RCI is "working" on SA trade power (TP) issue

philemer · Jun 12, 2009

I sent an email to RCI complaining about the drop in TP of both my SA weeks after the last "enhancement". I finally received an answer today. Here it is:

Thank you for your e-mail.

We recognize that members are currently experiencing Trading Power
valuation issues for deposits of South African resorts. Our team is
currently working to resolve this issue. If you would like assistance
with vacation planning, please call 800-338-7777 to speak with an RCI
Vacation Guide.

Thank you for your interest in RCI.

Kind regards,

Elise Werner
Customer Communications Specialist

After I read this note I logged into RCI and, low and behold, my two weeks were back up to pre-enhancement levels. My Dik week actually increased in power. I wonder if there will be more adjustments?

What are the rest of you seeing now? In general?

M. Henley · Jun 13, 2009

Dikhololo

My Dikhololo week has once again become a strong trader. I am pulling SoCal summer weeks that I hadn't seen in Points due to their being weeks deposits from a points affiliated resort.

JoyC · Jun 13, 2009

DIK still 50K less than

My DIK weeks show about 50K less than before the enhancement; my 2br DIK have a little more trading power than 1 br DIK. They were the same before, so I am still waiting to see what fixes RCI have in the next couple of days.

JoyC

rickandcindy23 · Jun 13, 2009

The email that Culli received from RCI will scare the britches off of you, because it basically says they can do anything they want with your trading power:

Hello,

Thank you for your e-mail.

The reason you may be seeing a different availability number displayed
for your SPACEBANK deposit could be for a couple of reasons. Inventory
supply changes daily, and as inventory supply increases, more inventory
is "available" to a specific member at a given time. Likewise, when
supply decreases, inventories become less available to a specific member
at a given time.

Additionally, the Trading Power of available inventory is routinely
evaluated to ensure the most appropriate pricing is assigned based on
our supply and demand patterns. Because this is evaluated frequently,
inventory availability can change for a specific member.

Kind Regards,

Sara Connolly
Customer Communications Specialist
RCI North America

jancpa · Jun 14, 2009

I just received the exact same email as Culli did. I guess what RCI is saying is that they can raise the "price" (or trading power requirement) of their available inventory en mass at any time thus pricing out our existing deposits. Therefore we see fewer quality resorts and have only smaller units offerred to us.

jamstew · Jun 14, 2009

I received the same message as well.

king1 · Jun 14, 2009

My two remaining SA weeks are a gold crown and a standard, both 1BR with the same travel window, and before the latest "enhancement" they always showed almost the same number of resorts available for exchange. Now the standard shows 117+K and the GC only 84+K. I emailed a general question several days ago, and the reply was that they were still working on "fixing" SA trade power.
I'm afraid to make a specific complaint since they might decide "fixing" means to lower the high number instead of raising the low one!

MuranoJo · Jun 14, 2009

I noticed last night and again today that Sudwala is doing well now--in fact I saw So. Cal. last night, haven't checked today. Durban is only doing about 65% of Sudwala, at least for now. I expect that will change--I honestly don't believe they're 'done' yet.

jancpa · Jun 15, 2009

I have a Dikhololo week on deposit which lost so much trading power that it cannot even pull itself for a year into the future.

suskey · Jun 15, 2009

My DIK week jumped way up this weekend...from 60K to 155K. I was able to snag a 2 BR Morritts Grand for February 2011. Beofre the enhancment I was seeing around 110K.

Susan

jbrunson · Jun 15, 2009

As is always the case with trading power issues, we are flailing in the dark. It may be the formula got tweaked. My impression (and it is just that) is the supply/demand pressure has been given more weight possibly at the expense of the resort quality. My Sudwala appears to pull most of the highest quality resorts in the non-peak periods, but seems to pull weakly in the higher demand periods. Of course part of that is there is less available then, but it seems weak compared to before. Unfortunately, without a range of of weeks covering mediocre to elite resorts across blue, white, red periods, we are left fuming and conjecturing. Has anyone else noticed any hint of pattern to this? Can some you compare the behavior with other weeks you own?

Carolinian · Jun 16, 2009

Quality is really not a seperate factor, but merely one of the drivers of demand. Real time adjustments to meet ever changing supply and demand factors are a positive with trading power.

MuranoJo · Jun 16, 2009

I can tell you with my Sudwalas I think I can see most of what I've seen before (but I'm just pulling up all they offer for the week and scanning through what's there--not sorting by date), but also noticed it seems I am getting more studios and 1 bds pulled vs. the numerous 2 bds I used to see. I really think inventory looks low--esp. for '09 and not much there into '10 and '11.

