Royal Holiday Vacation Club
Reviews and Complaints

Our story begins on a beautiful Mexican evening in Cozumel. It was shortly after dinner, and our family were enjoying the evening together walking around the town square in San Miguel (Cozumel). We were approached by sales representatives from Royal Holiday. We agreed to meet at the Park Royal the next day. We were not interested in purchasing a club membership, but we were interested in looking around the resort for future trips to Cozumel.
We arrived at the Park Royal on the morning of April 5, 2008. We were met by Nico. We went to breakfast with Nico. Our conversation over breakfast was pleasant. We then had a tour of the resort. The property is very beautiful, and has a lot to offer families. Finally, we went to the sales office. During our meeting we were promised:
 Five Years Unlimited usage of the Park Royal in Cozumel. We were told that this was to allow us to reserve any room in the resort, we could reserve as many rooms in the resort as we wanted, use the resort during any season (including prime because that is the only time Wendy can get off of work), and use the resort whenever we wanted with a 30 day notice.
 Ability to accumulate our member points during that five year period for a total of 50, 000 membership points.
 When we visited the Park Royal the only fee that we would have to pay is the all-inclusive fee. Which we were told was $38.00 for adults.
 Our “Membership Purchase and Sale Agreement” states that our maintenance fee for 2008 would be $375.00.

After and hour and a half we walked away, and decided that we wanted to talk without Nico or Gina Cordero (Royal Holiday Sales Manger) present. We should have kept walking. Instead we sat by the pool, and did the math. With the promises made, we felt the membership would have all of the amenities we require. We, however, did not intend to join.
Around mid-afternoon, Nico found us by the pool, and asked if we had any questions. We did. We followed Nico back to the sales office. We asked questions to make sure we understood what the membership included. The above points were intensively discussed. We were still not sold. Gina came back to the table and added another 30, 000 membership points as an incentive to sign. When we asked if we could think about it, we were told that this offer was only for the first one- hundred new members. Of these memberships only three were remaining. With much regret, we decided to join Royal Holiday Club.
The next day, we went back by the sales office and the number on the wall was now six. Meaning that there were six memberships left. We had a sinking feeling that we made a mistake.
After returning to the United States, we attempted to formally cancel our membership over the telephone on April 10, 2007. The Royal Holiday representative said that our contract was not entered into the Royal Holiday system yet and the contract information was needed to cancel, but would make note of our call and a representative would call when the contract was available. On April 17, 2007, another Royal Holiday Club representative called and left a message welcoming us to Royal Holiday (obviously our first message to cancel went unheard). When we returned the call, later that day, again in an attempt to cancel, we were told that our “Membership Purchase and Sale Agreement” states that the membership cannot be cancelled by either party. This agreement also states that “The buyer agrees with the legal effects of this agreement…for which there is no reconsideration period”.
We were completely embarrassed and angry about our mistake. We wondered, during many sleepless nights, how could we have overlooked that we had no right to cancel our contract and the verbal promises made by Gina and Nico were not binding? Over the next several months we found out that there were many discrepancies with what we were told and what we were entitled to under our contract. For example:
 Five Years Unlimited usage of the Park Royal in Cozumel cannot be used during the prime vacation season, and the only room available was a studio.
 Ability to accumulate our member points during that five year period for at total of 50, 000 membership points was not true. In fact we can only roll over 20% of our points per year (2, 000)
 In our sales presentation Gina and Nico stated that the all-inclusive fee per person each day was $38.00. When booking our first trip, to return to Cozumel to try to meet with Nico and Gina to get answers about the inconsistencies, the all-inclusive fee we were charged was $78.00 per person per day. This was over double of what we were promised. When we visited the RHC website the published price for the all-inclusive fee at the Park Royal is $60.00 per person per day.
 Our “Membership Purchase and Sale Agreement” states that our maintenance fee for 2008 would be $375.00. We were actually charged $395.00. When we questioned this we were told that the telephone representative could not make a credit to our VISA. So we were out another $20.00.
 Royal Holiday also charged an extra monthly payment to our credit card, but did not subtract it from our balance or the number of payments remaining. This was a two hour phone call to get resolved. The operator agreed that they would not charge us in January because of the extra payment taken in December, 2007. When January came we received a collection call. Another long call with the collection agency and Royal Holiday Club.

We were reserved to the fact that we made a very bad investment, but would work very hard in trying to get our problems resolved. After many stressful and unsuccessful telephone calls to Royal Holiday, we decided to return to Cozumel to meet with Nico and Gina personally to attempt to resolve our problems. Booking our first and only trip was a nightmare not to mention that it cost us $1, 230 more to use our membership than to book through a local travel agent for the same accommodations.
With that said, we were still optimistic that our trip would resolve our difficulties with Royal Holiday. However, to our surprise Gina and Nico were no longer employed at the Park Royal in Cozumel. Instead we met with Susana Nunez and Fernando Vazquez on March 21, 2008. Susana had us fill out a survey. We were honest about our stay and the major frustrations that we have had with our membership. Both Fernando and Susana took notes on the back of our questionnaire and on a Royal Holiday legal pad. Fernando said he would look into our concerns and requested that we return to meet with him the next day because he wanted to get this cleared up and he wanted us to be happy Royal Holiday customers.
Optimistically we returned at nine o’clock the next morning. Fernando did not come with solutions. He came with a plan for us to buy and additional 10, 000 membership points for $9, 995. He tried to persuade us to put it on our credit card with the incentive of up to five years of interest fee financing. He then said we could put it on our credit card, and if within five days we wanted to change our mind we could cancel. We shared with Fernando that we bought our membership last year on April 5th. We called RHC on April 10th and we were told that we could not cancel because our membership was not in the system yet. Fernando replied “you tried to cancel last year.” This quickly ended our twenty minute meeting, Fernando told us he would send us information by email so that we can think about updating our membership. We have not yet received his email or heard from him.
This year upon returning home (March 23, 2008) we were angry and determined to end our relationship with Royal Holiday once and for all. We have spoken to many Americans with fates similar to our own, and have since learned that Royal Holiday Club’s practices are unethical according to the American Resort Development Association, and violate Article 56 OF LEY Federal de Proteccion al Consumidor that states the following: “The contract will be perfected within five working days from the delivery of, or the signature of the contract, which ever occurs latest. Our first and second attempts to cancel were within the five day limit. We have also become aware that our right to cancel and to receive a full refund is not waivable. This right is guaranteed to all buyers even if the buyer signs a contract or form waiving this right. Such clauses in our “Membership Purchase and Sale Agreement” state “This Agreement cannot be canceled by either party, ” The buyer agrees with the legal effects of this agreement…for which there is no reconsideration period, ” and that my deposit and monthly payments are non-refundable are also invalid according to Mexican Law.

