Since we’ve spent a lot of time explaining the timeshare system and how deceit runs rampant, we wanted to start taking a more authentic approach. Far too many of our clients have been taken advantage of and we hope their stories can make a difference. Although educational articles give buyers a better perspective on the industry, real-life experiences help them understand how expensive a bad timeshare decision can be. More importantly, for those in the midst of a bad decision, they need to know they’re not alone. So today we wanted to highlight one of our clients stories to explain why they were so eager to cancel Wyndham timeshare expenses shortly after their purchase.
Tens of thousands of timeshare owners across the U.S. experience buyer’s remorse. Most of which believe they’re trapped in their contractual obligation. What some endure throughout their purchase is absolutely devastating. This occurs because far too many owners lack clarity. The same can be said during their pursuit of relief. Incompetent exit services tend to place them in even more debt and disbelief. The decisions made after the purchase is what traps most users. Many feel like they have nowhere to turn because they’re constantly getting burned. It can be a frustrating, hopeless place to be to say the least.
The good news is, some are finding resolve by trusting in our company for relief. Our qualification process helps timeshare owners understand we’re on the same team – even when it’s difficult for them to put their faith in anyone else. Not everyone needs to legally cancel their timeshare contract. For some, it’s not even their best option. There might be a way to find a mutually beneficial resolution with the timeshare company. You just have to work with a company that believes in helping you find the best solution. One that’s willing to advocate for your consumer rights, not your money.
Each of our clients extend us a level of trust that we don’t take lightly. Once we confirm your eligibility and you commit to our timeshare cancellation services, we take pride in communicating every step. Not only is it our job to reassure on the front end, but to continuously remind our clients they’ve made a good decision. We can’t blame you for being skeptical or bitter. Providing you with clarity promotes peace of mind until your timeshare obligation is officially no more. In the end, it encourages our clients to share their stories with other owners. We hope that telling their story at least saves someone from similar heartache.
Garry and Drue’s Wyndham Timeshare Experience.
In October of last year, Garry and Drue were asked to attend an owner’s update meeting when they checked into their resort in the Pocono Mountains. Their Pennsylvania timeshare, Christie Lodge, and RCI offered them a free breakfast to do so. They didn’t expect it to take very long. But when they arrived, they were surprised to see the meeting was for Wyndham. “We asked what the update was for and the reply was to update on all the changes within Wyndham, many new hotels and resorts, the purchase of RCI and other business changes. We did not own into Wyndham, but had a timeshare through Christie Lodge and RCI.”
Garry remembers the experience quite vividly. “The presentation turned into a ‘sales’ pitch to get us to purchase a timeshare with Wyndham.” He went on to explain how the breakfast quickly turned into a late lunch. “We were held hostage for over 6 hours and had 3 friends waiting for us back at the Condo. We only had one vehicle and they were not happy when we finally made it back,” Drue recalled. At that point they realized their “vacation day was pretty well gone!”
As the morning went on, they didn’t give into the pressure sale. “We said no to every offer they came up with telling them we were not interested.” But no matter what they said, Wyndham didn’t take no for an answer. “They would counter with perks and offers, ‘no more exchange fees’ or ‘yearly fees to RCI.”
False Claims Persuade the Couple to Sign a New Contract.
The couple repeatedly voiced their concerns with a certain salesman named “Ed Scro.” Later on during the 6 hour presentation, they adamantly claim he began waiving expenses. They stated in their complaint with Wyndham, “Ed even wrote these 2 amounts down on a piece of paper and crossed them off to show we would not pay the exchange fees or the RCI membership fee again! I asked at the time how could they offer this and the salesman’s replied ‘because we own RCI.’” When the couple talked to us, we noticed how betrayed they felt by his lies.
Things took a turn though as Wyndham’s offers became more appealing. “Ed talked about using our points to pay for the maintenance fee monthly, and to use our points for a few nights stay on short trips, and use the rewards points for 1⁄2 off tickets to parks, restaurants, plays, airfare, etc.” We could use cash to get a 3-4 bdrm resort for $319 or $219 for 2 bedroom or $119 for 1 bedroom for a full week!” This seemed to be an amazing offer to them at the time. It’s almost as if they couldn’t pass it up – they were hooked!
