We just got sucked into this as well. Ugh. Caught it within the five day period and mailed three certified letters to three different addresses appearing on the contract. We will not stop until we get our full refund. Have any of you been successful in getting your refund back?
My husband and I at the Occidental Grand Punta Cana from 8/23-8/30. During this time we had a very terrible experience. We travelled with another couple who we brought as a referral. The first rooms they gave us in building 18 had wet paint and began leaking, we were moved to another room in building 13 because no more rooms were available in the vacation club buildings. My husband and I stayed in room 13107. The air conditioning was not working properly in this room, which made the room smell very bad. The fan was also not working. In addition, on 8/28 our room lost power that night. We were the only room that did not have power. It took the front desk 20 minutes to send someone, we did not get power back until 3:00am. We booked this trip since November 2014, and have been members in the Occidental First Club for 1 year. My husband and I would like another trip to compensate for all the problems we have had on this trip. We pay a lot of money to be members and it does not benefit us to pay all of this money and not be able to be provided with the proper service on our vacation. The customer service at Punta Cana was terrible, after telling our representative all of these issues nothing was done. Even when we went to the vacation club office none of the representative offered any type of compensation and refused to help us. Since then I have been trying to cancel my membership and have been given nothing but the run around. The president Mr. Luis Namnum was very dismissive when I email him and offered no assistance. Do not joing this membership they do not care about their members and it is a HUGE waste of time and money
Total scam after reading the contract it does not state what sales person claim. He does highlight the rates on low and high season and they do show you in contract but they don't explain to you how the additional options of vacationing in other countries is a promotional incentive. Whole reason the club sounded great was to save on European vacations after reading contract it states their affiliate company for Europe (ICE) is only for 2 years. Mind you he stated this offer was for 25 years you can travel any where in the world. Who wouldn't want to travel the world with their kids and have the luxuries of home. This is how they get you. The contract also state no guarantee of your "purchased suite" if hotel is booked on selected week you will get a regular room.
According to the sales person the unit we were purchasing is ours no one will use it. Only our friends and family if we give them our weeks. Oh and here is the good part he kept saying if your late with monthly payment you will have a late charge which is understandable all creditors do that but what they don't tell you when you are signing unless you really understand legal language, which we all know is confusing. Is that you signed stating they can auto take payments from your account. I never agreed to that. Once I back home to review contract and see this club was (1) More expensive to use and maintain than just finding a deal on Expedia, Groupon, or cheapcarribean.com. (2) A false promise.
After trying for 2 days to get in contact with the vacation club to cancel I finally got in contact with the vacation club sales person he stated I was told only in high season I would have that issue which is bogus he stated we "purchase our own unit" which contradicts the contract. The sales person disconnected my calls numerous times when I kept telling him according to contract I can cancel within 5 days I will get a refund. He tried over and over to explain and I stood my ground, as the consumer it is my right to cancel if after review it does not benefit me I am allowed to cancel. Contract stated if buyer cancels with 5 business days no penalty and full refund. He then started to state I will be penalized for the incentives given. I don't know about you but incentives are gifts and In contract states on paper within 5 day cancellation no penalties are given , talk about total contradiction. Do you want to know what salesman told me about the auto deduction which I was never told and never agreed to. That it is just easier for then to get paid, I could not believe what I just heard. Now that is fraudulent to me. What is, the point of stating late penalties If your auto deducting. Then he went on if that is the issue we can remove it. After that I didn't want to hear anything else. This all started august 29,2014 scam purchased on August 24. still waiting on response for confirmation of cancellation and refund. Who knows how long that will take, consumers beware of the occidental vacation club scam and do not sign until you read all pages which is a lot.
Occidental Vacation Club is a Scam. We purchased a " membership" while on vacation in Cozumel. The company is based in the dominican republic. The sales people misrepresented the membership and just outright lied! We were promised huge savings on the vacation and 30-40% of airfare. When we went to book our vacation for the first time we found that there was no discounts on the airfare and after the required all inclusive fees for the food and drinks the cost of using the membership was more than if we booked with Expedia online.
We had already paid over $4000.00 toward the membership and found the membership was worthless! We approched the President of Occidental Luis Namnum to request a refund. Mr. Namnum first told us in writing that if we could show we could book with Expedia for less he would fully refund our money. We did that emailing examples of Expedia trips for the Occidental in Cozumel Mexico that were less that using the Occidental membership. Mr. Namnum did not keep his word has refused refunding our money. Instead we were sent a contract to sign for cancellation with no refund and a waiver that said we would pay $10,000. per instance if we spoke about Occidental. We did not sign. We are currently planning to file a lawsuit with Occidental's US based office in Florida. Do not purchase this worthless membership! The membership will not save you money and Mr. Namnum does not keep his word. I have looked at other web sites and found many other people who have had the same experiance. We have never used the membership and they refuse to return our money.
