Villarenters/Rental System changes

OTA = Online Travel Agency, which means those sites that sell the booking and take the payment for you.
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Hanorah
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Post by Hanorah »

I agree with everyone.

Pros

Love the functionality its really very flexible, clever and save me heaps of time on admin. It also means I can never double book or forget to send entry instructions etc.

Its good they are bringing back early payments.

cons

I hate direct bookings they are very confusing for customers but I had to go with them rather than let them keep MY money for up to a year. Glad they are phasing out.

They don't listen to their customers

Hate the way they don't trust us to post on a forum without moderating it. If people are posting negative messages then don't ban them listen to what they are saying. Its free market research!

They can come across as very arogant and talk down to owners on occasion. I can not understand this attitude as we are their assets and without us they do not have a business regardless of how good the idea happens to be.

The jury is still out with me. I had more or less made the decision to finish with them after this season due to the deletion of early payments. However now they are back on the menu I will need to think through again as I still beleive if they improved on their customers service skills, consulted us on ideas etc the system could be fantastic.

I hope Villarenters read this forum though I doubt this is the case as they seem to know best already or at least that is the impression they give.
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Hells Bells
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Post by Hells Bells »

They're charging you to have access to your own money though!!!
Paul Carmel
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Post by Paul Carmel »

And now they are looking in, have a look at our latest member.
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Post by Villarentersguy »

Hi I came across this forum today so I thought I should join in the discussion and put a few things right. I work for Villarenters

We do listen to our customers.

We read everything that people post on the forum. The fact that its moderated is because we're a business and there are people that can make posts that are damaging to our business.

We dont stop people from writing in though. Our forum is a way of hearing your thoughts. No business that I know of would do differently. Very few host a public forum even.

By the way its 2% not 2.5% that we charge your customers.

The damage waiver is chosen by the renter.

Payments made in advance of a service being provided are the renters money not the owners.

We hope that re-introducing the option to take the money early and the fact that we are now a fully owned subsidiary of the Daily Mail and General Trust will give all owner the assurance they need to allow us to be of service in processing their bookings. The service is free to join and costs nothing to use.

We have invested heavily in technology and continue to do so and less in customer service. As with any if the software is flexible, powerful and bug free the need for support disappears. We may not be quite there yet but thats where we intend to go.

We have processed tens of thousands of bookings and that gives us the knowledge we need to provide the best service. Customer feedback is invaluable of course but customers need to remember we have an enormous wealth of data thats at our disposal to analyse the best course of action.
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Hanorah
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Post by Hanorah »

Villarentersguy wrote:The fact that its moderated is because we're a business and there are people that can make posts that are damaging to our business.
I beg to differ I am not out to damage your business as in the main I am a fan. However I have tried to post my points of view on your forum when I do not agree with the way you are doing things. These posts have not been published. Which can only mean you moderate it because you do not want negative posts.

Of course you might mean your existing clientele complaining is damaging to your business in which case you should be doing something to change things. Which brings us back to the original point of not listening or taking us seriously. I agree the system is good I was test driving on this very forum some time back when I was impressed with it. Sadly my enthusiasm has waned significantly since that time.
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Hanorah
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Post by Hanorah »

Villarentersguy wrote: We have processed tens of thousands of bookings and that gives us the knowledge we need to provide the best service. Customer feedback is invaluable of course but customers need to remember we have an enormous wealth of data thats at our disposal to analyse the best course of action.
Sorry just re-read this bit. Can you expand on this? It is obvious too many took the direct payment option and you lost out on tons of commission. Your data no doubt showed you this but so did we when it was dropped on us. The response was to ban our posts and moderate the forum. The fact you are turning back to the orginal model demonstrates that we do know better than you because we are the ones who use your system and we said this would happen. Personally I feel people rather than graphs are the best people to provide feedback.

Also moderating your forum is a bad idea it used to be very useful and contained a lot of positive as well as the odd negative post. Now nobody bothers looking or posting very often because it takes days for posts to show or they are not published at all. If you have rivals not customers damaging your business then why not just delete those posts.

