not after today, never to be revisited; take them now or forever live in regret. He even advised Sue to "make sure he understands that these special offers are off the table after today."
Don't Let The Door Hit You in the...
As I was curtly escorted to collect my "prizes," I mentioned to Sue that she might have had a better time if someone had told us these were time shares; in fact, I might not have wasted her afternoon. This person who had been so kind, friendly, interested, inquisitive about my entire life had this to say: "Then you wouldn't have shown up. I bet I make more money doing this than you do. Sue takes care of Sue. I don't need any advice."
Nice to meet you, too, Sue.
Of course I have to take some of the blame. I had no intention of buying anything, and was just checking out the whole thing out of curiosity (and maybe to write up in this column). And somehow I had been put on their mailing list as someone who had attended these things before, and who might have some genuine interest. (I hadn't attended any, and had no interest.)
But I still have no idea what I would have been buying, where it was, how often, how frequently, or for how long I could use it, or what it was worth, if I had cut a check that day. And these folks shouldn't tell us we get a free vacation for taking a fun tour, then give us a haranguing and expect us to pull out our gold cards and plunk down a nearly five-figure sum for a vacation time share that we don't even understand.
The Bottom Line (Finally)
My take:
1) Two pairs of round-trip airline tickets, good for two years, to a choice of more than a dozen different hotels in Florida, Canada, Hawaii, the Caribbean, Mexico, or several stateside destinations.
The tickets must be used within two years, but may not be used concurrently or within a single year. They are transferable to friends and family, but not for resale.
My expense:
1) Hotel rooms ranging from $70/night (Orlando off-peak season) to over $300/night. In some cases, you are required to stay at least part of your trip in the higher priced hotels - for example, in Maui, you may stay three nights in a $189/night hotel, but the other seven you must stay in the $260/night hotel.
2) There's a bunch of other stuff that you need to watch for when making your reservations. For example, if you go to Acapulco from an airport that is east of the Mississippi, you pay a flight surcharge.
3) Three deeply painful hours of my life. Now that it's all said and done, it doesn't seem that bad, but I'll tell you, when I was in the belly of the beast, it was horrific.
To Be Continued...
And then I saw this in the fine print: "While on vacation, you will be offered exciting vacation opportunities in the resort area by the Host Resort in the hopes that you will vacation with the Host Resort in the future."
Arrggghhh... it's déjà vu all over again.
To discuss this and other Traveler's Ed articles, visit the Traveler's Ed Message Board.
Go Anyway,
Ed Hewitt
TravelersEd@aol.com
Features Editor
The Independent Traveler