We had the misfortune of getting sucked into a "90 minute" presentation for the Allegro Vacation Club while in Playa del Carmen. We had purchased discounted tickets for Xcaret and this was a part of the deal. After breakfast and the tour of the very nice resort the salesman, sat us down and went over multiple plans which while interesting, since my wife and I like to travel, we not financially feasible. They had our licenses and credit cards and we could not leave and the salesman and his wife, the sales manager, kept presenting different plans over 2+ hours. Finally there was one, a 3 year "test drive" that actually sounded good as it contained aspects that worked for us, so we agreed after confirming multiple times that the aspects of the plan we needed were in it (primarily 24 hour booking since we fly stand-by).
After we received the materials we learned we had been the victim of a bait and switch and what we had been given was unfeasible for us. We had to book 14 days out and pay up to 48 hours out with no refund for cancellations! We returned 2 days later to cancel and get a refund. The salesman refused and kept saying that what he told us trumped the contract and language of the certificates! He then started swearing at us and threatening us. We were then ushered into an office and the woman posing as an attorney pretended to be powerless. She then summoned the sales manager who denied ever meeting with us the previous day and saying we were lying about what her husband had told us! We offered to forfeit our deposit to get out and were told we were stuck and had no legal rights because the company was headquartered in the Dominican Republic (it isn't)....unless we agreed to a 50 year contract. We had to leave due too our flight departing before we could get anything resolved.
Upon return to the US we learned that Mexican law does not perfect contracts of this sort for 5 days, giving people like us the opportunity to cancel without penalty! The company is counting on people not knowing their rights and then being stuck. My wife and I sent numerous emails to addresses we found, sent requests to cancel through the website and called the membership service number - nobody answered! We have filed complaints with the BBB and the Mexican Consumer Protection Agency.
Beware - these people are excellent salespeople who will wear you down and create an offer based on what you say during the presentation, then screw you. Also, the date on the contract was wrong, probably to prevent a challenge of the 5 day window to cancel. Fortunately we caught that and made the changes to our copy of the contract. They are dishonest, sleazy people!
Occidental Vacation Club Reviews
money back?
We just got sucked into this as well. Ugh. Caught it within the five day period and mailed three certified letters to three different addresses appearing on the contract. We will not stop until we get our full refund. Have any of you been successful in getting your refund back?
My husband and I at the Occidental Grand Punta Cana from 8/23-8/30. During this time we had a very terrible experience. We travelled with another couple who we brought as a referral. The first rooms they gave us in building 18 had wet paint and began leaking, we were moved to another room in building 13 because no more rooms were available in the vacation club buildings. My husband and I stayed in room 13107. The air conditioning was not working properly in this room, which made the room smell very bad. The fan was also not working. In addition, on 8/28 our room lost power that night. We were the only room that did not have power. It took the front desk 20 minutes to send someone, we did not get power back until 3:00am. We booked this trip since November 2014, and have been members in the Occidental First Club for 1 year. My husband and I would like another trip to compensate for all the problems we have had on this trip. We pay a lot of money to be members and it does not benefit us to pay all of this money and not be able to be provided with the proper service on our vacation. The customer service at Punta Cana was terrible, after telling our representative all of these issues nothing was done. Even when we went to the vacation club office none of the representative offered any type of compensation and refused to help us. Since then I have been trying to cancel my membership and have been given nothing but the run around. The president Mr. Luis Namnum was very dismissive when I email him and offered no assistance. Do not joing this membership they do not care about their members and it is a HUGE waste of time and money
Total scam after reading the contract it does not state what sales person claim. He does highlight the rates on low and high season and they do show you in contract but they don't explain to you how the additional options of vacationing in other countries is a promotional incentive. Whole reason the club sounded great was to save on European vacations after reading contract it states their affiliate company for Europe (ICE) is only for 2 years. Mind you he stated this offer was for 25 years you can travel any where in the world. Who wouldn't want to travel the world with their kids and have the luxuries of home. This is how they get you. The contract also state no guarantee of your "purchased suite" if hotel is booked on selected week you will get a regular room.
According to the sales person the unit we were purchasing is ours no one will use it. Only our friends and family if we give them our weeks. Oh and here is the good part he kept saying if your late with monthly payment you will have a late charge which is understandable all creditors do that but what they don't tell you when you are signing unless you really understand legal language, which we all know is confusing. Is that you signed stating they can auto take payments from your account. I never agreed to that. Once I back home to review contract and see this club was (1) More expensive to use and maintain than just finding a deal on Expedia, Groupon, or cheapcarribean.com. (2) A false promise.
