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Okay, so I've been lurking forever and have a ton of stories from years in hotels and resorts, but instead of going to the backlog, I'm kicking off with a much more recent tale of woe.
I work for a big timeshare company, but not in sales. I just work the front desk. It's a lot like hotel front desk except we don't make reservations, we don't run items to rooms, and we don't collect payment for rooms. Sounds great, right? Mmhmm... well. You'll see, over time, that perhaps it's not.
So lady comes to check in, she has a two-bedroom unit reserved. Check-in goes smoothly, and she heads off. Bit later, maybe fifteen minutes, she and her party come back, saying someone is in part of her unit. Now, normally I'd think there was a computer foul-up somewhere along the way, that someone else had made keys for the wrong room and sent a guest there, or any number of possibilities. But something made me ask if she meant on the one-bedroom side. And I was right, she meant the adjoining unit.
INFO: This resort consists entirely of one-bedroom and two-bedroom units. Get one of each, and you have a three-bedroom.
She starts going on about how she's supposed to have a three-bedroom. Never mind that we already confirmed what she had when she checked in, now she's certain that because she owns a three-bedroom, that this must be what she has. Not to get too technical on the matter, but she's outright wrong on the matter because she doesn't own a specific unit, she owns points that can be used to make reservations for any type of unit for any time. I start to explain this and she goes on about how she just doesn't understand and she never has to specify what she wants and she always gets what she's supposed to have. I explain that since she used points for the reservation for a two-bedroom, she got exactly what she paid for in this instance. Which, of course, she "doesn't understand."
And THEN she spills out even more backstory, how she had a reservation last month but couldn't come because she was hospitalized and tried to cancel but it was too late and now she had a few days and wanted to bring her friends but there were four of them and she needed a three-bedroom and that's what she pays her money for all year and she wants what she paid for and she doesn't understand why she doesn't have three bedrooms and... well, the tale goes on like that. Enjoy the run-on because that's how it felt to me.
Okay, so this is still an easy fix, despite her complete breakdown. She just needs to call reservations and upgrade to a 3br. I tell her as much, which prompts half the story again, because she "just doesn't understand these points." Never mind that it's been points for years and years, and she hasn't owned a fixed unit in at least five years from what I can tell. Yet I get her on the phone with reservations, where she promptly starts telling them the exact same story. I eventually get her attention and tell her to say she wants to upgrade, which she does... and then continues with the story. I'm sorry, I understand and sympathize if she's been ill, but she's going on and on about how her friends are so "embarrassed" by this whole situation, when it's her own doing for not knowing what she owns, not paying attention when making a reservation, and not reading the confirmation paperwork that she confirmed she received - it's just that she gave it to her friends so they could see what they wanted to do in the area and now it's gone.
So she passes the phone to me eventually, saying reservations wants to talk to me. I'm assuming she was just utterly confused by what she was being told, because the poor reservations agent was surprised to find me on the line. RA told me she couldn't upgrade her and tells me what I've been thinking all along, that the guest has had several months to realize she didn't book what she wanted, and didn't. Tells me to give the guest the phone back and that she'll be transferred to a supervisor. So I do and we wait. Supervisor comes on the line and gets to hear the whole story as well, the poor fool. This time she repeats the line about having been in the hospital at least a dozen times, to the point of self-parody. Supervisor offers the only thing possible: she can borrow from next year's points to book a 1br, and I can move things around to get their units next to each other. This is fine, except that I can see this creating the same problem next year when she doesn't have enough points for what she wants... but you know what, after all this I'll take it. Guest agrees too and we get it all set.
I can't stress how many times she talked about being the hospital in October and November, and how ill she was, and how she just made this reservation to use the days she was able to come. And maybe she was ill, I don't know. But the real kicker, the thing that makes me doubt her every word? This reservation, that she supposedly only made after getting out of the hospital? It was made in September. So make of that what you will.
Whew! Hopefully I'll get better at editing these down. But it felt much longer in person, let me tell you.
