Report Abuse

Festiva buying Escapes

I dusted off my old Escapes Travel Club manual and tried to find any mention of the club dues on a bi-annual contract, but didn't find anything. I think jlb is correct in asking if the deed was a fixed week unit. If you have a fixed week or float unit, you aren't charged a club membership fee, if its a point unit, there is an annual club membership fee. I would take my concerns about the club membership fees back to the seller and/or the company you purchased the deed from and find out why they failed to mention the fee in the course of the transaction. I don't personally feel Festiva is being deceptive about this. It doesn't matter how many former Escapes Travel Club deeded units you have, you only pay the annual fee once. Whether you have a single bi-annual studio unit or ten 2 bedroom lockoff units, its just one fee annually. The question I ask myself is what does my club membership fee provide me. It provides me with an RCI account, at no additional cost, and a RTX account, at the premium level, at no additional costs. I already have an RCI account that I pay for separately. I have it because of the former Escapes float unit and fixed week units I own. The part of this that rub me wrong is that I have to have two separate RCI accounts to exchange my former Escapes units and they aren't compatible with each other. The "normal" RCI account will not work with my ETC units, and the "dedicated" RCI doesn't work with my fixed and float units. I have used RTX to exchange units but the issue is regular availability of units to exchange into. The selection of available units is tiny, but, and this is a big plus, they also will go outside the normal boundaries to find you a unit if you call them and ask. They have folks who call other resorts in the area you want to stay in and try to work out an exchange for you that is outside their normal available resorts. Another big plus is their exchange fees are about half, or even less, of RCIs. I have read many of the suits against Festiva, and the many of the other companies under the parent firm, and have seen several ranging from company reps with fraudulent promises and deceptive practices, to a sexual harassment suit by an employee, but nothing about the club membership fees.