This company is a scam! I am hoping that someone out there might be able to help. We were on vacation in mexico april 2007. We received this vip invite, and although we tried to turn it down, we were persuaded into attending. As always these presentations give you false hope and expectations, and I knew that. At the end we said we couldn't afford it and again, was pushed into a meeting room. After going over everything we thought well maybe if there was a trial package. We were given a smaller package but it wasn't a trial. We are now stuck with this for 30 years and will never be able to use it. We were told we could use rci, and I expressed no interest in rci because of the additional cost. They said they pay for the membership... Lie. They said you can put it for rent, well I tried that and before you can put it up for rent you have to have at least 300000 credits per year and have recently upgraded by 10000 credits... Deception!. These are only two of the lies and deceptions we have been subject to. I have written many emails to the company asking for some compensation, but of course no response. I have recently lost my job and we have to move 3000 miles to take care of elderly parents. We don't have the time, money or patience to use this. I don't care about the money lost so far, I just want to get rid of it. Does anybody have any words of advice?

I used to work for Royal Holiday Club, in the corporate office in Mexico City, not Miami Fl, like they lead you to believe. Unfortunately I agree with all the complaints that are presented on this page. just to let you know, all of you guys that have that infamous "annuity certificate" that your sales rep said would return your money after 30 yrs, well... its not true, in the history of Royal Holiday there hasn't been one single "anuity certificate" been cashed and the "bank" that holds your investment doesn't even exist, If you don't believe me, just try calling someone from that "bank" (the tel number is in the back of your annuity cert) and i assure you will never get an answer, and if you are lucky and you do get a call back, is more than likely to be a reservations agent from Royal Holiday. I would suggest you either sell, rent or give away your membership before it eats you away. Oh... and to all those people that think of reporting Royal Holiday to any American/Canadian Agency, don't waste your time or any more of your money for that matter, it's not going to do you any good. The U.S government or law has no jurisdiction in Mexico or the Caribbean were all of the Royal Holiday sales take place, why do you think that they don't sell memberships in their U.S resorts? Anyhow, Royal Holiday is not THAT BAD, you can actually make business out of it, well if you are smart about it of course, you can sell vacations using your points to friends, family or co-workers, just advise them not to make your same mistake, you don't want to see them back home with a 5,000 point membership that is not even good to cover for a decent family vacation. oh... and to all of you guys that complain about availability, please take into considerations the following points:

1)the amount of points you have (having 5,000 points does not make you a v.i.p when there is someone else that has payed a membership for 100,000 point, yes, there are people that pay more than 100,000 usd and are happy with RH).
2) seasons (for more availability go during months no one else is vacationing).
3)locations (its not the same going to the bahamas than going to hawaii, therefore is not going to cost you the same).
4)amount of people vacationing (please don't try to squez a family of 10 if you only have 5,000 points and can only afford a room for four people).
5)room accommodation (again, with a petty membership of less than 30,000 points, you are never going to see what a presidential suite looks like, sorry... not happening).
I truly feel your frustration, i had to deal with all of your complaints for 2 yrs, as a former NEW MEMBERS agent, if you want things done, you have to be super persistent and super duper NICE, most of the sales and reservations agents that RH hires hate the gringo ego and gringos in general (AMERICAN/CANADIANS).

Currently I am located in the South Florida Area, if you need any more specific info on how to make your membership to good use, in other words, how to beat the monster known as ROYAL HOLIDAY, you can email me to lori.lu.[protected]@hotmail.com.

Royal Holiday sold us a Dream vacation Club for $7000. They gave us a letter signed by the manager stating we were members of Platinum Rewards (Cruise program) at the following rates $65 per person perday for Mexico and Caribbean and $75 per day for Hawaii and europe. Royal does not answer the phone # in the literature. But Platinum Rewards (ICE) does I was informed bycalled Platinum Rewards @ [protected] at 3:03PM Feb.22, 2008 and talked to Steven Pesserillo.
Steven said there is no program that offers cruises at a guaranteed rate of $65 Mexico and $75 Europe. I asked him to send me a letter stating the policy but he refused. I asked to talk to a supervisor and he refused.
He said they the only program he had was a certificate for $1200 off on a cruise
I have asked for refund of down payment and aasked Credit card to stop payment.
credit card says I need letter from professional stating this is a scam.