I work for a big timeshare company, but not in sales. I just work the front desk. It's a lot like hotel front desk except we don't make reservations, we don't run items to rooms, and we don't collect payment for rooms. Sounds great, right? Mmhmm... well. You'll see, over time, that perhaps it's not.
So lady comes to check in, she has a two-bedroom unit reserved. Check-in goes smoothly, and she heads off. Bit later, maybe fifteen minutes, she and her party come back, saying someone is in part of her unit. Now, normally I'd think there was a computer foul-up somewhere along the way, that someone else had made keys for the wrong room and sent a guest there, or any number of possibilities. But something made me ask if she meant on the one-bedroom side. And I was right, she meant the adjoining unit.
INFO: This resort consists entirely of one-bedroom and two-bedroom units. Get one of each, and you have a three-bedroom.
She starts going on about how she's supposed to have a three-bedroom. Never mind that we already confirmed what she had when she checked in, now she's certain that because she owns a three-bedroom, that this must be what she has. Not to get too technical on the matter, but she's outright wrong on the matter because she doesn't own a specific unit, she owns points that can be used to make reservations for any type of unit for any time. I start to explain this and she goes on about how she just doesn't understand and she never has to specify what she wants and she always gets what she's supposed to have. I explain that since she used points for the reservation for a two-bedroom, she got exactly what she paid for in this instance. Which, of course, she "doesn't understand."
And THEN she spills out even more backstory, how she had a reservation last month but couldn't come because she was hospitalized and tried to cancel but it was too late and now she had a few days and wanted to bring her friends but there were four of them and she needed a three-bedroom and that's what she pays her money for all year and she wants what she paid for and she doesn't understand why she doesn't have three bedrooms and... well, the tale goes on like that. Enjoy the run-on because that's how it felt to me.
Okay, so this is still an easy fix, despite her complete breakdown. She just needs to call reservations and upgrade to a 3br. I tell her as much, which prompts half the story again, because she "just doesn't understand these points." Never mind that it's been points for years and years, and she hasn't owned a fixed unit in at least five years from what I can tell. Yet I get her on the phone with reservations, where she promptly starts telling them the exact same story. I eventually get her attention and tell her to say she wants to upgrade, which she does... and then continues with the story. I'm sorry, I understand and sympathize if she's been ill, but she's going on and on about how her friends are so "embarrassed" by this whole situation, when it's her own doing for not knowing what she owns, not paying attention when making a reservation, and not reading the confirmation paperwork that she confirmed she received - it's just that she gave it to her friends so they could see what they wanted to do in the area and now it's gone.
So she passes the phone to me eventually, saying reservations wants to talk to me. I'm assuming she was just utterly confused by what she was being told, because the poor reservations agent was surprised to find me on the line. RA told me she couldn't upgrade her and tells me what I've been thinking all along, that the guest has had several months to realize she didn't book what she wanted, and didn't. Tells me to give the guest the phone back and that she'll be transferred to a supervisor. So I do and we wait. Supervisor comes on the line and gets to hear the whole story as well, the poor fool. This time she repeats the line about having been in the hospital at least a dozen times, to the point of self-parody. Supervisor offers the only thing possible: she can borrow from next year's points to book a 1br, and I can move things around to get their units next to each other. This is fine, except that I can see this creating the same problem next year when she doesn't have enough points for what she wants... but you know what, after all this I'll take it. Guest agrees too and we get it all set.
I can't stress how many times she talked about being the hospital in October and November, and how ill she was, and how she just made this reservation to use the days she was able to come. And maybe she was ill, I don't know. But the real kicker, the thing that makes me doubt her every word? This reservation, that she supposedly only made after getting out of the hospital? It was made in September. So make of that what you will.
Whew! Hopefully I'll get better at editing these down. But it felt much longer in person, let me tell you.
There are lots of people with cookies, alcohol, 
, and 
, and we share liberally. I've always imagined people with timeshares would be a little on the entitlement whore side, seeing as they bought into those "great deals", so I can't wait to hear more of your stories! 
to 
.
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