TIMESHARE IN INDIA: THEN & NOW
Over a couple of decades ago the Timeshare concept was introduced to the Indian sub-continent. Though the holiday ownership industry is well established in the West, it has taken time to catch on in India.
In the beginning of the 1990s timeshare resorts mushroomed in few pockets across the country with the promise of offering multiple destinations to holiday at. However, with the promises by resort developers remaining unfulfilled, members of these resorts were limited to holidaying at their home resort only. They clearly harbored desires to travel to other destinations as well. However; this was not possible as they needed to buy memberships of other resorts to fulfill this desire. In addition, there were several incidents of start up hurdles that caused a lot of grief to the holiday timeshare investor. Growth of the industry was hence very slow.
Mr. Farrukh Shaikh the Director of Four Seasons Exchanges (established in 1991) realized the need to link all the timeshare resorts and their members into one chain through the "Exchange" concept. Today FOUR SEASONS is India’s leading Holiday Exchange Company that works like a bank; wherein you deposit your domestic week in exchange for a week in an affiliated Indian or foreign resort -- subject to availability and depending on the 'trading power' of the week you own. Therefore, if you own a peak season week in a popular destination, you are more likely to be able to exchange it for the foreign holiday you want than if you owned a 'blue' week in a not-so-happening location / resort.
We started with a soft opening of 5 resort affiliations and 300 members and today we have affiliations with more than 240 resorts / hotels and more than 95,000 satisfied exchange / rental members. Our repeat customers make us believe that our unique service of 'Holiday Exchanges' has been very satisfying to all timeshare members irrespective of their parent resort being affiliated with us. The exchange concept at Four Seasons has considered member benefits while designing its schemes. This has added true value and has changed the ’Timeshare’ concept in the minds of people.
