TravelSmart VIP
Reviews and Complaints

We got sucked into this scam in the DR while in vacation. Not only have we not been able to book a vacation but no one will return our calls. The only correspondence that we receive is a bill for our annual fee! Anyone have luck getting their money back and cancel their membership? We can't even get a response from anyone in regards paying the fee!

Never ever buy their "membership". I paid $4, 000 for 10 year membership and got nothing. I tried to cancel the contract. Their manager convinced me to convert our contract 10 year contract into a 3 year contract. We signed the contract. Then I asked a refund in 5 day rescission period. They told me that we will get nothing! Contract is just a sheet of paper for these CROOKS. They do not respect what they signed. You won't get your refund! You will get NOTHING from them. Shame on you Sunwing, shame on you Travel Smart VIP!

Hello

My name is Nelson Mendez I live in the United States I am also a travel smart VIP member. I received an email from a Travis smart representative Juan Hernandez from Cancun. He told me they had a program to buy weeks from members which are not using their weeks because of the COVID-19 pandemic. I was told I only had to pay the maintenance fees on the weeks and I will get $2400 back on every week. He emailed me documents and agreements from travel smart stating I will get paid within 30 days for my weeks. We are going on two months and I have not gotten paid I was told I have to pay taxes on the monies that I was going to get paid. I also sent the monies for the taxes that we claim I need to pay. I have yet to receive anything for more detail please have someone call me at [protected] in the United States. If I get no action soon I'll be forced to find legal action and use social media as a tool so I can get compensated.

Thank you
Nelson Mendez

We were pressured into signing into a contract that we didn't want. We wanted to cancel but they said they would take all the money we had paid if we didn't sign into another contract which is worthless. We were conned out of £2000.00. They said that they are a Canadian company which if they are, they are breaking all the laws.
We cancelled in the cooling off period.
We were on Holiday in St Lucia, staying in The Royalton. Booked with TUI. Nobody wanted to know . Not the holiday company or the manager of the Hotel. They ruin our holiday. Reduced me to tears. Pressure selling at its worse.

I recently looked on line to book a vacation. I was told by Travelsmart vip that I would be able to get 30% off of any rate I could find. I found a rate on bookit and presented it to Travelsmart who then told me that the would not honor the price because I logged into this free bookit website. I kindly told them that there is no where in the contract that says they will not honor a price from a website that I'm able to log into. They became very rude. I told them I wanted a refund after I spent over 5k and they told me that they will give me nothing back and they will continue to pull funds from my account.

I would like to say I have never dealt with a company so willing to take your money..and canxel your contract without warning and tell you basically after one trip and $11000 cad..your contract is finished. I ran into some hard times and was late on my payment.. I was embarrassed as I normally am a independent woman.When I had the money to pay in full my debt..they said they cancelled it..and can not talk to me..as I am not a custoner This company is beyond beleif Travel smart I asked if we can fix this..they told me a person in Mexico had my file and cancelled it..I still haven't heard back from them.

Cindy Pearson

My husband and I purchased this while on our honeymoon in 2015. We paid the membership in full only to discover we had been lied to about multiple aspects. It's now 2020 and I have been trying to cancel the remaining membership only to be told I cannot do so. We can not afford the "yearly fee" (that we were not told about) and simply want to terminate the remaining membership. We've already lost 7, 000+ dollars to this scam.

This matter has been ongoing since 20 December 2019. 12 days ago I asked to speak to a manager and I'm still waiting for one to contact me!

The service from Travelsmart is absolutely diabolical! I do not expect to be treated so badly when they are holding on to over $US 20, 000.00 of my hard earned money! This is unacceptable!

I will start legal action against Travelsmart for mis-selling, misrepresentation, breach of contract and theft. A year into our agreement, we upgraded and were told that the remaining points we had under our old contract for the year 2019 would be rolled over. This has not happened and I have been told that we cannot have the points which are rightfully ours. We paid for both of our agreements in full. Therefore their retention of our points is illegal, it is theft. We feel disrespected, hence why we are cutting all ties with Travelsmart. It is not worth the aggravation and stress.

I am disgusted at the way we have been treated! EVERYTIME we deal with Travelsmart there is an issue! I work a full time 9-5 job and I do not have the time or energy to keep on chasing them!

Travelsmart have had ample time to resolve our complaints but they clearly do not care about us, our feelings and the unnecessary stress they have caused us. All they have done is ignore my emails and thats exactly what theyll do to you if you challenge them.