During our vacation in Cozumel, Mexico, on 11/23/07, my wife and I agreed to view a presentation for a Royal Holiday vacation plan. A sales person gave us a tour through the resort which is pretty amazing in Cozumel, and offered to buy a timeshare from Royal Holiday. We liked what the company offered, but we had no plants to buy anything. Then another salesman (unfortunately, we don’t remember his name) took place and assured us that if we buy the timeshare in Royal Holiday, we will have opportunity to travel around the world spending very minimum using various discounts Royal Holiday offers. He showed us a catalog full of information about hotels and resorts in Europe, Asia and Americas – all belonging to Royal Holiday. He offered us to trade in the timeshares we own, pay difference of about $27,000 and have 30,000 vacation points annually for 30 years. We still were very reluctant to buy.

Finally, “Developer Representative” Victor Maldonado, presented us very lucrative offer: to pay $2,950 plus closing cost to a total of $3,945 and to have contract for seven years. According to him, we would have 30,000 vacation points per year for the next 7 years, plus many more goodies (discount for cruises, two-for-one airfares, bonus-certificates, easy booking, no cancellation fees, etc). There will be no annual maintenance fees, just some co-payment at the time of booking. He said that this program was specially designed to give people “taste” of the proposed plan and encourage them to buy a long-term contract. The best part was that Royal Holiday owns many properties in the countries we wanted to visit, so timeshare will make those visits very affordable. Also comparison of the value we have using our timeshare with that we would receive from Royal Holiday showed significant advantages of Royal Holiday. Everything sounded so tempting that we decided to buy this plan. After signing contract, we were given a kit (box with several brochures, coupons and certificates) and a promise that we can receive the remaining certificates during next years or as we need them. When we asked for the catalog they showed us, we were told that they don’t have it, but we can either order it for $40 or use Royal Holiday website that has all necessary information.

Problems began when we came home and tried to get this information from website – it took us almost two weeks to get our password. But even then we could see a lot of “offers” but were unable to either check availability or make reservation – for any destination and any time we got the same answer: NO RESULTS WERE FOUND. Please try a new search with a different date range or try another destination”.

Brochure from the kit listed just 14 destinations in Central and South America, but nothing in the places we really wanted to go to. And the worst part we discovered when began talking to various Customer Service representatives: we will not receive any additional annual certificates – the only one for 30,000 vacation points is that we have in the kit; we can’t make any reservations now – we have to wait until next year; there is no guarantee that we will be able to go to those nice places we were told – they will try to make booking for us. Even to get this information required a lot of time and patience – phone lines are either busy, or we got transferred to the voice mail, or just got disconnected.

Also, while browsing Internet, we discovered that just one name “Royal Holiday” brings to the screen many sites literally stuffed with extremely negative comments about this company. We understood that we became victims of untruthful liars.
Bottom line:
1. Sales presentation was misleading; promises are not supported by contract and following communication with Royal Holiday customer service
2. Instead of discussed timeshare we got just a highly paid booking agent with a very narrow choice of properties
3. Customer service is very poor.

Just recently we found information that it is illegal in Mexico to charge in foreign currency – our contract was in USD.
We sent a letter to Royal Holiday and PROFECO where we disputed the charges from Royal Holiday and requested cancellation of our contract. We also are going to contact as many organizations, web sites and groups as possible with the message – DO NOT TRUST ROYAL HOLIDAY, THEY ARE LIARS AND CROOKS.

I am a member of Royal Holiday travel points exchange, got membership 2 years ago and every time I want to travel there is nothing available. I have been lucky going to Europe for 2- 4 days at a time and pay hotels out of pocket the rest of the vacation time there; ,1 time 3 days to Cancun and obligated to take the all inclusive package that is $60 daily, gym not included. I have been collecting all these points to go away on a great vacation planned for 3 months this year and there is nothing available so I had to take whatever they offered or loose my points... I paid $30000.00 to be able to go away without restrictions and it hasn't been true. I called several times to complaint to the only number they have and all I get is very nice agents who are there to say 'sorry' but members plan 2 year ahead of you! I you get a higher priority membership it may be different.

So I go to Cancun 12/17/07 for 4 days.

I was invited to hear about 'The New benefits for members' available to me. So that I could go anywhere, anytime and not to have the problems I have been having. I need $10000 to have all the points to be a ' privilege member'. In fact The salesman offered me 5 years of all inclusive benefits to 4-5 different Caribbean Resorts if i bought into the 'upgrade'; and i didn't have to use my points for those 5 years... Wow what a deal! I said oh well... 7days all inclusive for free / unlimited times/not using my points/ 100% saving points every other year. He told me yes, just pay your air fare and I was sold... At the time I had no money but $500 credit card down payment. before I left Cancun the next day I read my new contract and there it was...

Another Lie, nothing was written about all the promises made by Bernardo about my privileges... Now even my all inclusive fees are higher $20. All these dealing was done in spanish so there was no room for misinterpretation I looked for help among all the salesman at the royal palace cancun hotel where I was and everyone told me Oh wait for him and clarify it. My time to leave Cancun came and he never showed up. I wrote an e mail to Royal-Holiday the next day to cancel upgrade and there is no response. I am out of the country on a Holiday now and cant do much until Jan 2nd. I don't know what to do about it. someone help. I will go to court and face them if necessary. Is all a Fraud!