After trying for 2 days to get in contact with the vacation club to cancel I finally got in contact with the vacation club sales person he stated I was told only in high season I would have that issue which is bogus he stated we "purchase our own unit" which contradicts the contract. The sales person disconnected my calls numerous times when I kept telling him according to contract I can cancel within 5 days I will get a refund. He tried over and over to explain and I stood my ground, as the consumer it is my right to cancel if after review it does not benefit me I am allowed to cancel. Contract stated if buyer cancels with 5 business days no penalty and full refund. He then started to state I will be penalized for the incentives given. I don't know about you but incentives are gifts and In contract states on paper within 5 day cancellation no penalties are given , talk about total contradiction. Do you want to know what salesman told me about the auto deduction which I was never told and never agreed to. That it is just easier for then to get paid, I could not believe what I just heard. Now that is fraudulent to me. What is, the point of stating late penalties If your auto deducting. Then he went on if that is the issue we can remove it. After that I didn't want to hear anything else. This all started august 29,2014 scam purchased on August 24. still waiting on response for confirmation of cancellation and refund. Who knows how long that will take, consumers beware of the occidental vacation club scam and do not sign until you read all pages which is a lot.
Occidental Vacation Club is a Scam. We purchased a " membership" while on vacation in Cozumel. The company is based in the dominican republic. The sales people misrepresented the membership and just outright lied! We were promised huge savings on the vacation and 30-40% of airfare. When we went to book our vacation for the first time we found that there was no discounts on the airfare and after the required all inclusive fees for the food and drinks the cost of using the membership was more than if we booked with Expedia online.
We had already paid over $4000.00 toward the membership and found the membership was worthless! We approched the President of Occidental Luis Namnum to request a refund. Mr. Namnum first told us in writing that if we could show we could book with Expedia for less he would fully refund our money. We did that emailing examples of Expedia trips for the Occidental in Cozumel Mexico that were less that using the Occidental membership. Mr. Namnum did not keep his word has refused refunding our money. Instead we were sent a contract to sign for cancellation with no refund and a waiver that said we would pay $10,000. per instance if we spoke about Occidental. We did not sign. We are currently planning to file a lawsuit with Occidental's US based office in Florida. Do not purchase this worthless membership! The membership will not save you money and Mr. Namnum does not keep his word. I have looked at other web sites and found many other people who have had the same experiance. We have never used the membership and they refuse to return our money.
We had the misfortune of getting sucked into a "90 minute" presentation for the Allegro Vacation Club while in Playa del Carmen. We had purchased discounted tickets for Xcaret and this was a part of the deal. After breakfast and the tour of the very nice resort the salesman, sat us down and went over multiple plans which while interesting, since my wife and I like to travel, we not financially feasible. They had our licenses and credit cards and we could not leave and the salesman and his wife, the sales manager, kept presenting different plans over 2+ hours. Finally there was one, a 3 year "test drive" that actually sounded good as it contained aspects that worked for us, so we agreed after confirming multiple times that the aspects of the plan we needed were in it (primarily 24 hour booking since we fly stand-by).
After we received the materials we learned we had been the victim of a bait and switch and what we had been given was unfeasible for us. We had to book 14 days out and pay up to 48 hours out with no refund for cancellations! We returned 2 days later to cancel and get a refund. The salesman refused and kept saying that what he told us trumped the contract and language of the certificates! He then started swearing at us and threatening us. We were then ushered into an office and the woman posing as an attorney pretended to be powerless. She then summoned the sales manager who denied ever meeting with us the previous day and saying we were lying about what her husband had told us! We offered to forfeit our deposit to get out and were told we were stuck and had no legal rights because the company was headquartered in the Dominican Republic (it isn't)....unless we agreed to a 50 year contract. We had to leave due too our flight departing before we could get anything resolved.
Upon return to the US we learned that Mexican law does not perfect contracts of this sort for 5 days, giving people like us the opportunity to cancel without penalty! The company is counting on people not knowing their rights and then being stuck. My wife and I sent numerous emails to addresses we found, sent requests to cancel through the website and called the membership service number - nobody answered! We have filed complaints with the BBB and the Mexican Consumer Protection Agency.
Beware - these people are excellent salespeople who will wear you down and create an offer based on what you say during the presentation, then screw you. Also, the date on the contract was wrong, probably to prevent a challenge of the 5 day window to cancel. Fortunately we caught that and made the changes to our copy of the contract. They are dishonest, sleazy people!