***UPDATE 2015/03 This post is a little inaccurate. It reflects what I understood at the time but I have subsequently learned more.
Upon arriving home from our trip to Jamaica staying at the Gran Bahia Principe, I found there was not very much information about the Privilege Club. We did make this purchase and have the highest hopes it was a good one. Since there is so little information, I am starting this to record our experiences with this program.
I do wish that prior to visiting a Gran Bahia this type of info popped out at me. I still believe we will get value from this purchase but I like to be a little bit better informed upfront. I may have been able to negotiate for a bit better of a deal I think if I had been.
Googling the club provides a number of negative remarks regarding their sales tactics. I have heard multi-level marketing and scheme thrown about quite freely. Based on these comments, I have also seen numerous people trying to "buyer's remorse" their way out of it (which by the way is specifically noted in the contract and sounds tough to do). I believe your local laws allow for backing out of these deals within a certain time frame (days) and the company seems to be very difficult to get a hold of in a timely manner. Looking at these comments closer, none of them are dissatisfied customers; just people providing uninformed advice. The very few comments I found from experience members were they were very please with the perks.
As I am a researcher by trade I believe I can relate some unbiased information from the start that may clear up a few things. We purchased on Feb 15, 2012 and were told it will take a couple months for all our information to arrive so the following info will be a little sketchy as we are a little in the dark about all this as well.
First off, their sales tactics are horrible. I was fed so much misleading information it is almost sickening. Don't be angry with your sales person regarding this. They are trusting the company fully and believe the propaganda they are fed. I befriended our sales rep and although I was suspicious of what she was selling, I didn't want to burst her bubble as she was told she gets a membership to the club once she's worked there for a year and was so excited for it (3 months away). We were escalated to sleaze bag #1 and then further to sleaze bag #2 who I believe were totally aware they were being misleading
Price: We repeatedly told them that although the concept appealed to us, it just wasn't the right time for us to commit ourselves to any more obligations. The price kept going down and down. What we ended up with was 8995 US for the package plus 875 US for the closing costs. This was for the "Gold" package and included 30 membership weeks that can be
exchanged in the RCI network and 30 preferred weeks that are Gran Bahia
only. We were also told that the Jamaican sales tax of 17.5% as well as the standard 400 per year maintenance was being waive "today only". Arriving home, I don't believe there is a maintenance fee charged to anyone and that sales tax is always waived. I am still okay with the dollars, just unimpressed with their pushy sales tactics. I think if I would have been better informed going in, we wouldn't have bought this year but we definitely would have next year. Our membership fee is 79 US per year and our RCI membership is paid for during the first two years. We were offered financing at 18% simple interest.
Membership/RCI weeks: This is where some of the sales pitch was most misleading. We are interested in primarily traveling in Jan/Feb and not wanting to limit ourselves to Gran Bahia destinations. We were told that our 30 exchangeable weeks can be used any time of the year but our preferred weeks we were limited to the May - June and Sept - Dec 20th time frame. We felt this was doable. We could travel to our hearts content with the 30 membership weeks and also throw in our Gran Bahia weeks in the Nov/Dec months. After spending some time researching this and going through the contract numerous times, although it's technically true we can exchange our membership weeks for any time of the year, that's not exactly how the RCI network works. We were also shown so many resorts/hotels we could exchange these weeks for and they mislead a bit on this as well. The membership weeks we purchased are also Gold season weeks (wasn't aware until reading later) so will have a lower point value in the RCI network. One of the destinations they teased us with was the Disney Animal Kingdom resort and without having any concrete numbers yet, I am anticipating one week at that resort will cost us numerous weeks of our membership. This RCI concept and the 222 US per week promise is what really sold us and where we really felt we'd see a bargain. Again, although I now believe I was completely mislead, I still feel we can make out good on this purchase. There are numerous other benefits of belonging to the RCI network ... in particular the extra vacations ... that still make this look worthwhile.
More BS: There was so much other unsubstantiated promises made that never found their way into the contract nor can I find any information about on the internet. We were given gift certificates to do our departure from the Montego Bay airport in the Mobay Club. We went; it was quite nice. We were told that the Gran Bahia had these clubs in a number of the airports servicing their resorts and that our membership would provide free access to these clubs. I can't find anything confirming this so am assuming lies. We were also told that as a privilege club member we would not have to wait for the resort bus but would be greeted at the airplane with a private taxi that would whisk us to our destination post haste ... it's looking like this feature is at an extra cost. Another big story (bs) is that our rooms would be privilege club suites in separate buildings with separate bedrooms from the living area's. From what I'm understanding this is a complete fabrication as well. We still will get standard rooms just with a few perks. The last promise I am still up in the air about but I'm assuming is lies is we were told we would have access to wholesale airfare pricing which should save us 20 - 30 percent ... just check it out on their website. Although the website does say that online options will be available in the near future, this is not supported in my mind. Oh, and another thing was they talked about earning referral points that we could use to pay our all inclusive fees but we weren't provided any info regarding that in our take home package????
The truth and nothing but the truth: What I do believe to be accurate from the sales pitch:
- the in-room safe is free
- we have express baggage check in at the airport
- unlimited al-a-carte with reservations made for us prior to arrival
- maybe slippers and bathrobes
- maybe turndown service in our room (who cares)
- express check in at hotel
- discounts at the Gran Bahia souvenir shop, excursions, golf (I think a whopping 10%)
- a welcome cocktail (another who cares)
- premium alcohol for free - we're flexible so this isn't a biggy as well
- I think this club has only been around for a couple years which would explain the sketchy info available online. The future may provide way more info as well.
So, I'm sure I've forgotten a thing or two but for right now I think this is complete. Our feeling is that either this is a great purchase or we blew 10 grand; give us two years. I will keep updating this relating our experiences to hopefully better inform everyone else. I'm not expecting our info in the mail for a couple/few months but from my understanding, I can call RCI in a couple weeks and get some more info from them at that point.
