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Kenmore Club News

29/6/2010 - Following the DRI AGM on 29th June 2010, the co-opted member on the Kenmore committee is now Rit Albanese, who has replaced Sid Jenkinson. We wish Rita well in her new role and thank Sid for his efforts over the last three years.

11/5/2010 - Travel & Leisure Group have been appointed as the official weeks reseller by DRI. Read about it HERE.

27/4/2010 - TATOC publication regarding Bogus Solicitors And Legal Firms

Spring 2010
We have received our ranking for Interval International and Kenmore is classed as a Select Resort which is classed as exceeding their already high affiliation standards.  This is assessed annually based on resort inspection, customer feedback and other relevant factors. We are already an RCI Gold CRown Resort and have been for many years. 

Reception - Our new team member, Kirsty Black, started on the 15th of March. Kirsty has a university degree and we welcome her to the team.

Housekeeping – We have new staff in housekeeping who are now receiving training.

Maintenance and grounds - After a bad winter we are slowly getting back to normal maintenance of our grounds. The maintenance team have been concentrating on Reception, Gym and public areas. The Gym has been decorated and a new wooden floor has been laid down. The reception area has been decorated, a new door has been installed and a brand new carpet laid down. We now have some lovely paintings (Scottish scenery) in place made by a local artist.

A new CCTV system has also been installed to cover bigger areas of our Reception and Food & Beverage.

New flat screen TVs have been installed in phase 1 and phase 2. This has improved the first impression and the quality of our cottages and our owners and guests are delighted with them.

We have started with the cleaning of the balconies, doing the worst ones first. After this bad winter  the balconies are in a bad condition.

The contract for the new TV system has been signed and it is envisaged that the work will be completed by mid May.

F&B/Activities
The restaurant is slowly getting busier and the opening times have now changed again to Summer (open all day). We have started a trial with new activities for children/young people i.e. face painting, egg painting and Nintendo Wii challenges.

After contacting the local council Alex has organised for a 6 minute long DVD about places of interest and beauty in Perthshire to be available in each cottage.

Winter 2010
We had some of the most severe weather conditions at the resort, with snow reaching nearly 2 feet recently! However, even with roads being closed the operations and the normal services offered were not affected and we received some great comments from owners and guests about the way the Kenmore team have dealt with the situation.
We still have to sort out the contract for the new TV system with a local company called Smart Home Design. However, in the meantime, new 32” SONY flat screen TVs have been ordered for phase 1 and 2 cottages and two 40” SONY TVs ordered for cottage 30 and cottage 15.

Reception - Stephanie Anderson has left the reception team and moved to a job in the city of Perth. We wish Stephanie the best for her new career. Kirsty Black has now replaced Stephanie.

Maintenance - We are still concentrating on maintenance weeks in the cottages in phase 2. Cottage 12 and 39 had their maintenance week done and they have been redecorated. Maintenance work to improve reception has been scheduled for the end of March.  The following improvements will be done:

new carpet,
new front door,
decorating of the reception walls,
new laminate wood effect floor for the gym;
also the following will be purchased:
new tub chairs and coffee tables for the lounge,
new stand up lamps,
new pictures to decorate the walls.

New sofa beds have been ordered, they will be placed in the cottages in 3 stages:

  1. Stage 1 March 2010: cottage 3, cottage 11 and cottage 9
  2. Stage 2 April 2010: cottage 7, cottage 5 and cottage 12
  3. Stage 3 May 2010: cottage 14 cottage 31 and cottage 32

Grounds - The scheduled landscaping work for the back car park and front reception area has to be put on hold due to the heavy snow fall we had in February. Work will now be carried out in May with hopefully better weather conditions.

21/12/09 - Fees for 2010
The Management Fees for 2010 can be found on the resort map page (scroll down below the map). New photos added.

December 2009
The Reception team continue to deliver excellent service and in Housekeeping, Elizabeth Mitchell has been promoted to Head Housekeeper on a temporary contract to replace Rhoyas MacGregor. Liz has been with us for a long time.