I would not recommend Travelsmart to my worst enemy. Do not do it people, it sounds glamours and theyll pretend to give you the world but once they have your money, theyll start treating you like [censored]! And the last time I complained I had to post on social media for them to even acknowledge my complaints. They had the cheek to request that I delete my posts. I refused as everything I said was fair, accurate and true and others should be warned about their practices.

This matter has been dragging on for long enough. Travelsmart owe me an explanation, an apology and damages!

My husband and I are Travelsmart VIP members. Our membership is the $39, 000 membership. We originally signed in January in 2019 and then upgraded at the Royalton Riviera Cancun in March 2019. Since we upgraded, we began receiving phone calls and emails in regards to people wanting to purchase our membership. We never thought anything of it. In November 2019, we received a phone call from "travelsmart" asking if we wanted to pay off the remainder of our membership, they would give us a bit of a break on the balance. They emailed over the paperwork which included our membership number, amount owing, emails, address, phone numbers etc. We then transferred just over $28, 000 to pay off our 30 year membership.
A few days later, I called in to confirm that they received our payment. I was then told that we were victim of a scam. Now can someone please tell me, how did someone get ALL of our personal information ? This information was with Travelsmart.
Travelsmart refuses to speak with us and takes zero responsibility for our confidential information being released. We have phoned, emailed, text messaged, FB messages, wrote on their Instagram, sent messages on Instagram and we keep being told that someone will contact us...which never happens.
Now, within the last week, we have received 2 more fraudulent companies message us that have our membership number and our credit card information. I have forwarded these emails to Travelsmart and have asked them to verify that it is in fact someone else again with our private and confidential information- again, no reply.
With us losing 28k we still opted to book a vacation, no here's where it gets even worse. We can book the exact same vacation- same day, same resort, same room for the same amount of people for only a couple of hundred dollars more through Sunwing. What the heck is the point of our membership? We are using points and still have the same price. We were told we would get 30% off- not 2% off.
We have now spoke to our credit card company, lawyer and will be speaking with media.
If you are ever approached by Travelsmart VIP please do yourself a favour and run the other way. They are a big scam company who takes your money, sells your information and then doesn't help their customers. Beware!

I booked a reservation in sept 2019 for an trip in feb 2020 ..which was confirmed, for 3 adults and 5 night ..paid with my credit card and got my confirmation reciept.. I get a call weeks b4 my trip telling me they made and error saying that my reservation was booked for 2 adults and 4 nights which was untrue because I have a receipt that clearly states what i booked..the reservation dept is now requested 900$+ or they will cancel my reservation.. not only that when I reached out to the resort itself they quoted me a price way cheaper than what travel smart quoted me ..why is that ? This very unprofessional and I didn't sign up for this kind of experience..this will deter me from ever recommending this company to any if my friends and family ..very disappointed ..please help alleviate this crisis
thank you ronica Manuel

Travel Smart is a complete SCAM!
Be aware this company will try to feed alcohol and hold you hostage... Till you sign up for there scam program. We said no several times while they wasted our vacation time. We were exhausted and under the influence when we signed. They wear you down until your only option is to do the damn thing and then they rip you off.
After paying so much for your membership and your points you up paying the same amount of money if you book a trip with Expedia and any other company. The flybacks are only good if you travel to the Royalton resorts only.
This was not told to us when we bought the membership. IT IS JUST A BIG SCAM DO NOT GIVE INTO THIS GARBAGE MEMBERSHIP.

In 2013 I became one of the first Travel Smart members, Travel Smart (part of the Canadian Sunwing Group) call us founders.
I bought a 30 year membership ( US$ 25.559, -) with yearly 30.000 points.
The promised me a lot but the most important was savings!

See my example (picture)
If I book the Presidential one bedroom suite at the Royalton Bavaro resort for 10 nights starting december the 12th 2020 I pay Travel Smart US$ 4.924, 08
Online I can book the same Presidential one bedroom suite for US$ 3.352, 00.
So no savings, I pay US$ 1.572, 08 more then not members.
Each year I lose money instead of earning back the membership money.

Several times I asked Travel Smart to react. They answer friendly but they do not respond to the content of my example.

