Less than Awesome

[MattKenzie]

I try to never fly through Chicago. Have only heard bad stories from that airport.

OMG. WAY to many stories to back that one up....

I fly about 125,000 miles a year and do my best to make sure ZERO of it has anything to do with O'Hare. Have been through Chicago three times in a little over 10 years and have had to overnight there everytime. Once on a cot in the airport with about 600 other folks trying to make it home for Christmas.

All of those miles are with Delta or Delta partners and until recently, they've been great. Starting to see a slide in customer service. They've got a new CEO and they've changed the safety briefing from one that was humorous and with paying attention to to one that's all PC with about 40 different nationalities reading (some in not so understandable English which I am used to due to where I work) the safety briefing to us: Boring with a Cap B. Speaking with the flight attendant during the briefing she was the one who pointed out the PC nature of the new video.

Travel insurance is something we've bought for each of our Caribbean trips the past three years and only needed it the first time, but glad we had it.

Like many, I will be following this thread to see how Property Management deals with this. Out $1,000 basically for things beyond your control and as you said, the resort wasn't packed. Sliding a day would have been the way to assure a happy and returning client.

[candjwv]

If anyone has suggestions as to how to bring this to management's attention, I'm all ears. The ladies working the reservations desk shut me down every time I tried. I was getting NOWHERE with them, and they made it very clear. I could have pressed more, and asked to speak to management once we were on site, but I tried to salvage what I could of my vacation instead. I was more concerned with getting my wife to stop crying than arguing any further with them.

Up until now, I would have said these were the best places I've ever stayed. DRM two years ago made us believers. The food, service, and accommodations were top notch, even when compared against my experiences with First Class international business travel. Pearl was also very good, except for this horrible experience, which wasn't the resort's fault. But again, in my eyes, they really missed a chance to showcase some exceptional customer service, and instead just decided to keep my $950.

This is coming from a guy who has walked 3 steps away from a McDonald's counter only to drop an entire tray of Happy Meals on the floor. That was 100% my fault, but the restaurant still replaced my chicken nuggets, just to keep me happy, and cheer up the kids.

RESORT FAIL!

[mikeinnj]

On a trip years ago, we got severely delayed (about 15 hours) due to a cancelled flight and re-routing. The airline reimbursed us for our flight cost for that leg in vouchers for future flights. We also called the travel agent who had a day added to the end of the trip to make up for the "lost" day. I have no idea who paid for that extra day but it wasn't us.

Now we carry travel insurance as we have a few older relatives that could result in trip cancellations or interruptions. But, we agree with the earlier poster, travel insurance doesn't usually make financial sense but for us, it's worth it for the peace of mind.

Mike

[bobsharon79]

Hey Mike, It's like insurance on jewelry that you will probably never lose. Bob ps See you soon

[Moon]

I am real sorry for that terrible experience.

I was fearing a really bad experience a month a so ago when my wife's appendix burst 4 days before our trip to Pearl. Fearing the timing would make any re-scheduling impossible my thoughts were A. losing a ton of money or B. going to Desire with my wife in recovery not able to be in water, drink alcohol, etc.. Fortunately they were really good at rescheduling our trip and even kept the same rates of our original booking.

I realize this is somewhat different experience from what you had, but thought I would share something positive that Desire did in accommodating a bad situation.

[candjwv]

Thanks to a suggestion by a PM sent to me, I have contacted the resort via their online form. I will post the resort's response, if and when I receive it. My comments to Original Resorts:

We just returned from a visit to Pearl last week. We had previously stayed at DRM and Temptation, so we were really looking forward to trying Pearl for the first time. We had many travel complications, and your staff wasn't very helpful to us, so I feel obligated to provide the details.

Our flight was to leave Washington DC at 6:00 AM on Friday July 29. Due to multiple airline issues (3 different mechanical problems, a delayed connector which was eventually cancelled, and stranded baggage, among other things) we arrived at your resort about 30 hours later than planned. As soon as we realized that the airline wouldn't be able to get us to Cancun until the next day, I called the resort to ask if we could move both our check-in and check-out dates so we could still have our 5 nights at your resort.

I spoke to 2 different agents, and my wife spoke to 2 others. We were told that since the room was pre-paid, we simply had to lose the $950 we had paid for the first night, even though the delays were not our fault. Their only suggestion was that we should have called earlier to cancel. Obviously, this was impossible, because the airline was trying to rebook our flights. I explained that I called as soon as I knew that we wouldn't be there that evening, but still, the agents said that we should have called sooner.

My wife was in tears, I was upset, and I still had to find a room for our unplanned overnight layover in Chicago. I decided to let the issue rest until we got to the resort, so that I could speak to someone in person and explain the problem.

When we arrived, check-in went smoothly, and the agent remembered that I had called her the day before to explain our travel problems. She said that she was very sorry for our misfortune, but insisted that there was no refund, because the resort wasn't able to rent our room, and therefore lost business. However, she then told me that the resort was in fact not full the previous night, which invalidated her point. How could the resort possibly lose money by simply shifting our stay by one day, if they didn't have to turn away any business to do so?