My wife and I purchased a membership from royal holiday club in cancun mexico in 2000 upon arriving home we checked them out and were afraid after we heard all the complaints about them. However being the optimistic people we are we decided to give them an opportunity. We have since been to several of their resorts nassau, australia, hawaii, orlando, aruba and mexico three times we are happy that we did we have some great memories we had to sit down and go over our plan to fully understand it but once we did we knew how to take full advantage of it. Our marriage was on the rocks but after some r and r and quality time seeing the world our bond is stronger than ever thanks royal holiday club my advice is dont judge these guys unless you take your first vacation with them it will be wort it.

I signed with Royal Holiday for a Platinum membership in September (2007). In spite of being Mexican, I write my complaint to this American web-site because, as far I understand Royal Holiday is an International company with headquarters in Miami.

I have not had time to "enjoy" the benefits of my membership but problems came first. Before the Platinum membership, I had signed another agreement in August 26 for a Bronze membership, but soon they convinced me that a Platinum membership was the better. Their offer seemed to be good and I signed the new agreement in September 17 (2007). The first line in the new contract explain: "Modification agreement" in reference to the first membership acquired in August 26 (quoting the number of the original agreement). And, of course, this new agreement canceled all the obligations of the original document signed in August 26 and described the new financial obligations.

I was happy and everybody was happy. But it was a lie. Royal Holiday took more than 9,000 dollars (91,000 pesos) for this new agreement and have continued charging me 750 dollars a month for the old agreement, which it means that they are collecting money from the two agreements. And that is illegal.

I have not received either the "certificate" of reimbursement from Granthix Capital Financial Services nor the "fabulous" platinum card. Instead, I have read horrors about ROYAL HOLIDAY. I WILL SUE against Royal Holiday, by fraud. And I sum my complain to thousands of scammed Canadian, American and Mexican people

We were promised all kinds of stuff to lure us in. We were told that we would get our investment back after 30 years but if you read the small print on back of certificate it is not true. We did some comparison shoping and found that it was actually cheaper to book vacations though a travel agent or Expedia than it was through Holday Travel. The royal holdiay website is also a joke. When you try to book a vacation, it keeps telling you that it is unavailable. Also your annual membership can go up every year, they tell you that they need 70% of membership approval to do so but that is not true. They also can collect special fees for such things as hurricane damage. We were told by our sales rep in Cancun Mexico that if we were not satisfied or found that we did like the program we could cancel at anytime and get a full refund. I called to cancel and get a refund and was told that we cant cancel and can not get a refund. They keep telling you to call back at a certain time or they will call you and they never call back. We purchased our Royal-Holiday vacation in Cancun Mexico at the Grand Oasis Cancun The week of October 26, 2007. the high pressure sales there is unbelievable. We used to like going there but will never return to that hotel again.

My name is Carmen Azevedo. My husband David and I stayed at the Oasis Cancun January 13-20/07 on our honeymoon. When we were checking in we were directed to the concierge to set up a honeymoon package, which we never received. The lady that helped us set up a meeting on Sunday January 14/07 with what we thought was the Nolitour representative as sit was at the same time as what we had on our package. When we arrived on the Sunday the meeting was in fact with a representative for Royal Holiday which has an office set up at the Grand Oasis Hotel.

We were given a tour of a suite, and then sat down with Art Martinez from Royal Holiday. We signed up for a package for just under $3000.00 that was for travel coupons good for 5 years. We were told we had 60 days to cancel this contract for a full refund. Upon signing these contracts it appeared that we were signing up for a package for $10,000.00 and there was no mention of the cancellation that he advised us about. Mr. Martinez assured us that we were not signing up for that. Mr. Martinez crossed off the portion of the monthly payments to prove to us that we were only signing up for the 5 year package. He also wrote on our contract that we could cancel and either keep the gifts in exchange for the payment we made on our Visa or cancel for full refund. He did not write 60 days on it however.

On Tuesday January 16/07 after having second thoughts about what we signed up for I went back to the Royal Holiday office at the Grand Oasis to cancel the contract and hand in the packages we were given. I was directed to speak with Mr. Octavio de la Canal – Sales Director. Who had me write a letter stating that I wanted to cancel and the reasons why. He advised me I had to take the packages home with me as they are to be returned once the amount was credited back to our credit card. I asked Mr. de la Canal for a copy of what I had given him stating our intent to cancel and he refused to do so. We would never have knowingly signed a contract committing us to a monthly charge of roughly $200.00 as we advised Mr. Martinez of our situation of having just gotten married , purchasing a new house and not having a full idea of what our monthly expenses were going to be. At this stage of our lives just starting out and potentially starting a family in the near future we would never commit to something like this.

Upon arriving home we received a statement from Royal Holiday asking for the first monthly installment of this contract. I contacted Royal Holiday to discuss this situation and spoke with Mr. Molina who advised me that we only had 5 days in which to cancel the contract, which we did within 2 days. He advised me that they did not receive a cancellation letter that Mr. da la Canal advised me he had sent in. Mr. Molina advised me that he would look into this and when he called me back he advised me that the resort advised him that we did go there to cancel the contract, but were resold on the package, which is absolutely not true. I tried to contact Mr. Martinez using the cell # that he wrote on our contract only to find it is not a valid number. I have also tried to email him using the email address he provided us and have not received any response.

Thank you

Carmen Rodrigues Azevedo

Harold R. & Barbara J. Bence
PMB #154, 41 E 400 N
Logan, UT 84321
Phone: [protected]
[protected]
Email: [protected]@msn.com

To Whom It May Concern: June 29, 2007

On December 1, 2005 we were vacationing in Puerto Vallarta and approached a vendor to purchase a couple of tours. The agent suggested he would discount our tour tickets if we would go listen to a sales promotion for Royal Holiday. Unfortunately, we accepted his offer and thus the beginning of a very disappointing adventure. Reference below is in regard to Contract 3-101419, Account #[protected]-3.

