Royal Holiday Scam-- You Do Have Rights
Complaint
Vin Manzello
Country: United States
We made the purchase of a vacation club membership with Royal Holiday on May 31, 2010 while on vacation in Cancun. We had agreed with the sales director, Ernesto Barberi to exchange 1 of our paid in full timeshare properties in addition to a cash deposit for a paid in full membership package. Later that evening while reading through the membership packet, we realized numerous discrepancies and outright lies between what was presented and what was contained within the language of the packet. We therefore decided that night to exercise our legal right to cancel the membership and receive a full refund. We exercised that right the very next day, June 1, 2010 and met with Mr. Barberi, who claimed that he was unable to process the cancellation at the sales office and gave us instructions of what he needed to do to obtain cancellation and refund authorization. Needles to say, Mr. Barberi has failed to respond to any phone calls, emails or letter since that date.
We have sent registered letters to all adresses in the contract, email notifications, faxes and phone calls on a daily basis and all within the legal time frame allowed, all without results. All our attempts to obtain a cancellation and refund within the allowed 5 business days been roadblocked by the company. Each and every person we contact via email or phone claims that they are either unaware of the process to provide a cancellation/refund or they are not authorized to do so. Also, they are unwilling to provide a name or contact number of any person who knows how to process a cancellation / refund or is authorized to do so.. Ironically, although not authorized to process a cancellation, each representative is authorized to offer upgrades and downgrades galore.
After conducting an internet search, I was amazed to find literally hundreds, if not thousands, of complaints of fraud on behalf of the Royal Holiday representatives. I also found an extremely shocking number of cases of victims attempting to cancel within the legal timeframe as is their right by Article 56 of the Federal Consumer Protection Act all to no avail as the company refuses to abide by the law.
Know You Rights
Article 56 of the Federal Consumer Protection Law
The contract will be perfected within five working days from the delivery of, or the company/signature of the contract, which ever occurs the latest. During this period, the consumer will have the right to revoke his consent without any responsibility. The revocation will have to be by means of warning or delivery of notice, in person, by registered mail, or another method of average reliability. The revocation according to this Article, will terminate the contract. In this case, the costs of shipping and insurance will be the responsibility of the consumer. If the contract is for services, this article will not be applicable if the date of receipt of the service is less than ten working days from the date of the order of purchase.
ARTICLE 32 OF the Federal Consumer Protection Law
The information or publicity relative to goods or services that spread by any means or forms, will have to be truthful, verifiable and clear of texts, dialogues, sounds, images and other descriptions that induce or can induce error or confusion, by its inaccuracy.
Immediate Cancellation Procedure
To protect your right to cancel within 5 days of signing your contract you must immediately send notification of your intent to cancel and exercise your rights under ARTICLE 56 OF Ley Federal de Protección al Consumidor.
You need to send your cancellation by a means that you can easily prove that you complied with Article 56. It is best to send a certified letter to all Mexican Addresses contained within the agreement and to follow up via email and fax. You should also copy yourself, and PROFECO (the Mexican Federal Consumer Protection Agency at: extranjeros@profeco.gob.mx ) on your email. If your email system allows, you should request delivery confirmation and a return receipt. Do this even if you make the cancellation in person.
Also, it is best to forward copies of all correspondence to the Mexican Embassy in your home town or better yet, show up with documentation in hand. They will assist you with a PROFECO claim.
As an added measure of insurance, forward all correspondence to the Mexican Embassy in Washington, DC, the US Consulate in Mexico, and the Mexican Board of Tourism.