How Gift Incentives Were Nothing More Than a Mirage.
The couple went on to explain, “We were offered a free 2-night stay for attending the presentation. When we tried to get into the app to redeem this offer, we could not get it to work. Ed Scro had told us when we left the presentation center that he would call us the next day and help us get this set up. He never called, he had called our HOME phone in Utah and left a message, which we didn’t get until we got home from our vacation the first week in November 2018. I had given Ed my husband’s cell number to call and instead he called our home # knowing full well we weren’t there. He knew we had arrived in PA 2 days previous to this presentation and we were just beginning our vacation (which we didn’t get home for a month). We tried to call someone at the resort to get help and there was no one around in the timeshare desk to help. The day we left PA Oct 6th, 2018, we stopped in the resort office and there was a girl at the desk for timeshare info. She tried to help us get the app for the free 2-night stay on my husband’s phone and it wouldn’t complete the transaction. The message read to “try later”. She apologized and said we could try later (we were headed to Salt Lake City), and gave us a phone number to call and ask for her (Dulce) or her supervisor Phil if we still couldn’t get the app to come up. I did call later that day and no answer. I left a message for Dulce and Phil, never heard back from either. Needless to say we never got the 2-night stay!”
But little did they know, the entire timeshare experience would turn out similarly. In his voicemail, Ed told them a quick start team would be calling to help them set up their first vacation. While they wanted to remain optimistic, they admit they became pretty skeptical at this point.
Actual Costs Didn’t Match the Sales Presentation.
Although a “quick start team” called, they were a bearer of bad news informing the couple that although they purchased for incentives, such as no exchange fees from RCI, they in fact were still responsible for paying those. Like many new timeshare owners, they didn’t know the cost of their vacation could be significantly higher until they contacted Wyndham to book their first reservation. You can probably imagine how understanding Wyndham was when they heard of Ed’s failed promises. Drue remembers, “some empathized, others made no comment; but [both] still tried to get us to book a vacation.”
After learning of the false claims, she decided to call Ed back for an explanation. “I questioned him on the fact that he told us we would never pay another exchange fee with RCI, and he said well you would pay it if you booked through them. I told him he never mentioned that in the sales pitch. It was supposed to be a perk that we didn’t have to pay because Wyndham now owns RCI. He just skirted around the question and deviated to another subject,” she said.
He told them “he would mail out the free trip.” After a few weeks went by she called again and he said the same. While they awaited answers to multiple questions, Ed continued to buy himself time. This is more than likely to get passed their rescission period and solidify his commission. After the cancellation period is over, the contract becomes final (in most cases). After additional calls for an update, she told us he disconnected his phone. “To this day [the free trip] has never come!”
Trying to Make the Most of Their Wyndham Timeshare.
They recall a Valerie Thomas calling them in December of last year with a great travel deal they wanted to pursue. “We were given several options of places and prices, with a $250 cash back by way of American Express for $150 and a free night stay some other time valued at $100. Some options were to bring friends or family members. I was interested in the Orlando option to take my daughter and her family.”
After setting up most of the reservation, Valerie told Drue everyone traveling would be “required to attend a 2 hour presentation.” Even though the resort told her she could get babysitting services for the kids, Drue decided to opt out altogether. She requested a link to review her options but Valerie told her she’d have to prepay to get it. This frustrated Garry and Drue so they decided to take some more time to take it all in.
A few weeks later, Valerie called Drue back to remind her the deal expired at the end of the year. Solicited sales with time closes rarely ever prove to be fruitful, as will be shown in their experience below. “She wanted me to pick one and I could change to a different option if I wanted to.” After paying $229 on her credit card, she waited days for the link with her choices. Drue said, “I called [Valerie] and she said she would find out what the problem was.” Nearly a week later, Valerie told her they misspelled their last name in the email.” Either way, they still weren’t able to choose where they vacationed. “We never received any other vacation option links.” They only received a booking confirmation to San Diego on January 7th. “I picked San Diego just to get the link for all.”
What Inevitably Caused Them to Cancel Wyndham Timeshare.
All of this caused them to immediately review the purchase. Garry said, “I read through the terms and conditions and read that I had to cancel in writing to the address on the email within 15 days of purchase.” Their purchase date was 12/29/18 so they “created a cancellation letter and sent it registered mail on the 8th.”