Needless to say we were “taken in” by the offers of an annuity, reservations anywhere at any time, two for one airfares, etc. Also we fell for the offer of the purchase of the time share we presently had. We have a signed statement from the agent that we would receive money for our time share within 180 days, payable 30 days after proof of ownership and deed. In this signed statement is also included the following statement. “We also guarantee to accept into our rental program 4 weeks per year from Royal Holiday Club at 1,100usd per week net to owner starting July 2006.”

The entire price was quoted at $20,950.00. We paid $10,475.00 down, closing costs of $402.50, Administrative fees of $496.50 and 15% sales tax of $3,142.00 totaling $14,516.00. This left a balance of $10,475.00. We were then called later in the month of January and told we needed to pay a “one-time service fee” of $599.00. After several telephone calls requesting this money we asked that it be submitted in writing. This was received so we sent the money. We had searched our papers trying to verify that this money was going to be requested but to no avail. We operated in good faith and trusted that ARS (travel service for Royal Holiday) would also.

January 28, 2007 a developer’s cash-out offer was received. A check in the amount of $8,100.66 was sent to Travel Experience (ARS) as Payment in Full of the above mentioned contract.

We have made numerous telephone calls, have many emails, but to date have received absolutely nothing from anybody. The last telephone call we made they requested that the signed copy of the agreement alluded to above be faxed to them. We did that and have received no response. We have paid the annual fee once because of their threats to turn us over to the Concord Servicing Corporation, their collection agency. We wrote to cancel the contract but to no avail. If anyone has any suggestions of anything further that can be done please advise.

Harold R. & Barbara J. Bence,

Copies were sent to the following:
Royal Holiday Club www.Scambusters.org
Mexican Administration for Tourism
US State Department
Utah, Arizona, California and Florida Better Business Bureau
Attorney Generals of Utah, Arizona, California and Southeast Florida
American Association of Retired Persons (AARP)

Like more than 500 others, with whom we are joined together in a Yahoo group, we were scammed by this "club/hotel" in Playa del Carmen, MX. We were promised everything but the moon, in a three-hour closed-door presentation at the hotel. We thought it was a fantastic way to travel and save some money. But after we signed up, it has been nothing but hell ever since. First, they never followed through on ANYTHING they promised. They lied, cheated and stole from us, promising WORLD CLASS ACCOMMODATIONS at THOUSANDS of great resorts, but never even sent "the book", not delivered on ANYTHING they promised. Within our group, there has been approximately $1-million lost to these thieves. If you visit in Mexico or the Bahamas, BEWARE of any group under the name of ROYAL HOLIDAY VACATION TRAVEL CLUB or PREMIER HOLIDAY VACATION CLUB and if you visit Playa del Carmen stay clear of a gorgeous hotel called HACIENDA VISTA REAL. It is little more than a FRONT for these SCAM ARTISTS.

My wife and I were in Ixtapa, Mexico on our vacation when we were introduced to Victor, a Royal Holiday salesman and he’s persuaded us to purchase a contract with Royal Holiday on June 4, 2007. We were promised by this guy that we could stay at any Royal Holiday's resort or any contracted hotels, such as Sheraton, Wyndham, Marriott, Hyatt, and Radisson at anytime in over 300 countries at some incredible membership points that we have purchased. We came back to the states two days later to find out that what was promised to us is not true so we contacted Victor by email to cancel our contract and demand for our refund. He asked us to send him a written request. He also stated in the email that we should be getting our member ID within 30 days and if we still are not satisfied with them, then we can cancel our contract anytime after. We overnight our written request for cancellation, and we were put in touch with Jaye, one of their customer service person. We told him that Victor has wrongfully lead and present us to purchase the contract, and we were very disappointed with Royal Holiday. Jaye told us to give him about a week to come up with some deal that will accommodate us. We did not get any respond from him over a week so we called him, and his respond was he still needs more time. We decided to give Royal Holiday another try since they already charged over $33,000 to our American Express account so we called the travel service department to book for a night at Sheraton hotel in San Diego, and the respond from them was "we do not have any contract with Sheraton hotel in San Diego". What about over 3000 hotels and resorts in over 300 countries that Royal Holiday promises, we asked. "We only have Wave Crest at Del Mar in San Diego and it's not available now" is the respond we got. Again, we contacted Jaye and Victor to let them know about their services and demand for refund; however we did not get any respond from them. We are trying to do everything we can to stop innocent travelers from getting scammed by Royal Holiday by getting our story to all news channels including local and national. We hope that no body will have to go through the nightmare we have gone through

Hello Everyone!

