aventura spa palace

[sxcT]

Wow I can't believe they gave you a hard time about the photographers.  Now I am worried as well because mine is in November and they will probably be a lot more stricter by then.

 

Who do you get the day passes from?  Can you do it thru the front desk or does it have to be the WC?  Wonder if that would make any difference.

 

Sorry to hear about your issues Mia.  Hope you can work something out with them.

 

Can't wait to read your full review and see pics banksnelson.  Also, where is Karen?  Still haven't seen her review.  I am so anxious to see how things have been going for other brides.

[Matt Adcock]

 

 

Originally Posted by Banksnelson 

 

 

 

Warning!! - I hired LaLuna for photography and was planning on just getting them guest passes like so many other brides have done. LaLuna also told me they had been to the resort with guest passes before with no problem. Well when I had my meeting with cristina and told her the names for the guest passes she says "they are photographers" and made me pay for a room for the night for them in order for them to be allowed in. I tried to argue and told her it was not fair when I knew that so many other brides had done it, and I cried, but it got me nowhere. She said so many people have been hiring outside vendors so they had to crack down on it.

 

 

Seriously,  this is an inside job because I have authorization by the directory of all palace hotels that our company is an authorized Vendor. 

 

Does that mean that they can say and or do anything they want to inside the hotel on your wedding day????    Sounds like this is a communication problem within Palace.  We send them all of our clients contract numbers..

 

Here is our approach:

 

 

 

 

Dear Matt,

 

Thank you so much returning to the office to a flooded inbox.  I sincerely apologize for my delayed response. There is an outside vendor fee that applies should a wedding couple hire a local photographer from Mexico, it isn’t a problem for your services to be contracted.  We handle every case on a case by case basis when it comes to vendors.  The following reasons are why we must contractually protect ourselves and why we include those clauses in our contracts.

 

-First, couples in the past have hired outside vendors and when the vendor does not hold their part or the couple isn’t satisfied with their work we are brought into the legal dispute

-Second, we’ve had previous cases where the company who is providing the services has not obtained the correct business documentation nor fulfilled hacienda regulations and Palace has been brought into question for not screening outside vendors properly.

-Third, Palace Resorts is an all-inclusive property bounded by strict regulations every member of the team must purchase a day pass once the resort has screened the vendor.

 

We already have a reputable relationship with you so it would be no problem to have you become one of the approved outside vendors. We are definitely willing to work with you and wanted to provide you with some reasoning as to why we have those clauses.  If you can provide us with the names of the couples I can give the resort the green light to allow the exceptions without a problem.  Please feel free to contact me should you have any questions or concerns.

 

Kindest Regards,

 

 

 

CAROLINA LOPEZ

Corporate Director of Weddings & Honeymoons

@palaceresorts.com

 

Tel: 800.635.1836 ext

Direct: 305.416.6554

Fax: 305.421.1608

 

www.palaceresorts.com

www.leblancsparesort.com

 

 

Seriously???  We have authorization. 

 

Matt

 

 

[Banksnelson]

I had the CRAZIEST thing happen to me today! I swear all the weird freak problems happen to me! So I was getting a few last things out of my suitcase and a LIZARD jumped out onto my arm!! I was so scared! The thing had just been sitting in there for days I guess! So now we have an accidental Mexican pet, got it some crickets and put it in a cage.

 

Anyway, hopefully this photog stuff is resolved for all you ladies and I just had a freak problem. And La Luna was great to work with I didnt mean anything bad against them!

 

I'll try to write up a review tomorrow and post some pics (wont be the professional ones of course) I'm so tired after my first day back at work and my lizard fiasco.

 

About the toiletries, I think it was just shampoo, conditioner, soap and body lotion. Shampoo, conditioner and lotion was biosilk.

[perry1217]

Jess, my WC for Playacar Palace just told me that we cannot use dollars for the videographer. especially since a fellow Palace bride who was just married there a few months ago said she was able to use them for it.  Let me know how you make out.  I'm starting to see that it's a different answer every time you ask a question
 

Originally Posted by jszy10 

I think my FI and I have decided to go with the resort photographer instead of trying to use an outside one.  I am too afraid of having an issue once I'm down there, and I have honestly seen good work from them anyway.  We decided its not worth the stress of chancing it after all   ALTHOUGH, I am still keeping my outside photog for our TTD session the day after.  He is 1/2 the price!

