A day in the life of an OPC, A Continuing Story - By: Bweiss

A day in the life of an OPC, A Continuing Story

I would like to start by stating that the facts are true but the names have been changed to protect the innocent so they can keep their job and live as private as possible.

So let’s begin with me in how I got started in this timeshare business. First of all my name is Bonnie and I have been In sales most of my life. I moved around a lot and finally decide to semi retire in Virginia. After moving here and looking for a job for about 3 months I ran across this ad in the news paper that was hiring sales people to sell timeshares. You do not need a real-estate license in this state to sell timeshares so I thought I would go apply for the job.

I made an appointment and the very next day I went and was interviewed by one of the resorts in town . I filled out an application and was taken in to meet the sales manager of xyz resort, after a long interview he told me he did not feel that the job was right for me. Basically he was telling me I probably could not sell anything. After the interview I went away with, I will show you kind of attitude and looked into the timeshare industry a little further.

After some extensive research I found out that they were 7 resorts in town and they were also hiring people to OPC. What that job consist of is working a location or roaming around town in your car asking people if they would like to go view the resort. For going they would receive some kind of gift. The gifts could be any combination of things like, $ 100.00 dollars in a visa card and a 3-2 day vacation, or 2 Busch Garden ticket, 2 Water Country tickets, different vacation packages and many other gifts. I always offered the money or Busch Garden tickets but sometimes people who already had tickets would take the 3 day 2 night mini vacations.

To receive the gifts they would have to take a 90 minute tour of the resort and have to meet some other qualifications such as, have 2 forms of id that had to be a driver’s license and either a major or debit credit card depending on what resort you worked for. You had to be between the ages of 25 – 68, be married or co- habituating couples and make at least $ 50.000.00 dollars in combined income a year.

There were seven resorts in town hiring for this position so I applied at all of them except the one that would not give me a job as a salesperson. I was going to show them how good I really was but did not want them to make any profit off me while I was doing it. So I took the first one that called me which was the following day after I applied. They offered me so much a tour minus what I gave away, another words if they paid me a hundred dollars a tour and I gave away fifty I made fifty for booking that tour if they showed up and took it. They also gave me the usually benefits but had to pay for most of it myself.

They assigned me a location to work at which was a restaurant. I stood outside and was allowed to talk to people as they left the establishment. The resort paid this restaurant chain a lot of money to allow us to work on their property. However these establishments still had rules and the main one was that you were never to talk to people on the way in to eat. The reason for this is if you talk to people on the way in they would sometimes complain to the managers that they did not appreciate you pitching them (inviting them to the resort). They were there to dine not get sold on timeshares. However If you talked to them on the way out they had full belly’s and were in their car so they would be less inclined to get back out of the car to go in to complain.

After standing at this location for about 6 hours a day 7 days a week I only got in a few tours for the first three months. Being a newbie in the business it took me awhile to catch on that I was getting it where the sun doesn’t shine. Most of the people that came out of this restaurant had already been booked in or had done the timeshare resort I was working for and I couldn’t figure out who was booking all these tours. So I started asking people who came out of the restaurant that had already taken the tour who invited them. To my amazement I found out that the timeshare resort I was working for had a call center (they have telephone solicitors that invite people out for a 3day 2night stay) and was invited out to the resort through them who was also gave them a certificate to eat at the location I was working at. So the bottom line is I was pitching people they have already booked, so I was wasting my time and the location was no good.

I stopped working that location and had to come up with another plan of action. The first thing I did was to start roaming. That is when you drive up to people in your car and pitch them to go to the resort. They could be in places like other restaurants, stores or just walking down the street. Being a people person I am always willing to talk to anyone, so this was easy for me. Another thing I did was to build a website (vacationpackagestogo.com) and start handing out business cards that I designed for the timeshare business.

I started handing out the cards and came up with an idea to put these cards on cars whenever I walked though a parking lot that I had other business at, like when I went out to eat or buy something at a store. I also started putting these cards on cars that were at some of the hotels around town and it wasn’t long before I started getting nasty phone calls from hotel managers that I was trying to steal their customers and better never do it again.

There was a big mall in the area and I started putting cards on all the cars there on regular bases, I am still not sure why or how the police got involved but they thought it was some kind of scam. Unknown to me some Undercover cops called me to make an appointment to do a tour, I told them to meet me at the gas station down the street and I would give them an invitation to go. I explained to them that I wanted to meet them at the gas station to give them the invitation instead of the resort because they did not want me writing people up in resort parking lot.

When they arrived I wrote them up and was handing them the paper work when I observed a car dive up and started taking pictures, they then pulled out and pulled back in again and took more pictures as they were handing me the signed paperwork back. I gave the couple their copy and they left to go to the resort. One of the gas station attendants asked me if I saw the guy taking pictures of us and I replied that I did. I then left the station and went over to the resort to see what was going on and the person I had give the invitation to was coming back out of the resort. To end this part of the story they found out that the gifts offered on my business cards were legitimate and they apologized and left.

A few months’ later things started paying off as I got better at what I did and was sending about 15 tours in a week in the off season. They were getting 2-4 tours a week from their other OPC,s that had been working there for years. So I finally felt good as I was proving to that other resort that I can really sell and get people in better than most of their employees.

But all good things must come to an end. The resort was paying me for more tours than anyone else so to save some money they decided to start clipping me for some of my tours. I do not understand why people who do not want to work get jealous of people who want to make a better life for themselves. They cause you trouble so you will lose your job and even if they cannot find something to complain about they start making up lies.

The resort which was open 5 days a week and had tours 3 times daily 9-12-3 and decided to have a 6 pm tour time for those who worked and would be willing to do a Thursday night tour instead of messing up their weekends. They offered along with the other gifts a catered dinner at the resort, which consisted of Salisbury steak, potatoes, corn among other things. So when we offered a steak dinner at least it was close.

I had booked, on one of these Thursdays, 3 tours all which had more than met their qualifications and have given me a $ 20.00 dollar deposit. The resort asks you to get a 20.00 fully refundable deposit off the couple as an incentive for them to show up. Many people swear they will go and 95% never show up if they do not give you a deposit. Getting a deposit insures a better turn out.

I was over at the resort waiting for my 3 tours and when they showed up I had them all park in parking spaces I had saved for them and the parking spaces were all together. Once they had all arrived and parked I walked them into the resort and got them situated and left for home. I was home for about an hour and a half when the phone rang. One of the people in charge called me and asked me what kind of people was I sending over there as they all were NQ,s ( not qualified) and they sent them home.

This did not make any sense to me as they were already there for over 2 hours, and if they NQ anyone it is usually within the first 15 minutes. Having already been ripped off form this company for some of my tours already in the past I jumped into my car and drove over to see what was going on. On arriving onto the property I looked over to where I had the couple’s park and to my surprise all three cars were still in the same parking spot.

If you are interested in ready more additions to my nightmare they will be added to vacationpackagestogo.com in the article section. Bookmark the site as this nightmare will be a continue episode and I have more relevant articles to post on this site.

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