Our Cancun vacation at the Oasis Cancun Resort - Booking Id # 357963:

We arrived on July 15th - went to our room there was 1 working elevator for the whole hotel. There were drunk people everywhere - trash all over - empty cups/ plates of food etc. When we got to our room it smelled so moldy and the only light switch that worked had a strobe light in it - flashed continuously. There were fire ants on the balcony and it was not ocean front(as promised) - then we found cum stains on the bed - I complained- nothing happened. The next morning (2 of us had nose bleeds probably from the mold) we went down to the lobby and asked for help they asked how we made our reservations and we said "Bookit.com" they told us to talk to Jesus our "Bookit.com Rep"- we complained about all of the above and he said he did not know if he had anything available but we needed to go to the Grand Oasis for our meeting and maybe they could do something. We went to the Grand and met a woman named Cecilia - she took us to breakfast and showed us a room where she said we could be staying - then she took us to a Lobby meeting room in the Grand, where they started explaining this package. We told her we wanted to think about it and she went and got her boss who told us if he let us walk out he knew we would not come back (That's when the promises and bonuses which proved to be untrue were given), they did not leave us alone at any time & they kept sending one then another over to talk to us to occupy our time (a private conversation was impossible!). He said they could upgrade our room(at the Oasis, not the Grand) and meal plan - After 4+ hours we signed up. They did get us a new room and a upgraded meal plan. The new room was better 1 king bed and we had to have 2 portable beds bought in for our boys, but still not what we expected. When we got home we started looking at the Royal Holiday book and found out that what they said in the meeting was different from the book. Because we took the bronze plan there is not enough points to even pay for 4 people for one week much less the airfare that they said we could use our points for. So we contacted them and told them we wanted to cancel - we were threatened and told we were beyond the 5 day grace period and they would come after us - take the money out of our checking accounts if they have to. We were never told we had 5 days to cancel but we did attempt to find the people we dealt with at the Grand on 3 occasions as we had questions and concerns & had decided to not join or participate in the "Club",, but there was no one in the Grand lobby meeting area where we had our initial meeting!

For Bookit.com: A total list of problems with our room:

1 working elevator/ only went to 5th floor - we were moved to the 6th promised ocean front - ended up with lagoon view, strobe light, smell extremely bad - mold, Air Conditioning did not work properly and quit working completely in new room! New room had 1 king bed - my sons were on 2 portable beds trash everywhere - from night parties (cups/plates of food sitting in halls and stair wells) puke on the floor in the hallways, couple screwing in the pool in front of everyone-Witnessed by even small children-during the day - while this may be a turn on to some not what I wanted to see on vacation.

If you did not turn in your card for the beach towel - it cost you $50.00 - hidden charge! Huge cockroaches in the hotel at night! Refrigerator was missing from 1st room and the refrigerator did not work in our "new" room...
Advertised as a family resort - there were teenagers/young adults running around cursing/fighting/ being obnoxious and raising hell until early in the morning - this was every night!

We had a GREAT trip last year (other family members as well) staying at the JW Marriott, Visiting Tulum, Isla Mujeres, and Xel-ha etc. We anticipated another great trip and had already began planning a group trip with family & friends (20+ people including children) next year, an annual summer trip/vacation to Mexico for many years. Cancun, Isla Mujeres, the people and culture are awesome! All in all we made the best of a very bad trip and I doubt we will ever return to Cancun! Paradise lost to those who would enjoy!

I was scammed, lied to, falsely led, and denied service by scam artists at the Hacienda Vista Real on behalf of the Royal Holiday Vacation Club. Needless to say that I lost a very substantial amount of money and my vacation was ruined twice. I filed a complaint with Profeco but received no real help. Although a settlement with the "supplier" was reached in January 2007, I have received nothing to compensate for my losses. Profeco is going to close my case just because a Royal Holiday representative does not show up. You can see how simple it is to scam you in Mexico. My money is stolen, my time is wasted, and this is the end of the story. Do not buy anything and do not rely on Mexican governmental organizations - they will not protect you!

On March 18, 2007, my boyfriend and I arrived in Cancun International Airport (CUN) where we were approached by a travel information representative to attend a 60-90 minute Royal Holiday Club presentation. In return, we would receive free tickets to two Cancun excursions, regardless of whether we sign up for a membership or not. We agreed to attend a presentation the following day at Hyatt Cancun Caribe. During the presentation, Royal Holiday Club explained that they are not a timeshare but a vacation club. Members are able to purchase points and exchange these points for vacation time, hotel stay, airfare, and other services. They began by showing us around the Hyatt hotel and their vacation suites. They explained that once members, we can stay in these suites as they are part of Royal Holiday’s vacation destinations.
We were offered a 15-year bronze membership for ~$15,000. We quickly declined this offer as it simply was too costly, and we are not prepared for such a significantly large commitment. The presenters were very persistent and continued to present other offers, lowering the membership length and price. We denied each successive offer and were about to leave when a Mr. Art Martinez, who claimed to be Director of marketing of Royal Holiday arrived. He presented us with a 5-year membership for $3095. We told him it seemed like a good offer, but we would like to sleep on it and first do some research on their company. He said the offer is only good for that day, and continued to give more explanation as to why this is the best offer there is. He assured us that once we were members, if we had any questions he would only be a phone call or e-mail away. He gave us his “personal cell phone number” [protected]) and his “personal e-mail address” ([protected]@yahoo.com), and he would be able to personally help us with any issues that might arise. He assured us during the presentation that he’s available anytime for any questions. He encouraged us to call and e-mail him anytime and even told us that he wants to be the first person we contact for any issues with our membership. To this day, Mr. Martinez has never returned one phone call or email.

