Today’s Guest Blog comes from a very frustrated and angry Diamond owner. This pattern, and it is a pattern, of continually attempting to upsell owners with more and more outrageous promises MUST STOP.
Ok, Here goes. We were/are long time Diamond members with 2225 (ish) points a year. In January 2017 we went to Orlando Florida on a free stay/meeting. We met with the DRI rep and told him that our biggest complaint was the maintenance fees. $700 a year for points we rarely used.
He told us that if we bought more points to get our total up to 5000 points a year that we would become Platinum members. Yeah, my maintenance fees would go up because of the added points, but as Platinum we would get access to more options, one of them being the ability to sell back unused points for $.50 a point at the end of the year. That money could then go towards paying our maintenance fees. We would also be able to use our points at any hotel anywhere, and in January of 2018 there would be a "cash out" option where Diamond would buy back out timeshare if we were not happy, we would take a loss, but we would be free and clear. All of this was because Apollo was taking over and things were getting better. He then offered us what sounded like a good deal on 3000 points to get us to the magic 5000 points a year mark. so... sadly... we did it.
Turns out the new 3000 points became a second account, so instead of one account with 5000+ points, we have the original 2225 and a second one with 3000.
I cannot even use them on the same vacation, I have tried. I have been trying to get Diamond to merge them for a year. There is also no such program to buy back points. at least none they will tell me about, and I have learned that it does not take 5000 points to get to platinum, it takes 50,000.
It is very difficult to use points at a non Diamond resort and if you try, you end up paying almost as much as you would out of pocket anyway... plus you use points. As for as cashing out....yeah right.
So I walked out of that meeting a year ago thinking that my maintenance fees would go down or if I didn't use any points, i could pay all my maintenance fees with the money earned from selling my points back. instead... I now pay more then twice as much in maintenance fees and of course i am still paying on the loan for the new 3000 points.
This last week I have been talking to Diamond. They finally said they could merge my accounts. All I have to do is buy another 2500 points. What is wrong with these people? When I told them i wanted to be less invested in DRI, they said I would have to pay the maintenance fees for the rest of my life and if i did not buy the extra 2500 points and merge my accounts, one of those accounts would get passed on to my children.
This is not a vacation. this is horrible.
I know a lot of people that claim they can help are scammers, but I need something!! ... this has to end, I have to get out from under DRI somehow.
What are your experiences with Diamond?
No comments:
Post a Comment