PLEASE READ.!!! TIMESHARE & HOLIDAY CLUBS

[darry]

Hello
About 8 years ago while taking our first family holiday in Majorca and being very gullible we fell victim to a Holiday Club called VACATION TIME . After two holidays with them the penney dropped that we were only staying in accomodation that couln't be filled by regular timeshare. We decided to put this behind us until today when we had phone call from somebody called Lyn telling us we were due a refund but would have to travell to Tenerife and speak Solicitors to claim aparently 90% of our membership fee or sign a disclaimer agreeing not to persue any money owing us. I told her I did not believe her and put the phone down. Has anyone else had a similar experince and our these holiday clubs in trouble .Would be greatful for any feed back

Bill

[Fred 2]

You were right not to believe her. It is a common fraud.

[willywonka]

I was caught up with the Club Greece holiday scam and trying to get out of it cost me my health, I went to a solicitor and followed the advise of the Timeshare association and now I own a worthless piece of paper that cost me �8000 so if anyone as any suggestions on how to recover any of my loss I would apprciate it. It was my first holiday in ten years and not been able to afford holiday abroad since, it also cost me my relationship.

[tsuser]

I too find it hard to understand how people still get caught up with this con,specifically Holiday Clubs. It's been going on for some years now and gets loads of publicity in newspapers, radio programmes and on the likes of Watchdog on TV. I suppose a lot of it is down to people being relaxed on holiday and letting their guard down.
One dead giveaway is ANY system that runs for 35 months as they are currently totally unregulated. No mandatory cooling off period etc.
If anybody is genuinely interested in timeshare (Holiday Clubs are a totally different thing) never, never, never, never (get the idea?) buy from the developer as you will pay way over the odds. Timeshares can be purchased for a fraction of the developer price on the resale market. Look at sites such as www.timesharetalk.co.uk or www.tug2.com for in depth information from people who know plenty and are more than happy to share that knowledge.

[Lin2]

Are you generalising about Timeshares? We have one and don't feel we were ripped off by the developer -it costs a lot to stay at our resort if it is not your timeshare.

[tsuser]

Lin2,

It's estimated that 60% of the purchase cost when buying direct from the developer is their profit and 'on-costs' i.e. staff, marketing etc. Certainly for the vast majority of resorts there is no benefit in purchasing from the developer. A few resort groups do provide additional benefits for developer purchases but not many.
I didn't actually say 'ripped off' as to me that suggests purchasing something of no value. I own timeshare and have done for many years, and I purchased from the developer as I didn't know of the alternative options then. In fact in the mid 80's the resale market in the UK was probably almost non-existent.

[lookout]

We are going on a free holiday to Tenerife on 6th July, This is in response to a questionair we filled in sometime last year before we sat foot in Tenerife. I and a choice was of where I would go that I had never been before and I ticked Tenerife, Must have had the shaked that day. Anyway according to a contributor Aquilla ther price of our free holiday is being paid for by increasing the cost of living to Ex Pat English residence of the Island so Thank you all next time you buy a drink Aquilla says you are paying for our freebe, THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU ONE AND ALL.
And a special thank to Aquilla for giving me that valuable information, I will enjoy the free experience even more now.
Anyone who is invited should go and find out the facts first hand and if its not for you they cant force you to sign.
By the way the only good thing we found in Tenerife is the SUN and it was millions of miles away

[watban1]

I have been a timeshare owner for 15 years without any problems apart from being cold-called on a regular basis by travel firms offering all sorts of deals. I have never taken up any offers until recently when a company called Extra Weeks repeatedly called to offer me 3 weeks holiday over a 3 year period in 'luxury accomodation at incredilble prices'. The price for the 3 weeks was �346 which seemed pretty reasonable to me so eventually I caved in and paid my money. The downside is that there is only 1 resort in the UK, the majority are in Canaries, Florida etc. I have yet to try a holiday with them so watch this space.

[Duckwing]

To Watban 1
Dont go with extra weeks you are expected to go to presentation ours was with Club Class Concierge (you can read all about them on one of the other forums) We got scammed for nearly �2000 trying to get it back from Credit Card but have been refused once.
Also extra weeks changed the resort we booked at the last minute after flights were paid for to one that did not suit us
Regards Duckwing

[alexsmith]

Hi Jan C,
I have visited this site link which you have described in your last post

http://www.timeshare.org.uk/scams.html

Off course this great site of helpful information and thanks for sharing...

Alex Smith
Buyatimesahre.com