Mr. Martinez explained that we have 90 days to decide if we want to upgrade to the Bronze 15-year membership. He showed us “examples” in the membership that showed samples of what monthly payments would look like if we decided to upgrade our membership. If they don’t hear from us within 90 days, then we can simply just keep our 5-year membership with no further obligation. We signed up for the 5-year membership, paid in full. To ensure we were on the same page, we reviewed with Mr. Martinez that our membership was for 5 years for $3095 which included the items listed in List A. We were all in agreement. We again triple checked with Mr. Martinez that the charge to my American Express card was for $3095 with no further charges. He said, “Absolutely, no other charges will be made because you are not authorizing future charges.” I also asked him to tell us of any fine prints or hidden fees within the membership. He assured us that there were none. Seven hours later, we were members. After we agreed to a 5-year membership, it was only then when he gave us a large bag that contained a 2-inch tri-fold portfolio which included a book of travel destinations and directories and a box that contained the travel certificates. When we went back to our hotel after the presentation, we went over the membership and the certificates. To our dismay, we realized the “examples” shown to us of sample payments for the Bronze 15-year membership plan was actually a promissory note to make those payments! We also discovered the value of the points was not what it was described to be. Many of the destinations were well over 20,000 points per week – with many restrictions – making the one week per year virtually impossible. You could do one week per year if you went to certain locations during non-peak times (but, this wasn’t how the plan was described). In the back of each travel certificate we found multiple fine prints. These fine prints were purposely not divulged to us even when presenter Mr. Martinez was specifically asked to disclose if there were any. We also found an alarming amount of discrepancies with the membership we agreed upon vs. the membership that they actually sold to us. The value of the plan was definitely not as described or as promised. We called Mr. Martinez’s personal cell phone the very next day to cancel our membership. There was no answer from Mr. Martinez. After multiple attempts, we were finally able to get a hold of someone at the Hyatt Cancun Caribe. We were swiftly and rudely told that there are absolutely no refunds or cancellations and that no one was currently there that would be authorized to help us with the matter.

We later discovered that this statement alone along with a clause written in the membership agreement is illegal according to Mexican law. (See http://www.mexicolaw.com/LawInfo24.htm) There is a clause in the contract that states that I am not allowed to cancel the contract. This clause is illegal. Mexican law does not allow me to waive my right of cancellation. Mexican law also requires that I receive sufficient and truthful information about the products acquired
(Articles 32, 33 & 34 of the Federal Consumer Protection Law). Clearly this was not the case. Mexican law also gives me the right to rescind the contract when the products acquired are defective in manufacture or hidden defects (Article 82 of the Federal Consumer Protection Law).

After finding this out, we started online research on Royal Holiday Club and found yahoo and msn online groups that have been formed by people who were also scammed by Royal Holiday Club along with multiple sites with dozens of complaints against this company.

http://groups.msn.com/RoyalHolidayClubConsumerAction/messages.msnw

/URL removed/?q1=ALL&q4=&q6=
&q3=&q2=&q7=&searchtype=0&submit2=Search%21&q5=royal+holiday&Search=Search

http://www.complaintsboard.com/?search=royal+holiday+club

A week after returning from our Cancun trip and many unsuccessful call attempts to Royal Holiday Club, we finally received 2 voice messages from “John,” a representative from the Royal Holiday Guest Relations Department. He welcomed us to the club. He stated he is our contact person should we have any questions. We called him several times but no answer. A week later, we received two letters from Concord Servicing Corporation (CSC) stating that my American Express card will be charged monthly for our Royal Holiday membership. We immediately called CSC to explain that we have fully paid for our membership and that I did not authorize any further charges to my account. CSC suggested contacting Royal Holiday.

We again attempted to contact Mr. Art Martinez. This time, the cell phone number seems to be out of service and we never get a single response to our emails. After failed attempts to contact Mr. Martinez and “John”, we tried the toll-free number for Royal Holiday. Several more attempts were made to contact Royal Holiday, at least once a day since we received those CSC letters. Of these attempts, there were only 3 occasions when a live person answered the phone. We first spoke with “Alvin”, a customer service representative. We explained to him that our 5-year membership was paid in full and we don’t owe Royal Holiday anything. He said it is showing up in their database that we are members for 15 years and have a balance in our account. He said they may have made a mistake at the presentation. It’s possible that the presenter and the secretary who wrote up the membership may have miscommunicated. He then said he will inform our ‘personal advisor’, “Mike Mora”, of our situation and to make sure Mike Mora calls us back the next business day. Our phone calls were unreturned.

The second successful phone call, we finally spoke with John. John listened to our issues. However, said he could do nothing about it because he was unauthorized to make any changes. We asked to speak to our ‘personal advisor” Mike Mora, but John said Mike Mora was unavailable but will call us back the following business day. Again, there was no call back. When we finally were able to speak to Mr. Mora on May 11, 2007, we explained the same issues to him. He said he will call the Royal Holiday Cancun office to clear things up and will call us back the following business day. Once again, unreturned phone calls. Again, we continue to make calls to cancel our membership, but time and time again have no success getting a hold of a live person that can help or at the very least give us any definite answers.

Royal Holiday Club gave a presentation of deceitful lies. They purposely withheld important details and provided falsified information to lure us into signing up for a fraudulent membership to take our money.

On May 8 2007, we went to Nassau for 3 days vacation. I attended a seminar at the Wyndham Nassau Resort hotel which was arranged by an organization named as "Royal Holiday". A sale representative & sale Manager tried to sell us a holiday package. It should be an half an hour presentation with no obligation to purchase anything. However, the sale team hold us for 4 hours until we joined a trial member package. The sale representative told us that with this package, we will pay a fixed hotel price for 7 years everywhere around the world that we want to take our vacation. It sound good...
We did not see the package until I signed the contract agreement. When we returned to the hotel, we reviewed the package contents and realized that, the package did not indicate the same deal with the fixed hotel price as sale representative told us.