Jim and the Maintenance team have had another fantastic month scoring 90% customer satisfaction, number 5 in Europe for the month! At The Waterfront, Heather and Cameron have introduced new restaurant and bar menus, together with a new “Take Away” menu. Christmas and Hogmanay have been a success and every guest enjoyed the firework display.

Despite the arctic weather conditions we have had a very good month at Kenmore and customer satisfaction has been excellent. The snow has made the resort even more beautiful than normal. Temperatures reached -20°C but our water pipes and infrastructures didn’t suffer at all whilst half the village had problems with their water supply.

November 2009
Reception -  Alexa and the team continue doing a great job. The latest addition to the team Laura Ramsey has settled in very well and she will be a great asset to the team.

Housekeeping - The team has done very well over the past 6 weeks achieving great results  and is now concentrating on deep cleaning of the cottages.
 
Maintenance - Jim and the team have had the best result for months. The team is taking the opportunity of lower occupancy to do maintenance work (maintenance weeks) in the cottages that most needs them.
 
Restaurant - It has been a very quiet month for Heather and Cameron but the guests satisfaction is still excellent and they are now the second Food & Beverage operator in the UK, Germany and Austria Area.  Well done!
 
Overall - It has been a quiet month for the resort and we are taking this opportunity to plan for major works like resurfacing of the back car park and  maintenance weeks in cottages. The resort achieved a great result  last month scoring an average of 91% and going back in the top 10 resorts in Europe for the month of November! Well done to all the staff, they have worked very hard and they deserve all the credit for this achievement.

15/12/09 - Highland Safaris
Owners and guests at Kenmore can now benefit from a special deal given to us by Highland Safaris. Click here or see the Activities page.

October 2009
Reception - Alexa Moran re joined us as Head Receptionist at the beginning of October. She is already showing that she will be a very good member of the management team. We have also welcomed a new receptionist, Laura Ramsay. Laura has a university degree and is currently undergoing training.

Maintenance - The team have scored really well on the comments cards, a great improvement on this time last year. A big well done to Jim and the team!

Housekeeping - At the moment Jim (Head of Maintenance) and Alex (Resort Manager) are running the department during Rhoyas’s absence. We hope to appoint a temporary Head Housekeeper until Rhoyas is fine to come back to work. At the moment we are working on new procedures and better time management, we are hoping to maximise the resources and improve the standards even further.

Grounds - Dewar and Lacey have done an excellent job as usual, cutting back plants and hedges ready for the winter season. We have already had a few frosty mornings but ice wasn’t an issue because Rury and his team have made sure the paths were well salted which is a very encouraging start of the winter season.

Food & Beverage - It has been a good couple of months for our restaurant with excellent feedback and good guests satisfaction results. They have had lots on enquiries for Christmas period and Hogmanay dinner and a result Christmas day is already fully booked.

Overall - We have started the refurbishment in phase 3 (the cottages outside the walls) and recycled sofas, beds and other furniture in good conditions and placed them in cottages in phase 2. The TV system has been partially repaired, but we still have a problem with few lodges. Aberdeen Technical are coming back on site at the end of November to finish the job.

AGM

The Kenmore Club AGM was held on Saturday, 26th September, 2009, at 11:00am at the Kenmore Club, Waterfront Restaurant. This was Brian Wood’s last official duty on the committee after many years illustrious service. He was thanked by the Chairman and the committee have commissioned him a framed painting of Kenmore and Loch Tay as a thank you for all his hard work, best wishes were received from everyone attending the AGM. Brian has very kindly agreed to continue to assist the committee in bringing the Constitution up to date.
John Lapthorne was elected to the committee by majority vote to replace Brian and he received a warm welcome. After the AGM, the new committee agreed that Robin Dolman would continue as Chairman of the Committee.
After much debate at the AGM the four special resolutions and the vote to assign the Management Agreement were passed. 
The next AGM will be on Saturday, 18th September, 2010 at 11:00am in the Waterfront Restaurant.

