More Wyndham/Sabor drama with a Sand Dollar Sports and Dive Palancar thrown in!!!!

[Aigtbootbp]

Ok, a quick paste from some postings on another board. I know nothing more than what I am posting here so I can't answer anymore questions.
Just what I need, a busload of local bull**** drama to deal with when I am on vacation.
I have redacted names and other data not necessary to get the point across. I hope this won't get me the ban hammer on either board...


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SAND DOLLAR... the saga continues
Thank you for watching another episode of As The Reef Turns....

today the divers showed up at Sand Dollar to find it closed with a sign on the door, thaqqt they would be open tomorrow. They reopened, they contacted the divers and the boats went out. The staff is on the phone and looks pretty stressed. They are cleaing the office in the main section of the Hotel and there is now Reef Security at the Sand Dollar office in the Regency Section. John has dives scheduled for tomorrow. More later............

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Wow, I had assumed as a separate business they were removed from the drama, but I guess not. Please keep us updated on the developments in this on going soap opera.

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Okay, heres the scoop.
The Regency tried to get more money out of sand dollar, they refused and today they were kicked out. Apparently, this was quite a surprise to sand dollar. They say a new dive operation will be here tomorrow.

One of our members alerted us around the pool, and so the hubby went and checked it out.

Good News, Sand Dollar will continue to run and pick up people at the same pier. They are picking up the husband tomorrow for his dives.

You will need to contact them directly

3 Hermanos

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The resort just announced that the new onsite dive operator will be Dive Palancar.

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[spyder]

Ok, need more info and you can pm me directly. We're heading down there Thursday and having trouble getting our reservations confirmed (we're members). So Sand Dollar is out? I have several dives still on a card. Guess I'll give them a call directly as well.

 

[Christi]

If you have reservations with Sand Dollar, please contact them directly. I am CERTAIN that they will honor existing reservations and even outstanding dive credit - but this is something to deal with them directly on - not hearsay and incomplete information based on what well meaning guests may or may not actually know.

 

[Aigtbootbp]

If you have reservations with Sand Dollar, please contact them directly. I am CERTAIN that they will honor existing reservations and even outstanding dive credit - but this is something to deal with them directly on - not hearsay and incomplete information based on what well meaning guests may or may not actually know.

Yep, from I what I have heard Sand Dollar will still pick up at the pier. I would call and ask just to be sure.
Spyder, call the resort directly at 1-888-773-4349, its no charge and connects you directly to Mexico. Confirm your reservations with them. Bad news is you might have to pay for everything again. Yeah, that screwed up. Seems if you paid in advance through the houston office your money might have grown wings. You seriously need to call and see what your status is.
Good luck and let us know what you find out.
BTW, the houston office hasn't been answering the phone for at least a week now.

 

[DandyDon]

Names. Change often to keep the suckers confused. If you understand some of this, can you clarify for me...?

1: Wyndham Cozumel is also known as Sabor? Why?

2: Is this the same Wyndham Cozumel with the chronic Legionnaires disease problem?

3: So they were booking thru a Houston office and now are in default on those? What if you booked thru other means, i.e. Orbitz, Wyndham, etc?

4: Is this the one that used to be called Reef Club? Gawd, I hated that weekend.

5: So Sand Dollar who has been there for years (I hated the hike to the dock & shop) is out and Dive [-]Paradise[/-] Palancar who got kicked out of Allegro is in...?

 

[ggunn]

4: Is this the one that used to be called Reef Club? Gawd, I hated that weekend.

5: So Sand Dollar who has been there for years (I hated the hike to the dock & shop) is out and Dive Paradise who got kicked out of Allegro is in...?

4. Yes

5. Dive Palancar, not Dive Paradise

 

[dougr52]

Names. Change often to keep the suckers confused. If you understand some of this, can you clarify for me...?

1: Wyndham Cozumel is also known as Sabor? Why?

2: Is this the same Wyndham Cozumel with the chronic Legionnaires disease problem?

3: So they were booking thru a Houston office and now are in default on those? What if you booked thru other means, i.e. Orbitz, Wyndham, etc?

4: Is this the one that used to be called Reef Club? Gawd, I hated that weekend.

5: So Sand Dollar who has been there for years (I hated the hike to the dock & shop) is out and Dive [-]Paradise[/-] Palancar who got kicked out of Allegro is in...?

4 yes,but it is almst too complicated to explain, they were the reef club..
then they became franchised by the wyndham..
then they built the sabor adults only section..
then they built the aura section..
AND all this time there was another section, regency club, which is a time share and is where sand dollar sports is located..regency club has the office in houston where the mony is dissapering..if you were a member of the regency club, and wanted all inclusive package that was extra, paid to houston office then forworaded to the wyndham, that is the transaction where the money went missing..