Can I say I am grateful for this open forum Paolo created that does allow us to openly discuss the vast amount listing sites for benefit of the whole community, giving people the opportunity to make an informed choice.
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Hells Bells
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Post by Hells Bells »

My concerns are as follows.
1 Renter books in June for 1 week in February next year, chooses damage waiver option. Rental site hold all money.
2. Early Feb , guest arrives, enjoys holiday, but manages to break dining table and a couple of chairs, 500 euros to replace them all.
3 Mid-Feb, rental company are in liquidation, property owner cannot claim for damage, and cannot get hold of the money they are owed by the listing site.

I am not for a moment suggesting that this is likely to happen with Villarenters. I realise too that it could also happen to the guest, that they wouldn't get their holiday if the property owner folded either, but at least they would be able to clain for their loss through their holiday insurance.
How are we, the property owners safeguarded against this happening?
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Post by Villarentersguy »

It is obvious too many took the direct payment option and you lost out on tons of commission
Hanorah

This is exactly why we use graphs as well as feedback ,sorry but we have the data and you dont ....We are discontinuing direct payment not because we are losing 'tons of commission' but because so few people use and it contradicts our philosophy that its safer and more efficient to pay by card. Now we have early payment theres no need to support it.
If you have rivals not customers damaging your business then why not just delete those posts.
Because we dont have time to monitor all posts.

Helen B

Well you have to make your own mind up whenever you do business with anyone. I certainly hope the Daily Mail doesnt go bust! Dont really know what else one can do when you are already part of one of the largest media groups in the world.
Hells Bells
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Post by Hells Bells »

Villarenterguy, My comment was more of a 'what if' and probably applied to VR before its sale to the DM. I wasn't comfortable with someone unknown being responsible for what would be my money for such a long time. I still feel happier being in control of my own cashflow though. FWIW, when my property was listed and active, despite regular enquiries from other sites, I had none from VR.
Last edited by Hells Bells on Thu Oct 05, 2006 3:03 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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paolo
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Post by paolo »

Dont really know what else one can do when you are already part of one of the largest media groups in the world.
Couldn't you reveal your name and position in this organisation rather than posting anonymously? Then we would know if we are talking to the sales manager/IT director/founder, etc.
Paolo
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Big Sis..
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Post by Big Sis.. »

I dont really see how you can say you run a 'public forum' :roll:

If you cut out the things you dont like, surely thats what a forum is a debate....not one sided praise ...
thats called advertising.....

Bit animal farmish to me....were all equal but some are more equal than others...... :cry:
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paolo
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Post by paolo »

By the way, villarentersguy, I don't suppose you can do anything to stop it, but someone is aiming to copy your site:

getafreelancer.com/projects/PHP-Java/need-clone-Villarenters-com.html
Paolo
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Hanorah
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Post by Hanorah »

You do have the time to monitor all posts as they are moderated. So in fact someone has to look at them all before they are posted. Couldn't this same person read the forum instead and delete as necessary. What happened to justify your decision how was your business being damaged. Was it to ensure the Daily Mail deal was not jeopardised. Or were there rivals out there logging and spying? Or simply were you fed up with your customers who keep you in business posting responses to things you had changed that they didn't like?

The point is a moderated forum is not useful and out of all the things you have done this is my biggest bug bear as I did have more respect for villarenters when it was happy to defend its position on an open forum. Not allowing your customers to discuss your site freely is a sign that you want to have total control. In that case lose the forum as I can not see the point in having it.

Villarenters always takes a very defensive stance to criticism but please remember criticism can be very constructive. Some of my posts were pointing out the positives but you are not quoting these in your replies. Look at the whole picture. I am someone who uses your system and loved it up until the introduction of direct payments so I am exactly who you should be trying to keep on side not isolate
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Paul Carmel
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Post by Paul Carmel »

Daily Mail.........sorry, shudder :shock: a very pro Europe organisation. . . not
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Post by Hells Bells »

Paul, I agree with you there. I was even more hesitant about VR once I found out it belonged to them.
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