The AGM was preceded on Friday 25th by the budget meeting which meant the 2010 management fee increase could be announced at the AGM. The initial starting proposal reflected an increase in fees of over 11%. This was felt by all to be too high and a lengthy meeting ensued to ascertain where we could reduce costs to bring this initial increase to a more acceptable level.
We were also faced with an ongoing damaging situation whereby defaulting owners were now causing us to have to make provision in the budget to cover the management fees that we were no longer receiving. This provision would have resulted in adding a further 2% to the budget. The committee reached an agreement with DRI that they, as the developer, would take over all defaulted weeks at the date of the AGM and free the committee from the ongoing and escalating costs of these weeks.
The final increase was successfully limited to 5.2%.

August 2009

The reception area has been re arranged to have easy access for wheelchairs, Alex is looking into the possibility of purchasing tub chairs and low coffee tables to make the all area more welcoming. Sheila Gall is still helping in reception until a suitable replacement is found.

It has been a busy month for Housekeeping but Rhoyas and the team have achieved good results scoring 90% guests satisfaction against 85% the same time last year.

Jim and the Maintenance team are continuing improving and results this month see our scores up 9% against the same time last year. Maintenance work has been carried out in the Waterfront restaurant and new sinks have been installed. Painting of balconies and apexes is continuing. Despite the weather we have managed to bring up to standard 10 cottages. The walls near the playground area have been repaired and the road marking has been completed at the entrance making the all area looking much nicer.

We have established a partnership with Highland safari and our guests can now enjoy safaris at a discounted rate. We have now received a quotation from Aberdeen Technical and looking into the possibility of repairing the TV signal sometimes in the upcoming weeks. Service scores at The Kenmore Club have again improved, we are up 4% against the same time last year.

July 2009
Our new Reception Manager Natalie Barry has started and is settling in very well. Natalie has a lot of experience in customer service and we are confident she will be a great asset for The Kenmore Club. Stephanie Anderson is still undergoing training and is showing potential to be a key member of the team already. Sheila Gall is still helping the team until a permanent new staff member is found.

Rhoyas and her housekeeping team have done a very good job in the last month and scores have increased to 92% which is the highest scored this year. The new housekeeping plan and check lists are proving to be making a difference already.

Jim and the maintenance team have increased their scores to 82%, a massive 8 points ahead of the same time last year. The DDA (Disability Discrimination Act) car park by cottage 48 is not quite finished but the walls by phase 3 have been repaired. The playground area is looking much tidier after the maintenance work done in the last 2 weeks which included the purchase of more bark. All the trip hazards and steps have been highlighted in colour and together with the painted new hand rails are making the resort looking much better. Maintenance of balconies is continuing and a new window cleaner has been arranged, this will have a massive effect on the overall looking of the cottages. A new person joined the maintenance team, Robert Montgomery. Robert has worked at The Kenmore Club previously and we are confident he will settle in very well.

Andy from Legend Sailing is now on site during check in time on Saturdays and Sundays to promote activities and take bookings from guests.

Hospitality scores have gone up to 93% in June credit goes to all the staff here at The Kenmore Club for achieving such a good result. TV reception is still an issue and we keep receiving complaints at this time, one quotation for the new System has been received and we are awaiting one more quotation for comparison.

5/6/09 - We are well aware of the long standing TV reception problems at Kenmore and believe we have at last found a solution. We have set up a trial of ‘Freesat’ in reception and if this proves to be successful we will look at rolling it out across the resort.

20/5/09 - We now have a new Resort Manager at Kenmore - Alex Cibelli. We thank Jasper for all he has done in the interim and look forward to a long and happy relationship with Alex. I'm sure I can speak for us all in wishing him well.

23/3/09 - The new planning calendar is now available and you can see a copy from the "Buy or Rent a Week Page. If you do not have Adobe Reader on your PC then use the link below in the Constitution section to download the reader.

19/3/09 - Our Resort Manager, Jason Powell has now left us and we are pleased to let you know that we have a new interim resort manager in place – Jasper Van Der Zalm. As you may have guessed, Jasper is a Dutchman but you would never know talking to him.

The 2009 refurbishment has already been completed successfully with the units being back online and receiving excellent reviews. However, there will be no more work done on the refurbishments until 2010 in the 40 cottages comprising Phase 1 and 2 but there are still 5 or 6 cottages to be done in the Phase 3 block. Phase 3 refurbishments are funded separately as these cottages are Points Club units. We are reviewing the possibility of a disabled unit in the Phase 2 block to be converted next year if the assessment shows it is possible.