Contact Your Credit card company immediately to stop payment and issue an dispute. Provide copies of all written, emailed, faxed correspondence in addition to a copy of Article 56
If you feel you were defrauded at a timeshare or vacation package sale in Mexico, you can fight back for a full refund…Check out http://www.mescam.com/index.htm
Check out the following for more assistance:
http://www.thesqueakywheel.com/
http://www.ripoffreport.com/
http://www.complaintsboard.com/?search=royal+holiday
http://royalholidayclubmexicoscammedme.blogspot.com/
http://www.timeshareconsumergroup.org/fraud_royal.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1W2HVGnNls 20/20 Royal Holiday Timeshare Investigation
https://complaintwire.org/Complaint.aspx/WgFSMGOF9gA7WwjJdplNoA
http://www.thetimeshareauthority.com/2008/04/ ... reasons-part-i/
We have sent registered letters to all adresses in the contract, email notifications, faxes and phone calls on a daily basis and all within the legal time frame allowed, all without results. All our attempts to obtain a cancellation and refund within the allowed 5 business days been roadblocked by the company. Each and every person we contact via email or phone claims that they are either unaware of the process to provide a cancellation/refund or they are not authorized to do so. Also, they are unwilling to provide a name or contact number of any person who knows how to process a cancellation / refund or is authorized to do so.. Ironically, although not authorized to process a cancellation, each representative is authorized to offer upgrades and downgrades galore.
After conducting an internet search, I was amazed to find literally hundreds, if not thousands, of complaints of fraud on behalf of the Royal Holiday representatives. I also found an extremely shocking number of cases of victims attempting to cancel within the legal timeframe as is their right by Article 56 of the Federal Consumer Protection Act all to no avail as the company refuses to abide by the law.
Know You Rights
Article 56 of the Federal Consumer Protection Law
The contract will be perfected within five working days from the delivery of, or the company/signature of the contract, which ever occurs the latest. During this period, the consumer will have the right to revoke his consent without any responsibility. The revocation will have to be by means of warning or delivery of notice, in person, by registered mail, or another method of average reliability. The revocation according to this Article, will terminate the contract. In this case, the costs of shipping and insurance will be the responsibility of the consumer. If the contract is for services, this article will not be applicable if the date of receipt of the service is less than ten working days from the date of the order of purchase.
ARTICLE 32 OF the Federal Consumer Protection Law
The information or publicity relative to goods or services that spread by any means or forms, will have to be truthful, verifiable and clear of texts, dialogues, sounds, images and other descriptions that induce or can induce error or confusion, by its inaccuracy.
Immediate Cancellation Procedure
To protect your right to cancel within 5 days of signing your contract you must immediately send notification of your intent to cancel and exercise your rights under ARTICLE 56 OF Ley Federal de Protección al Consumidor.
You need to send your cancellation by a means that you can easily prove that you complied with Article 56. It is best to send a certified letter to all Mexican Addresses contained within the agreement and to follow up via email and fax. You should also copy yourself, and PROFECO (the Mexican Federal Consumer Protection Agency at: extranjeros@profeco.gob.mx ) on your email. If your email system allows, you should request delivery confirmation and a return receipt. Do this even if you make the cancellation in person.
Also, it is best to forward copies of all correspondence to the Mexican Embassy in your home town or better yet, show up with documentation in hand. They will assist you with a PROFECO claim.
As an added measure of insurance, forward all correspondence to the Mexican Embassy in Washington, DC, the US Consulate in Mexico, and the Mexican Board of Tourism.
Contact Your Credit card company immediately to stop payment and issue an dispute. Provide copies of all written, emailed, faxed correspondence in addition to a copy of Article 56
If you feel you were defrauded at a timeshare or vacation package sale in Mexico, you can fight back for a full refund…Check out http://www.mescam.com/index.htm
Check out the following for more assistance:
http://www.thesqueakywheel.com/
http://www.ripoffreport.com/
http://www.complaintsboard.com/?search=royal+holiday
http://royalholidayclubmexicoscammedme.blogspot.com/
http://www.timeshareconsumergroup.org/fraud_royal.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l1W2HVGnNls 20/20 Royal Holiday Timeshare Investigation
https://complaintwire.org/Complaint.aspx/WgFSMGOF9gA7WwjJdplNoA
http://www.thetimeshareauthority.com/2008/04/ ... reasons-part-i/
Comments
I't´s been a nightmare for me!!! I was doing a research on internet about this fraudulent resort and how to get out of this fraud, i found this information and i want to share it with you, i hope it helps someone:
http://www.timesharescam.com/blog/189-how-to-cancel-a-royal-holiday-timeshare-membership/
Long story short, they are liars and fooled us with promises that were exaggerated from what was written in the contract, not that we paid attention to fine prints and it was too much to read when you're hot and intoxicated so we skimmed through and decided to trust the words that they said to us. We let them have our money for almost 5 years now, blaming ourselves for our stupidity but it's just too much now and fees have gone up!