NOW what was the wyndham is no longer franchised by the wyndham..
SO what was the wyndham is now called the sabor, what was the sabor is called the sabor exclusive section..

so what you have here is 4 sections..

sabor, sabor exclusive, aura, and regency club ( time share) all connected...AND another problem, the whole place is now adults only, so now if you are a member of the regency club, and have kids the can no longer go to over into other sections of the resort..

 

[1KWIK_69]

And I always thought things were complicated and confusing there before? I like the place, and in five stays there I've somehow avoided catching legionares disease.

***Edit*** I had to go look that up, and wow, it was recent! Sounds like it's not much danger to healthy people, but it's still a little scary.

Since I'm not a member, I never had any idea where they would park us, one trip to the next. My first stay there, I sprung for the extra to stay in the Sabor section when it was the adults only part. The Sabor rooms, restaurant, bar and pools were really nice, but the walk to the pier lugging a dive bag was a killer, and the night life in Adults only Sabor was non existent. If you wanted to hang out and meet new friends at night, you would have to walk to the main pool area, which kind of defeated the whole purpose of it being adults only. After that trip, I made a practice of just booking the cheaper rooms. One time they put us up in a Regency section room, right on the beach for the cheapy room price. That was a nice surprise! I've always found good and bad when I stay there, but I still plan to stay there again. With all the changes and drama right now, I'm glad we booked else where for our trip in less than two weeks.

I wonder what the current situation is with pier fees??? My biggest complaint about Wyndham was that they allowed Sand Dollar to own the concession on thier wooden pier, so you had to pay them if you were diving with another shop! It always seemed like a place as big and nice as Wyndham should provide a pier for all of their guests to use free of any extra charge.

 

[spyder]

I talked to Sand Dollar directly yesterday after posting. They are going to honor the punch cards and will be picking up at the pier as normal. They are going to keep in touch. They don't know what is going on with the resort specifically but said it looked normal to them other than they got kicked yesterday morning over fees. I did reserve via Houston this year but hadn't paid yet and couldn't get through/no call backs was the reason. Maybe that was a God send if money has disappeared. Guess we'll see how it goes when we get there Thursday. We do like the resort and have had many good trips there. Still have a lot of points left (member) but have used quite a few weeks also.

 

[cicopo]

Reef Club was the original beginnings of the property, and it opened in Nov or Dec of 97, and I stayed there in Feb 98, and at the time the food & service were great, but I think that was a big show to get their name out there through word of mouth. I sent friends there 1 year later & they were less impressed, mainly due to cut backs to both food & beverages. They said many of the more popular foods were in short supply very quickly once the restaurants opened for each meal.

The Wyndham name was just leased. Wyndham had nothing to do with how the property was run, but they were very quick to pull their name once the health issue hit the press.

When the Aura was about to open someone in management decided it should be a clothing optional swingers resort, even though it was located right next to the very family friendly Reef / Sabor / Reef Residencias (the condo area) but due to customer / time share owner pressure that was reversed to keep the Aura as what they saw as a 5 star adult only property.

Also around the time the Aura was supposed to open it was reported that Dive Palancar would operate at the Aura using the new pier. That didn't seem to happen but I never heard anything as to why

Now with this news I'm wondering about a few things starting with the pier fees, which based on EVERYTHING I have ever read were paid to Sanddollar because as I understood it they owned the pier & their shop, and were not a part of the Reef Club property. When the Aura opened Sanddollar also took control of that pier, and fees were collected there too. If in fact the Reef Club (under any of it's different names) owns those piers then I think guests have been shortchanged by the fees, since in my way of thinking all inclusive should include the use of the pier. Who knows how that will go once Dive Palancar takes over.

Re Sanddollar, I hadn't ever heard of them having another base of operations, so things will be rough getting re established, plus they'll have to live on a much smaller customer base & compete in an open market. I doubt they'll need their all of their current staff for a while or ever again, and the same for all the boats they operate. This will be a very big blow to their business, compounded by any money stolen through the Houston office embezelment scheme.

So far as an outside observer who saw the place when it first opened & has watched it go through many changes in direction over the years I get more & more disappointed with the management team running it. It was built & sold to families, using their money through time share sales, but it suddenly decided it didn't want their business by changing the format to ADULTS ONLY, but so far I haven't heard of any serious effort for them to buy back the time shares at fair market value. I think they are hoping those owners will just get fed up & walk away.