We joined Travel Smart VIP Club on January at St. Lucia. We were explained (with draft papers and all) that we could take point in advance in order to get free (or almost) vacations. We have been paying around $500 monthly for this Club. We are ready to book our vacation and I found out that they do not accept more points than the established on their website. That means that no matter how many points you have, the price is fixed. I checked the price for the same dates and resort and yes, the price at first look more expensive than with the Club but when you add up what we have paid through the year, it gets way unbalanced. We have paid in 2019 $3900. If we book their cheapest rate, it would be $1420, plus the airfare ($550 from SJU-ANU). That would be $5870 for a 3 night vacation! Also, They said we would have granted access to the Diamond Club areas and I do not see that anywhere. My main question with this issue is; what are winning with being memebers of this "Club"? I want at least a considerable room upgrade...

I have just returned from the Royalton in Cancun Mexico on the 20 October 2019. The hotel was great.

It all went wrong when we attended their sales pitch. We were kept there for 7 hours! We signed up as we were promised cheaper prices on 2 weeks per year for upgraded rooms. We agreed to pay £16500 over 10 years plus their 9.9% interest charge.

On returning to my room I went through the brochure. The prices stated were very high, I could get much lower prices online and it became clear that you are not guaranteed upgraded rooms. We were totally confused as to what we were paying £16500 for.

We cancelled 24 hours later. They weren't happy, kept us in the room for ages. I had to plead with the man that we needed to leave as we were returning to England that day.

I expected a small admin fee for cancelling but it actually cost $650 for the closure fee which is outrageously high. However they also kept 15% of the deposit we had paid. Another $482! This is just daylight robbery.

I have emailed to complain but no response so far.

Don't stay at a Royalton Hotel as they all hassle you to sign up to a membership scheme that's a scam

We were approached while on holiday in Jamaica for a lunch and presentation, we sat for 5 hours listening to hard sell of TravelSmart VIP, when I suggested that we go away and research and consider the options, the big boss guy entered the picture, a Canadian Manager, who bamboozled us with figures/gifts and packages
We signed so we could leave but then decided to cancel as per 5 day cool off period, in all this has cost us £1000 English pounds and my mental health and physical health have suffered greatly, not a good advert for a Canadian Company, I'm a UK resident who is very distressed and anxious, find this very unfair while on holiday

We were pulled in for a ‘chat' about how we could save money on our holidays. They claimed we could have a Caribbean holiday every year in a royalton hotel as well as saving us money. After paying over £10, 000 it turns out this is far from the truth . We got flybacks included in our deal yet Its over £1000 cheaper to go to a holiday company and book it as a package than to book it separately with travelsmart. We even asked if we can book out holiday elsewhere and still receive our flybacks and diamond club ( to try benefit from the £10, 000 we paid them) and they said no! . Absolute scam . We are looking into getting our money back, i recommend not buying into their false promises .

I been trying to cancel my membership after the grace period without no success. Which my wife and I got suckered on Punta Cana Royalton. We live in US. So far we had to waited over 1 month to get to someome review my case. To inform me that I was not going to be able to pay in full in order to canceled. So far I have blocked my credit card from being charged, but it seems that I won't be able to cancel has anyone. Has anyone been got suit/legal persuit for not paying.

This is the biggest legal scam since insurance. These people are selling potentially what we would call mortgage holiday memberships. You pay to get access to a so called membership for 30% for some resorts and 15% for others. They charge you a monthly interest in your membership which doesn't make sense because the sales manager at the time told us it was 7% interest overall. They over sell their services and your benefits. It's cheaper to just find an agent and book your holiday. Waste of money to use them

Hello everyone. We are experiencing the same problems! Our problems stem from a vacation in the DR. Additionally, we used all of the provided resources to cancel within the allowed time period. I contacted my bank and asked that that block all transactions from Travel Smart. They complied and we thought that all was well since there were no additional charges for 5 months. Unfortunately, they submitted a new charge using a different name and it successfully went through last night. The POS charge was presented to my credit union from "TSVC Barbados Las Vegas". I've contacted my credit union and disputed the charge. Thankfully, the card on file expires in a few days. This has to be illegal.

In 2018 we have been told that by signing the contract we are receiving 3 free weeks, which is not true
They said the point is enough for for booking which is not true
They said we are receiving 2 free weeks in where in the world which is not true
The said that the price will be cheaper then any other posted price which is not true
They said we can cancel any time which is nor true

We have been giving wrong information, we need to get out
We haven't receive anything
I want my money back
We have paid over then 5800 dollars