As you know, TV reception at Kenmore is very bad and we have now decided to go down the Freesat route. We have been advised that we should get a decent signal if we use a bigger satellite dish so we have agreed to fund a trial this year where we will have the dish installed and we will put an LCD screen in reception and leave it running on an HD channel so that you may see what will be coming in 2010. We need to let the trial run so that we can see what happens as the weather changes. We do not wish to put in a system that fails every time it rains!

Assuming the trial is a success we need to purchase and install the new TV's. We feel it would be desirable to purchase TVs which have built in Freesat. These should be much easier to use as it avoids having yet another set-top box and remote control.

We are also looking to improve the telephone system and we will be rolling out a WiFi offering that should enable WiFi to be picked up in every cottage. This is all part of a DRI initiative so we are awaiting a time-scale and proposals from DRI. Finally, we are just starting to look at the possibility of upgrading the current smoke detectors to having ones linked to reception.

You may have noticed that on the home page (the page that is displayed when you load the website), that I have added a discussion forum. It is very early days and I know from experience that it takes a long time for these things to "take off". It would be great if more owners joined the forum. Just click on the link on the home page and then the "Register" button. If you have any trouble then please email me and I will resolve any issues. 

Sid Jenkinson
Committee Member and Webmaster

The Kenmore Constitution

A PDF version of the constitution is available to view here.

If you do not have Adobe Reader on your PC then click the icon on the left to download the reader.

More Refurbishments

Our major refurbishment programme is now well under way. Cottages 16 to 20 had already been refurbished in 2007 and cottages 21 to 25 were completed in January 2008 (see bottom of this page). Cottages 29 and 30 were completed in time for Christmas 2008 and 26, 27 and 28 have now been finished (Jan 2009). Cottage 15 will be done in 2010 and that will see the completion of all Phase 1 cottages. Photos of cottage 30.

Fees for 2009

Click here to see the fees for 2009 and the last two years.

Cottages for Sale or Rent

At the recent AGM it was agreed that a large number of cottages would be taken over by the Kenmore Club. These are now shown on the "Buy or Rent a Week" page.

Have you been telephoned by a company wanting to buy or sell your week - click here - Unscrupulous Companies.


AGM

The Kenmore Club AGM was held on Saturday, 6th September, 2008, at 11:00am at the Kenmore Hotel. We bade a fond farewell to our long standing committee member and Chairman of the past three years - David Arthur. After a close vote, committee member Robin Dolman was re-elected to serve for a further three years. Commiserations to John Lapthorne. Robin has now taken over as Chairman of the Committee and can be emailed on robin.dolman@btinternet.com.
A request from the AGM was that a planning calendar be added to the website. This has been added as a link from the "Buy or Rent a Week " page.
The next AGM will be on Saturday, 26th September, 2009

Resale Companies

For anyone that has been taken in by ETOO's adverts (see this page), you may be interested to know that the Advertising Standards Agency has adjudicated against ETOO following a number of complaints from people who had paid them a lot of money based on false promises. You can read the adjudication on the Advertising Standards Authority website - http://www.asa.org.uk/asa/adjudications/Public/TF_ADJ_44892.htm.

I can also inform you that OTE say that two resale companies have been closed down by the Spanish police for fraudulent activities. The bogus companies are Holiday Network Solutions and Real Escape.

Refurbished cottages

In 2008 we had to increase the annual maintenance charge to allow us to begin a comprehensive refurbishment programme for the cottages at the Kenmore Club. Over the years we have tried to maintain the cottages as best we can within a relatively modest maintenance budget. The resort is now quite mature and to preserve our investment we need to do more than the normal painting and decorating and replacement of soft furnishings. Your Committee is very well aware that we have a quality resort at Kenmore and we need to preserve that quality. We have agreed a refurbishment programme with Diamond Resorts International that means over the next five or six years we will see ALL our cottages completely stripped out and fully renovated to the highest standards. We have now refurbished cottages 21 to 25. Have a look at the photographs.