tags: Scams
Florida Vacations - How to cancel.
June 16th, 2005, by Rich.
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Several people have emailed me, or left messages asking for help in getting a refund from Florida based holiday companies (such as AmeriVacation, YourVIPTravel, etc), either because they have bought in haste, or feel they have been misguided by the sales person. In this article I hope to condense all the comments from other stories into a simple action plan.
Your Rights
According to Florida State Law “You have a right to cancel your purchase and receive a refund within 30 days of the date of purchase” after which, “the seller has 30 days from the time of receipt of your notice of cancellation to send you a full refund”. [source] [corroborating source]
The law exists to regulate Sellers of Travel to and from Florida, as well as Sellers of Travel whose place of business is in Florida - it helps to maintain the reputation of Florida as a welcoming vacation destination and protects the citizens of any country by forcing licensed sellers of travel to follow strict rules, including the ones about refunds; so the suggestions listed here are valid from any country.
Action 1 - Call
- Call the number you originally dialled.
- Politely and clearly state that you are calling because you wish to cancel a contract.
- Ask them to confirm the company name and address to which you should send a cancellation letter.
- If the person on the other end bluffs or prevaricates, remind them that Florida State Statute 559.933 is quite clear on your right to a full and prompt refund.
- If they verbally agree to send you a full refund, accept this happily, but you should not stop yet because if they were to forget to send it, or lose the note to say that you’d called, or had a computer crash, (etc. etc.) then you’d have no evidence that you called within the 30 day cancellation period.
Action 2 - Write
- Write a letter of cancellation.
- This is a generic letter template.
- This is an AmeriVacation template.
- Send the letter by an international recorded delivery service.
- From the UK you could use International Signed For.
- Sometimes the companies will state that “you have to return the package”, this is usually just an obstruction tactic, but if they insist, take photographs (and scan or photocopy) everything that you return (example).
Action 3 - Complain always
If you you’re unhappy about the experience and wish to air your grievance, then please do. Lodging a formal complaint will quickly raise the profile of your scammer so the DOACS can monitor them better:
- Complain to the Florida Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services (who regulate the selling of travel in Florida) using this form.
- Inform your “local” national press so that others do not go through the same experience.
- In the UK there is the BBC’s Watchdog Programme
- In the Netherlands, there is Opgelicht.
Action 4 - Write to your credit card company
- Write to your credit card company and tell them that you are seeking a refund from the vendor.
- Explain why you feel the company misrepresented itself.
- Include a copy of the letter you sent to the vendor.
- Use local legislation if necessary:
- If you’re in the UK and the vendor refuses (or is unable) to provide a refund, then the Consumer Credit Act 1974 section 75 is your fallback. It makes the credit card company equally responsible for any misrepresentation (which in the case of AmeriVacation there has been), so should attempt to claim the refund from your credit card company.
Action 5 - Help Others
If you succeed in getting a refund, using this or an alternative method, let others know by describing your success below, I’ll modify the above steps as appropriate.
May 11th, 2006 at 4:36 am
I also make the mistake of falling for a scam through Great Vacation destinations. I am not sure if it really is a scam, but I have been hearing so many things lately about travel scams that it made me nervous. I spoke to a rep and explained I needed the money back for other reasons. He said he would refund most of it, but I could still have the vacation. I tried everything to get him to refund the full amount but he started to get very rude and I decided that I just couldnt talk to him anymore. Well, that was two days ago and I actually got the refund he promised me. I thought that was pretty good considering everything. I am still going to write a letter to try to get my entire amount refunded but at least I got most of it back. Hopefully this helps others out there. Just say you really need the money for something else. Good Luck!!!!!
May 13th, 2006 at 8:06 am
Hi. just letting u know I got my money back from summer bay resort.
I checked my credit card statement and I am no longer overdrawn. My credit card company simply mailed me an unauthorised transaction statement filled it out and money refunded. Now I can sleep at night good luck to everyone trying to get refunds with persistance
It can be done.
May 19th, 2006 at 1:50 am
I went and fell for GVD today. I didn’t realize the mistake I’d made until I tried to go to the sight they gave me, http://www.greatvacationdestination.com. My first thought when I saw it was “I’m dumb”. Supposedly there is a place where you can enter you trip verification number… They also said that I would be recieving an email from them within a few hours.
According to them it is too late today to call the # they gave, so I’ll have to wait until tomorrow. Wish me luck. I’m not good on the phone, which is probably part of why I fell for it.
May 20th, 2006 at 2:45 am
I too fell for this “scam” from Great Vacation Destinations. I too had entered a vacation raffle and recieved a call, and was “sweet talked” as it were into going through with it. Afterwords I felt like a complete and utter idiot. About 20hours later I called their customer service and had a horrible conversation with one of their sales reps (who of course gave me no name to which I could call him saying quote “Customer Service is speaking and that is all you need to know”. I’m going to call my credit card company in a few moments to find out what I can do about this from their end but this whole thing is really stressing me out. I can’t imagine what kind of reputable company would treat their customers like that; I felt more like a ‘mark’ than anything else.