On next Morning(5/9/2007), I went to the sale office and tried to see the sale manager. No one let me to talk to the manager. I had to talk to a female clerk who did not want to identify her name. I requested to cancel the contract ( in the contract indicated that I have 30 days to cancel this contract with full refund). She was denied and ignore my request. I requested for a contract cancellation form and the requested her to put a cancellation on my contract. However, she told me the contract was already sent out to the main office. I had to put my request in a piece of paper with my signature. I requested her to put a time stamp with her signature to acknowledge my cancellation. She hesitated to do that. I was refused to leave the office until she did that. However, she refused to write her name along with her signature. I returned the whole package and asked her to check the content of the package and signed to accept my return package. I told her that since this package was cancelled, I denied to make any payment.

When I returned to US on 5/9/2007, I called my credit card company to dispute any charge that submit on the behave of Royal Holiday as part of this contract. When I received the credit card bill, the charge was on my bill with the posted date of 5/22/2007 for the amount $775.00 I also received another bill from "Monterey Financial Service in California in reference to this contract for the amount of $156.25.

I don't know if these group of people working at Wyndham Nassau Resort are really represent Royal Holiday. The contract did not have the Business address, phone number and the manager who signed the contract did not have his name on the contract. Anyone who plans to travel to Carribean. Please be aware of this scam. Do not waste your time to attend this seminar. It does not worth. Please think twice before you attend this seminar.

This video is about companies in general who sell vacation plans, timeshares, point systems. Video that shows how these scams are world wide. Different continent, same scam

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i36A0jfTzOs

Although this is not about Royal Holiday, Royal Holiday uses the same presentation tactics seen here. They tell you if you do not sign today, you will not get what they are offering. As you will see if you read the accounts that people post on the Internet about the experiences the same offers have been made for years. This is not the last day. They are only saying this because they know if you research the services they say they will give you will not sign.

Please, keep putting in Royal Holiday complaints, Royal Holiday scams, Park Royal complaints, etc. into Google, and Yahoo and read before you sign. If you have already signed, do what others have done to get out of this.

Beware of Royal Holiday! Royal Holiday will scam you out of your hard earned money! Here's a copy of the letter I sent to Profeco summarizing my experience with the crooks at Royal Holiday.

I am writing this letter to file a formal complaint against Royal Holiday a.k.a. TRAVEL EXPERIENCE, and to seek your help in reclaiming funds that were fraudulently charged to my account by this company currently based in the Hyatt Cancun Caribe Resort Hotel. My wife and I were accosted by one of their representatives as we exited customs and were lured with free tours and taxi fare into one of their vacation presentations. We met with them on Sunday May 6, 2007 and sat through over five hours of pushy sales tactics and incentives geared to lure us into a signing a contract. Their sales tactics are reprehensible if not downright illegal. They misrepresented the terms of the service that they claim to provide and used incentives and alcohol to coerce us into making a poor decision. We eventually agreed to sign the contract with the understanding that at any point later in our vacation we could simply call back or stop by and cancel with no ill effects. They also asked us to agree to a ‘pre-authorization’ of our American Express card, NOT a charge, for the down payment amount to lock in the incentives that they had promised. Our instructions were simply to determine how we would like to handle the real down payment and to contact them once we had made our decision. At no point did they inform us of the five-day Mexican right of cancellation nor did they indicate that a Notary Public was present during the signing of the contract. In fact, we have a copy of our contracting stating that "This agreement cannot be canceled by either party...". This is fraudulent according to Mexican Law. We left their office on Sunday with the understanding that nothing would be charged to us unless we called back to authorize it. Since neither my wife nor I speak Spanish and because we are novice travelers, we did not find an Internet connection until Wednesday May 9th, 2007. It was at this time that we realized that our American Express account had been fraudulently charged on two separate occasions for a total of 16904.07 US dollars. These charges were made on May 6th 2007. We immediately attempted to call the telephone number provided on the contract on 3 separate occasions on May 9th 2007 to cancel the contract and reverse the charges but no one answered. We also attempted to file a dispute for those charges with American Express but unfortunately the collect number on the Amex card did not work from the hotel phone. We kept getting a Spanish-speaking operator whom I could not understand. My mobile phone also did not work. We decided that we would head over to Hyatt hotel before we left on Saturday May 12th 2007 to resolve this issue in person since we had two remaining tours planned for Thursday and Friday. Our goal was not to delay but rather to try to make the best of the remainder of our vacation. My wife and I printed out a copy of our American Express bill on Thursday and attempted to contact them again via phone with no success. We finally went to the Hyatt hotel on Saturday May 12th to cancel the contract in person but none of the original three people we dealt with were there. We spoke to another manager who tried to appease us with an additional 15000 points but we turned him down and insisted that we wanted to cancel the contract. At this point he informed us that the 5-day cancellation period had expired and that there was nothing he could do. He then brought us to the on site director, Daniel Villa, who told us that he would explain the situation to the corporate office and they would contact us on Monday May 14th at my office in the US. They never did. We didn’t realize the extent of the fraud by this company until we returned home and were able to contact countless others via the Internet who have been similarly scammed by this company. I have included additional attempts to cancel the contract via email but I have received no replies. I am therefore hoping that you can help me resolve the fraudulent charges in the amount of 16904.07 US dollars.

All off these people are crooks! Please do not trust them and please don't fall for their scam! Also, please don't support the Hyatt Cancun Caribe resort. They know what's going on and do nothing to stop it!

Here's a list of all the thieves we dealt with at Royal Holiday. Orlando?, Alex?, Hector Montalvo, Daniel Villa.

[protected]@royal-holiday.com, [protected]@royal-holiday.com, [protected]@royal-holiday.com, [protected]@royal-holiday.com, [protected]@hyattintl.com