Trade Winds Travel Club or Travel Center review: Membership, dues, fraud

I have recently had similar experiences to those of other people with Travel Center/Trade Winds Travel Club: citing non-payment of dues for some 12 years, out of the blue I received vague threatening letters from different places that sound official, a letter that prompted a call to the number listed because of a threat to disclose supposed "income" to the IRS by virtue of "owing dues for the past 11 years". After two calls that resulted in being hung up upon, I followed up on an email thread sent by Miranda B. I was finally sent a supposed contract from March 2011 with my "signature" on it, along with a separately snail mailed offer for $498 to settle dues and part company. In arguing with "staff" via email a reduced price of $398 (no lower, I tried) was offered. I was told that all complaints have to go through the American Arbitration Association in Montgomery County, Illinois, for a minimum cost of $3500, and my debt had to be settled first. Everyone I talked to was most insistent that I call them and use a credit card to clear things up, and the settlement offer specifies payment by credit card (or other method they approve), with a deadline of only a few days before the offer is rescinded.

As far as I can tell the "contract" is faked up from one signed years earlier, with address and date of signing from when I no longer lived at the address, using my legal name only (I go by an unusual nickname and use it on everything possible), and everything was addressed to me and my wife, who died in 2020. In addition, here is what I found doing brief internet searches from paperwork passed to me by "Travel Center, PO Box 447, Litchfield, Il, 62056, (affiliated with Trade Winds Travel Club, with Operations Director Tom Lee, Member Services Director, all a service or part of Travel Services, Inc, a Delaware corporation, according to what I could piece together):

Litchfield is in Montgomery County, Illinois. It is a small town of fewer than 7000 people. There are no easily found addresses or phone numbers for either Travel Services or American Arbitration Association (the closest office of that organization is in Chicago). There is no listing for Travel Services, LLC in Delaware, although my search was only done on Google. There is no website for Travel Center or Travel Services. In searching my personal email account I found only one email from Travel Services, from 2021. The supposed contract has both my correct email and phone number on it. Other than the random email, until roughly November 2022 I have had no contact with anyone from any of these supposed companies - no mailed or emailed bills for"Dues", no sales pitches for travel packages, no phone calls... Then several letters, the last one more threatening than the first ones.

Red flags - 12 years, and nothing?

Credit card only?

No listed penalties for non-payment given, just vague threats.

Wrong date/address on contract.

No signature of the selling party on the contract.

I believe this is a clever scam designed to scare folks into paying for nothing. If it is a real company I am sorry for the poor people working on it, because it is clumsy with backwards methods, no clarity upfront, and a horrible sales job in attempting to clear out stale accounts.