The New Year’s holiday falling on a Monday and Tuesday already hindered their ability to opt out. It’s almost as if Wyndham planned to persuade them during an inopportune time. Nonetheless, they received their letter on January 14th. This confused Garry because he was told by the Post Office that the letter would be delivered “within a couple of days.” Since the 7th was a Monday, his confusion was warranted.
The silver-lining to their dealings with Valerie is that it was most likely a certificate company booking the couple for another pressure-filled timeshare presentation, “a great travel deal” is quite a reach in this instance. The couple most likely unknowingly dodged a bullet. While this was disheartening to say the least, this just added fuel to the fire in their decision to find a way to get out of the Wyndham timeshare. After looking further, they realized they weren’t even eligible for the package Valerie offered them. The Terms and Conditions stated “persons having attended a CLUB WYNDHAM sales presentation within the last 6 months are ineligible.” They attended their presentation on Oct 1, 2018, which would have made them ineligible according to the language in the Terms and Conditions.
Shortly after, they realized Wyndham had charged maintenance fees on their Barclay credit card. A payment option they specifically told Ed not to use “until the loan was paid off.” Since he told them the fees wouldn’t be billed until April 1st, this was a big surprise to them. What made this revelation interesting was that Wyndham changed their method of billing without their knowledge. “They said I had chosen to go paperless. I never talked to anyone or saw anything where I gave them permission for my statements not to be sent,” Drue said.
At this point they were more eager to cancel Wyndham timeshare obligations than pay the company another penny. Garry went on to say the “resort deals” they were promised were “rarely available, if ever.” It allowed him and his wife to understand how they’re really “saved for non-Wyndham customers.” As the bigger picture sunk in, they developed a sense of urgency to cancel before things got even worse.
The Couple Finally Contacted VOC for Timeshare Relief.
When Garry and Drue finally contacted us for assistance, they were fed up with the “deception, lies and fraud.” In a dispute letter they literally wrote to Barclays, “Please help us get through this nightmare!” The desperation was evident and for good reason. Like many new timeshare owners, Wyndham signed up the couple for third party financing through Barclays. Aside from the unexpected “financial burden,” they told us the Wyndham timeshare created quite a bit of stress in their lives. The more they looked into the purchase, the more misconduct they found.
In an attempt of restitution, they wrote a letter informing of their decision to cancel the timeshare and requested a refund from Barclays. It said, “We have hired a company to rid us of this timeshare, and we would ask for your forgiveness of this debt since we have not used any of Wyndham’s services.” Barclays response was eerily similar to a timeshare’s response when client’s request to rescind the contract after they uncover omitted information, inconsistencies with the presentation to the signed agreement and lack of availability to use what they paid for. In short, the reason Barclays gave the couple was that they had a “signed contract”. Another client of ours recently stated they contacted Barclays with a similar dispute and without even mentioning that it was related to a timeshare purchase, he received the same, script-like response. He was told he could put in a dispute but since he singed the timeshare agreement he most likely wasn’t going to get the transaction reversed. One could only assume that Barclays has Wyndham’s best interest over their newly acquired credit client. It would seem that they either have a scripted response for timeshare owner disputes or they receive an overwhelming amount of complaints and still choose to extend lines of credit to clients under misleading or false pretenses relating to a timeshare purchase.
As experienced fractional owners, we’re sure they’ll find something that works. But they most definitely have been scarred by their Wyndham experience. In the end, they hope their vulnerability will help someone avoid a similar experience.
Timeshare Deceit Needs to be Addressed.
Bait and switch tactics can really sting when you believe someone with selfish intentions. Far too many timeshare owners are misled during presentations. But not all should be blamed for poorly informed decision-making. The timeshare itself needs to be held responsible for fully disclosing the details of their products. Garry and Drue would have avoided canceling the Wyndham timeshare if the promises during and after the sales presentation weren’t a lie. There’s no room for deceit when this amount of money is involved. Alongside regulatory agencies, we’ve made a commitment to addressing the deceit of the industry.
For more information on our timeshare cancellation services, you can schedule a free consultation or proceed with a qualification form below. Otherwise, feel free to watch or read about additional client testimonials.