I grew more frustrated by the lack of logic, and asked to go to our room. The agent could see that we were upset (my wife began crying again) so she directed us to the concierge for assistance. The concierge again apologized for our misfortune, and began listing all the amenities that Pearl offers by showing us a list of available services. She then said she could offer some spa credit for a massage, a dinner on the beach, or a few other perks that we could choose from. But just as I thought she was trying to console us about the horrible experience we had, she clarified to explain that we'd have to attend a timeshare proposal first.

After losing a day and a half of our vacation, being charged $950 for a night we weren't there, and spending $450 on a hotel in Chicago, it was pretty inconsiderate to ask us for more of our precious vacation time and money.

I realize that none of those travel issues were the fault of your resort. I'm simply asking the resort to realize that they weren't our fault either. Your staff missed an opportunity to exhibit some exceptional customer service by helping us out. Instead, they chose the simple path, and passed the cost on to us. I have received much better service with similar travel problems when staying at $200 per night hotels. I would have expected much more from a resort that promises an experience unlike any other in the world.

I have posted this summary on some of Cancun's travel forums, to see if other travelers have had a similar experience. So far, everyone is extremely surprised that the resort refused to help us. Several people on the forums have asked that I reply with the resolution, so that they understand more about the resort before making their travel arrangements. Hopefully there is a positive outcome, and I can report that your luxury resort is in fact willing to go the extra mile to make sure guests have the experience they are promised. I look forward to your response.

[swgap]

We had the exact same experience with Desire on our last stay. They would not change our arrival and departure dates after a cancelled flight, even though the hotel was not full. We were very, very disappointed in them. We are a frequent visitor and were surprised how badly they handled this. I kind of go in with my guard up at the front desk now, and the timeshare thing is definitely a no go from now on.

[desireaddict]

Moral of the story is...buy trip insurance...you never know what could happen. Sorry you guys had such a rocky start to party in paradise.

We always buy trip insurance -- usually less than $300 for a week-long trip (we're 50s). We've used it 3 times. Once was as the result of a quite serious injury. I didn't want to undergo surgery in a 3rd World country. We were back in the US in 4 hours. Leer Jets are really cool! even at $14000, which was a bit more costly than our Business Class tickets, but WTF! (The "all-inclusive resort" where I had the surgery was more expensive than Desire and the food was crappy.)

That incident alone has more than paid for 30 trip insurance policies over that past 15 years.

We......Don't Leave Home Without It!

And, YES!, Trip Insurance would have covered the cost of the room at Desire, the Chicago hotel, your meals, and a few personal items you might need when stranded in those circumstances.

BTW -- we had that happen with a stop-over in Dallas when we arrived 15 minutes late. About40% of us on the first flight missed our connection and American Airlines still didn't delay the Cancun flight. In our experience Desire RM did allow us to change our reservation dates and AA changed our flights to the following days without charge. I'M SHOCKED THAT DESIRE PEARL DID NOT ACCOMMODATE YOUR REQUEST. In fact, we had an occasion when we had to leave early due to a death in the family and they allowed us credit for our missed days when we returned later that year. We are frequent guests at DR, but that kind of consideration is WHY we continue to go back!

Life is Good!
DA

[Frank&Peg]

That is a real horror story. I'm sure I would have freaked out on someone or everyone. My advice for the future is only go with non stop flights. I have gotten screwed before (not in a good way) and non stop is the only way I will fly, if available.

[candjwv]

A small update for those of you following along. After 4 emails and several phone calls with American Airlines (who at first claimed they simply took the opportunity to do mechanical work during a weather delay, which would avoid responsibility) they have finally started to see things our way. Further review of the flight logs (due to me pestering them enough) revealed that we really were grounded due to 3 separate mechanical problems - just like I told them at the beginning. Also, they finally agree that a sunny 68 degree morning does not constitute unfavorable flying conditions.

I'm not exactly satisfied yet, but so far they have offered us 2 x $200 vouchers for future flights, $89 towards our hotel (which cost $450, because hundreds of people had the same problem at the same time) and about 15k miles refunded for our First Class flight (which cost us about 75k miles). That doesn't really make up for the expenses we incurred, but at least it's a start. The lesson - if you know you are correct, be persistent. The airline agents seem to be trained to make the process difficult, so that people give up on being justly compensated.

I'm still hoping that Pearl will step forward and offer to help us out with the $950 charge for the night we were delayed. I copied my trip report to Trip Advisor, as recommended by a user here. I'm hoping that it will be brought to Alessio's attention (I'm told he's the General Manager) since I'm fairly certain his reservation agents haven't passed anything along yet. I feel that if upper management at the resort were made aware, they'd have more power and incentive to help us out. Unfortunately, I don't know any other way to contact him directly, and I seem to keep encountering "gatekeepers" with each attempt.

I don't really expect them to write me a check, but an offer of a free night during a future stay would be a show of good will. That would let us put the thoughts of monetary loss behind us, and start planning our next trip to the resort. We tried to enjoy ourselves while there, but we were very stressed out. We'd like to give Pearl another chance with a "re-do" on the whole vacation.

I'll update this post again if/when I hear more.

Thanks for the kind words and show of support. I miss Cancun already.