 

Having said that..I noticed that their website no longer lists what you can and cannot use your resort dollars for!?!?!?!  I emailed them about that, but I'm sure it will take awhile for me to hear back.  I am just hoping to god they didn't take the resort dollars option away from that!!!  I think we would absolutely die if they did!!  We were already planning on using the resort dollars for the videographer anyway, so hopefully we can just use the rest for a photog package too. 

 

[jszy10]

First of all...Banks...thats CRAZY!!!  lol  I can't even believe that!!  I would have freaked!  haha  I look forward to your review and some pics

 

Second..

 

I am officially BEYOND stressed out about all of these changes.  I think I am just going to call them tomorrow and try to get everything straightened out.  It now states on their website for both photography AND videography that "No Promotions apply towards these services".  I already have an emailing stating that I CAN use my vacation dollars for the videography, so if they turn around and tell me no I'm going to be pissed.  I'm already upset enough about the photography changes I am making, that its going to make me feel 10 times worse if I can't use my dollars on it.  ugghh!!!  sorry for venting girls...I'm just beyond stressed right now about all of this.  I didn't budget to pay for things I thought I could use my vacation dollars for!!

[adales]

Wow this is getting ugly.  I just found my email conversation that I had with Rebeca regarding the videography service and how I can use vacation dollars for it.  So, I plan on printing out all of the pertinent info from my myriad of emails and highlighting and tagging the important stuff. 

 

On a positive note though, Christina tried to tell me that if I wanted to do my reception at the solarium mundaca (like I have had scheduled) that there was an extra set-up fee per person, even though we have reached over 75 room nights and are entitled to unlimited private functions.  So, I threw a fit about this because the other options that didn't incur the fee were already booked and the only option left was to do our reception at the pool.  When I asked her if thay part of the pool would be closed to the publice for our "private" reception she said no.  So, I let her know how dissapointed I was and she then told me that she would waive the extra set-up fee at the solarium mundaca so I am back to the original plan with that.

 

I am just not going to back down when I have my meeting with her and make sure that everything I have is in writing.

 

[jszy10]

I have all of my emails too, hopefully that will be enough.  You get married right before me, so I will definitely be interested in how everything turns out.  I think I am going to call their US wedding department number today.  If anything else, I want them to know how many people are stressed out and upset about the changes they are making. 

[lilbuddha]

I am just preparing for for the worst. After the flower fiasco last week I can tell that they are just trying to get as much money out of us as possible. I had an email and a picture and they still would not honor it. They just kept saying that it was a misunderstanding. I am not even sure that an email will keep them to their word. It just makes me sad that we were all enjoying planning our destinatnnweddings at this beautiful place and now we are all stressing about things we believed were set. Between all of us we are giving Palace a ridiculous amount of money. I just can't get over this lack of customer service.

[nicdeb928]

wow ladies! I cannot believe how many problems you are having.  None of these existed a few months ago for my wedding.  I will say communication was hard at times, but the actual day of the wedding I did not encounter one problem, everything went smooth and beautiful and they were professional all the way! My suggestion would be to just keep yourself organized with your notes, and plan for the worst.  Meaning, dont count on being able to use the vacation dollars for anything wedding related.  This way your prepared if it comes to that.  You do not want to spend the days before your wedding stressed and fighting.  That is time you can never get back.  Instead you should be spending it enjoying your time with your fiance and guests.  Just get prices now for everything you need in writing and bring those quoted prices with you.  My other suggestion would be if they dont honor those prices to call the Palace Resort headquarters in Miami.  The one problem we did have, they were able to fix it pretty quickly.  Good luck!!!

[jszy10]

Ok ladies...

 

I JUST got off the phone with Yesenia, and she has assured me that I CAN still use my vacation dollars for both videography and photography.  She said that it is all about when your wedding was booked (must be booked before March 1st).

 

Also, she said that if you want to have an outside photographer that you must contact her and she has to get an "exception" approved.  This simply involves the resort approving that vendor, and then you having to pay for a guest pass.

 

Hope this helps.  It definitely made me feel a little better, at least for now.

 

Now... off to my first dress fitting!!!