Last night was seeing over 120k for each of the Sudwalas. Significantly more than the Durban Sands.

pauldogg · Jun 18, 2009

Still Working

Spoke with an RCI supervisor. She indicated they have heard from many SA owners, and they are still working on the issue. She also indicated that the upgrade was intended to make enhancements to the system, not adjust trading power of individual resorts. I guess these new enhancements let the vacation guide login as your userid when you call in and see what you see.

Guess we'll have to wait and see. I'll give them another couple of weeks, then get more direct.

randkb · Jun 18, 2009

I spoke to a supervisor today, as well, who indicated that they are aware that there is a problem with SA weeks and they are still working on it.

cerralee · Jun 21, 2009

still waiting for a complete fix. Anybody getting better results? It seems things occasionally change over weekends.

carl2591 · Jun 23, 2009

have not check on trading power recently.. is RCI still "working" on it..

yearight...

deejay · Jun 23, 2009

Carl, I made what I felt was a superb exchange last week to the Outer Banks with my Dik week. At that point I was seeing all I was expecting to see--maybe a little more.

HuskyJim · Jun 25, 2009

Here's what I currently see for my 2 DIK weeks -

1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [141,732]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [144,135]
1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [91,520]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [95,460]

Something is still not right.

cali girl · Jun 25, 2009

What week # is your March 2010 week?

stevedmatt · Jun 26, 2009

HuskyJim said:
Here's what I currently see for my 2 DIK weeks -

1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [141,732]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [144,135]
1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [91,520]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [95,460]

Something is still not right.

Actually, that is about right if they have equal trade power. There's 5 months more availability on the first 2 weeks. You can't see anything before December on the last 2 weeks. Add up all of the availability on the first 2 weeks between now and December, then subtract the availability of the second 2 weeks from March 2011 to June 2011 and you'll probably be right about the same number.

HuskyJim · Jun 26, 2009

cali girl said:

What week # is your March 2010 week?

Click to expand...

My 2010 week is in December, and the week is 49.

My 2009 week is in March, and is the week 11.

stevedmatt said:

Actually, that is about right if they have equal trade power. There's 5 months more availability on the first 2 weeks. You can't see anything before December on the last 2 weeks. Add up all of the availability on the first 2 weeks between now and December, then subtract the availability of the second 2 weeks from March 2011 to June 2011 and you'll probably be right about the same number.

Click to expand...

stevedmatt,
I think I understand what you point out. From what you imply, my last two weeks only see weeks for the next two years (through to June 2011), from today's date, not through to the end of the full three year period (Dec 2012).

That would account for an 18 month period, so it makes sense.

stevedmatt · Jun 26, 2009

HuskyJim said:
stevedmatt,
I think I understand what you point out. From what you imply, my last two weeks only see weeks for the next two years (through to June 2011), from today's date, not through to the end of the full three year period (Dec 2012).

That would account for an 18 month period, so it makes sense.

Actually, you first 2 weeks will see availability from today through March 2011. You second 2 weeks will see from December this year through June 2011. You can't see anything more than 2 years out because they haven't been deposited yet. Therefore, your second 2 weeks are not seeing anything between now and this December, but they do see April, May and June 2011. The problem is there hasn't been much deposited for those 3 months in 2011 yet. The power on the second 2 weeks does seem to be a little bit weaker, but not quite as bad as your numbers look.

blueparrot · Jul 6, 2009

HuskyJim said:
Here's what I currently see for my 2 DIK weeks -

1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [141,732]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Mar-2008 to 31-Mar-2011 [144,135]
1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [91,520]
2 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Dec-2009 to 31-Dec-2012 [95,460]

Something is still not right.

You said it!

But, I would rather be in your shoes than mine.

This is what I am seeing:

1 BR Dikhololo (#1999) 01-Jul-2009 to 01-Jul-2012 [20,408]

And this is a RED week!

Previously would regularly pull 120,000+

Are they still ''working'' on this?

What numbers are others seeing for Dik in what months?

Reggie_Hammonds · Jul 6, 2009

Tracking my deposited week with RCI

I started tracking my 2010 week I have on deposit. Keep in mind that I can't use it until August at the earliest. Here are my results so far. Definitly a drop off.

04/28/09 – 133,220
05/07/09 – 135,583
05/11/09 – 137,050
05/15/09 – 139,383
05/22/09 – 140,774
05/27/09 – 141,460
06/24/09 – 112,770
07/06/09 – 113,248

RCI is "working" on SA trade power (TP) issue

philemer

TUG Review Crew: Veteran

M. Henley

TUG Review Crew: Veteran

JoyC

rickandcindy23

TUG Review Crew: Elite

jancpa

jamstew

king1

MuranoJo

jancpa

suskey

jbrunson

Carolinian

MuranoJo

pauldogg

randkb

cerralee

TUG Review Crew

carl2591

TUG Review Crew: Veteran

deejay

HuskyJim

cali girl

stevedmatt

HuskyJim

stevedmatt

blueparrot

Reggie_Hammonds