I’m at least glad to know that the law is on my side (hopefully). I can’t stand to let this ‘injustice’ slide.
Does anyone else have personal experience with GVD that they can share? Perhaps an effective solution can be found.
May 20th, 2006 at 8:44 am
Hi Crystal;
We got a call from Great Vacation Destinations today as well, and in a moment of weakness, agreed.
One thing they made clear was that the website is: http://www.greatvacationdestinations.com (destinations has an ’s’ at the end). Try that, and you’ll see the correct website, asking for your vacation number and so forth.
However, we’re still going to call in the morning and cancel it. At the end of the day, we’re putting $800 up front for a holiday we don’t really want, which will end up costing another $600/person after flying to Florida and paying all of the ‘incidentals.’ For $2000, we can get a very nice holiday of our own chosing and timeline.
I don’t think that GVD is a true scam like AmeriVacation and others, but their high-pressure sales tactics and overstatement of the holiday are less than ideal.
This site is a great help–thanks to the creators.
May 20th, 2006 at 7:42 pm
I was contacted just yesterday by Great Vacation Destinations, and I thought that I had won a draw that I had entered recently at a trades show. They told me that they had been trying to reach me for a number of days, and would have had to give my promotion away to someone else if they hadn’t reached me. Of course, the word “promotion” instead of “prize” should have been a red flag. Anyway, they caught me at the right time, because I had been researching the possibility of a cruise in Florida as a kind of honeymoon thing. Just the fact that I had entered what I had thought was a draw, and that I had been shopping for a similar product made me especially vulnerable to their come on. Now I realize that the package they were offering wasn’t really much of a deal, considering that it was $800. US for 6 nights in hotel rooms of unspecified location and quality. That’s almost $100 US a night, and everyone knows you can get pretty good accommodation for less than that in most holiday hotspots. In addition to this, when you visit their website, there is nothing there but a front page. None of the links work. If that’s not a bad sign, I don’t know what is.
I can’t believe I fell for this. I called Visa only two hours later, and strangely, they say they can’t do anything until they know what kind of contract I agreed to. Hopefully, I’ll be able to find the refund policy somewhere. Can someone post it on this site?
It’s interesting to read the comments from Mary and Jeremy; they belie the lack of respect this company has for its “customers”/ pidgeons, when they come right out and basically call them stupid. Yeah, I guess I was stupid, but I’m not going to give up. If I can’t get my money back, maybe I’ll just promise them that I’ll bring a video camera along to tape everything that happens. Then I’ll send copies of the tape to every outlet I can possibly think of, post it on the web, etc., and see if that convinces them to change their minds.
May 22nd, 2006 at 6:10 pm
UPDATE: Great Vacation Destinations (GVD)
Well now that it’s Monday, I phoned GVD and politely said that we would have to cancel our package. After several transfers, we got to a woman who said we would need a reason for the cancellation. (I said financial–perfectly fair). She also said upfront and without prompting that after we received the package there was a 30-day cancellation policy as well. She didn’t sound entirely _happy_ about us cancelling, but she processed it without any excuses, and said that there would be a full credit within 7-10 business days on our card.
Score one point for GVD for at least playing by the rules. Good luck to the rest of you.
May 23rd, 2006 at 9:41 am
well, i also fell for this GVD thing.
this site has been most helpful, thank you all.
hope i can get something worked on on the refund.
May 24th, 2006 at 2:28 am
I called them up today and they said they will refund me in 7 to 10 business days.
Should i ask them for a confirmation of cancellation? something written down?
May 24th, 2006 at 8:06 pm
I went to the Yoga in Toronto Conference and the guy at the raffle pressured me to enter the draw. Funny enough was I was in the middle of doing Yoga when I got a call from the tele-marketing rep, “Mary-Jeeps,” for Great Vacations Destinations and then I fell for it. My call display picked up their number as 647-438-4333. Perhaps it was my unguarded relaxed state that had my defenses down even though all the bells were ringing in my head.
A hold on my credit card is placed so no additional charges are made - they can still refund you the money even though there is a hold on it. I should have used my smaller credit card of $500 limit that I normally use for Internet purchases so the damage would be less but I couldn’t find it in time on the phone.
Contacting them said I would have to wait until the package arrives so I may follow the instructions in it to obtain a refund. I don’t have it yet but I will follow it indeed; however, I don’t believe stopping there will help because I’ve read elsewhere on the internet, that the package will be ping-ping back and forth in hopes you will give up. I am now filling out the letter which has been courteously provided on this website and sending it via registered mail.
I will later write back as soon as there is any progress made. Fellow refund seekers can contact me at mel.kianuko@gmail.com so we can share in the process.