After several ignored telephone calls to customer services and a couple of ignored emails in my attempts to get a fare solution to my grievances with Seasons Holidays, I finally resorted to putting up this blog.
Maybe because of the blog or maybe because my recent letter fell into the right hands (at head office and not customer services) I have today received a letter from Seasons Holidays with an apology and a fare compensation of maintenance fees. So it is only right that I report this also as they as a company have finally resolved my grievance.
I have to apologise to them in part for my comment on the referal program as they have pointed out to me it is actually many months since they called me regarding this. I do recall at the time being annoyed about them calling me several times attempting to coerce referals from me and as I don't keep logs of calls and it seemed more recent than that. So I have removed the offending comment even though at the time it was a valid concern.
However it was brought about by my annoyance and frustration over the overall lack of response from their customer service department to my requests for some sort of a meaningful reply. Had this happened when I initially complained then I would not have felt compelled to vent my annoyance online and they would not have created such an unhappy customer.
I think that the customer service department still leaves a lot to be desired but at last I am content that my complaint has been farely dealt with. I am still overall out of pocket over this though.
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WE are sorry to learn of mr wellers disappointment. It is important that the facts are laid out. Seasons reservations staff do thier utmost to fulfil holiday requests in line with member expectations but all holidays are subject to avaialbility. We do manage to satisfy most of our 23,000 members. Mr Weller has not made it clear here that a tentative reservation for Cornwall was made during a holiday at a Seasons resort whilst he was holiday at our development in Wales in August 2008, as part of a decision by Mr Weller to purchase an addional week. Mr Weller decide to cancel the purchase and instead he purchased a resale week which does not include a number of Charter member benefits included for customers purchasing directly from Seasoms such as internal banking, access to short breaks and facilities using the resale week. Since the original purchase was cancelled no further action was made to confirm the provisional booking. Mr Weller has been advised that all bookings should be arranged via Membership Services and no other department and when cancelling his purchase he did not submit a booking request for the week in Cornwall. By the time Mr Weller requested the holiday with membership services, the resort requested Clowance was already full for 2009, but other space was offered at other sites in the UK. Mr Weller was also advised that there is no internal banking with the resale week he purchased so holiday entitlement had to be used during 2008. This is still far more flexible than is the case with fixed week fixed unit resorts. We are at Seasons are truly sorry for Mr Weller's disappointment, but this year we will confirm more than 23,000 holidays for our members and we are proud of our track record in securing good holidays for our members, and we do receieve lots of positive feedback from members every week.
ReplyDeleteMembership Services Seasons Holidays plc 01994 426000
Dear Seasons Membership Services, Please refrain from commenting on this blog unless there is some element of truthfulness in your facts. Your comment appears to have been fabricated in a complete attempt of damage limitation and is strewn with incorrect statements. You don't even have the face to give your name, yet attempt to discredit me.
ReplyDelete1. "Mr Weller has not made it clear here that a tentative reservation for Cornwall was made during a holiday at a Seasons resort whilst he was holiday at our development in Wales in August 2008, as part of a decision by Mr Weller to purchase an addional week."
My response:- Apart from the fact that in August 2008 I was holidaying with a different company because you had let me down and cancelled my solid booking without informing me at all. This was not as you say tentative at all, it was a solid booking made whilst at your premises in Aug 2007 by calling your Membership Services Booking Line and using 2 Charter Membership banked weeks for which I received booking confirmation. It was definately not made as "part of a decision to buy an additional week" as I had made it quite clear in front of 2 witnesses that I had no intention whatsoever to buy during that stay. I challenge you to show me any sort of documentation that indicates otherwise as I know for sure that I didn't sign anything or even indicate I had any intention to purchase.
2. "Mr Weller decide to cancel the purchase and instead he purchased a resale week which does not include a number of Charter member benefits included for customers purchasing directly from Seasoms such as internal banking, access to short breaks and facilities using the resale week."
My response:- I would love to know how the completely non existant decision to purchase was cancelled as that one beggars belief. Since I already own 2 weeks purchased directly from Seasons and qualify for short breaks etc why would this be an issue to me. Or do you intend to strip me of my entitlement to them even though my original contracts give me this. Apart from that, during my many years of ownership I have tried and failed on numerous occasions to book a short break never once succeeding. I tell your staff of this regularly. In fact I have on 2 occasions been given short breaks in compensation for a bad holiday experience at your resorts and after 2 years of trying to book them and failing, you take them away. Some compensation that is!
I do admit that I did not realise that when somebody sells a week on to somebody else you strip them of their entitlement to bank weeks. Which by the way I believe is very unfare since the original purchaser paid full premium to have this as part of their package. I have certainly never been told whilst purchasing my weeks from you that this would happen and I can find no mention of this whatsoever in my original contracts. So how do you get away with that one. I believe a legal challenge is needed here.
3. "Since the original purchase was cancelled no further action was made to confirm the provisional booking."
My response:- Despite the fact I was not told this was necessary as it had been made using 2 of my already owned and banked weeks and confirmation was sent.
4. "Mr Weller has been advised that all bookings should be arranged via Membership Services and no other department and when cancelling his purchase he did not submit a booking request for the week in Cornwall."
My response:- Again, since the booking was made by calling the Membership Services Booking Line from your own offices using 2 of my already paid for (with your so called Charter member benefits) and Banked weeks with your own staff in attendance and for which I received confirmation. You keep telling that this is "wrong procedure" but the only difference from doing this from home is that it was under guidance of your own staff.
Now that you have told me this I know not to trust any of them in the future. (How rediculous that comment is.)
So much for Charter membership benefits.
5. Mr Weller requested the holiday with membership services, the resort requested Clowance was already full for 2009, but other space was offered at other sites in the UK.
My response:- Now I am confused. Do you mean 2008 or 2009? My whole reason for the original complaint was that I had booked 2 weeks holiday in 2008 using my own bought and paid for (from Seasons I hasten to ad) banked weeks. It was made via your booking line and confirmation was given. However Seasons completely let me down in 2008 by canceling and not informing me that they had done so and offering no explaination until now why they had done so. By the time I had discovered this, No available weeks were left in any UK resorts at all for the school holidays in Jul/Aug. At that point (May/June 2008) there were already no available weeks at Clowance for July and August 2009. For this reason I have booked up yet again to stay at Laugharne for my August 2009 Holiday. So yes during June 2008 I there was available weeks in Wales for Aug 2009.
I will reiterate my concerns over being able to get bookings as this is becoming more and more difficult in my experience. Will I ever get to stay at Clowance Estate? Search me as I can't see how.
6."Mr Weller was also advised that there is no internal banking with the resale week he purchased so holiday entitlement had to be used during 2008."
My response:- This bears no relevance to my complaints at all. The 2 weeks I originally booked at Clowance 2008 were booked using my 2 banked weeks purchased at full price from Seasons.
Why do you keep stating the fact that you stop peoples ability to bank if they sell their weeks on. I do own a week
purchased independantly which in 2008 was used in November. Whats the issue?
"We are at Seasons are truly sorry for Mr Weller's disappointment."
My response:- Is that why you have made such an attempt here to dismerit a long standing loyal customers integrity, and have only properly responded to me after I resorted to creating a blog.
I had intended on completely removing this blog after today but I am not so sure at the moment. I think I am entitled to an apology. The people at Seasons head office at least appear to realise the error in turning loyal customers into enemies.
There is much more I could say but I believe this to be a big enough can of worms. I thought my holiday
ownership with Seasons was supposed to be an enjoyable experience.