I just called again today for the last time, to cancel but the representative said we can not cancel the 30 year contract (which we weren't told it was for 30 years at the time we signed amongst other things). The customer service agent was rude and tried to argue with me and repeat things I already heard from them before, so I asked to speak to a manager but she said the manager isn't available. I asked for the manager to call me back but she changed the subject. Awful and unprofessional. We don't even want a refund, even though it's a lot of money from us for nothing! We just want out of the membership and to stop paying without getting bad credit. We only used the membership once because it was a free certificate for new members, we still had to pay our own flights and was stuck with no transportation (which was promised to us) when we arrived in Punta Cana. It was pretty risky and scary because we had our 4 year old and 6 year old daughters with us at that time. Food and hotel was like 3 star it wasn't top 5 star or amazing like what they said.
Every time we called to book a vacation, they never have availability for the date that we want, to the destination we want. They lied to us about 50% off flights too. They could not help us with that at all and many other things are lies. They did not roll over our points as they said they would, we had to call to ask. We don't have time! They said it would be automatically transferred when we first signed up in 2011. We did not use our points for 4 or 5 years now.
Sadly,We traveled through regular itravel2000 agents since 2011 because it is cheaper and had better options. We are paying Royal Holidays for nothing. Please help. We cannot afford it anymore as we are going through a divorce and won't use it at all. Plus the annual fee has gone up from around $300 to $467 USD. We are from Canada. If anyone knows a way out or have gotten out of this contract, please help share your procedure. Thank you.
Long story short, they are liars and fooled us with promises that were exaggerated from what was written in the contract, not that we paid attention to fine prints and it was too much to read when you're hot and intoxicated so we skimmed through and decided to trust the words that they said to us. We let them have our money for almost 5 years now, blaming ourselves for our stupidity but it's just too much now and fees have gone up!
I just called again today for the last time, to cancel but the representative said we can not cancel the 30 year contract (which we weren't told it was for 30 years at the time we signed amongst other things). The customer service agent was rude and tried to argue with me and repeat things I already heard from them before, so I asked to speak to a manager but she said the manager isn't available. I asked for the manager to call me back but she changed the subject. Awful and unprofessional. We don't even want a refund, even though it's a lot of money from us for nothing! We just want out of the membership and to stop paying without getting bad credit. We only used the membership once because it was a free certificate for new members, we still had to pay our own flights and was stuck with no transportation (which was promised to us) when we arrived in Punta Cana. It was pretty risky and scary because we had our 4 year old and 6 year old daughters with us at that time. Food and hotel was like 3 star it wasn't top 5 star or amazing like what they said.
Every time we called to book a vacation, they never have availability for the date that we want, to the destination we want. They lied to us about 50% off flights too. They could not help us with that at all and many other things are lies. They did not roll over our points as they said they would, we had to call to ask. We don't have time! They said it would be automatically transferred when we first signed up in 2011. We did not use our points for 4 or 5 years now.
Sadly,We traveled through regular itravel2000 agents since 2011 because it is cheaper and had better options. We are paying Royal Holidays for nothing. Please help. We cannot afford it anymore as we are going through a divorce and won't use it at all. Plus the annual fee has gone up from around $300 to $467 USD. We are from Canada. If anyone knows a way out or have gotten out of this contract, please help share your procedure. Thank you.
my email is: gege.nelly@hotmail.com
http://www.timesharescam.com/blog/107-timeshare-cancel-professionals/
I think It will pretty much say everything that needs to be say.
I went through a horrible experience with this resort, and I'm out of three thousand dollars right now BUT I'm in a process to cancel my timeshare.
Its been a nightmare for me!!! I was doing a research on internet about this fraudulent resort and how to get out of this fraud, i found this information and i want to share it with you, i hope it helps someone:
http://www.timesharescam.com/blog/189-how-to-cancel-a-royal-holiday-timeshare-membership/