On December 14, 2014 I attended a timeshare presentation. I agreed to a 90 minute presentation. For over 4 hours I told the sale representative I did not want to purchase a timeshare and after meeting with a 4th individual, we agreed to purchase a vacation package based on the information they provided, both written and verbal. On 1/7/2015, I received the information on the package and reviewed the benefits. Unfortunately, the sales representative misrepresented the the products and services. It was explained I could use $3000 in savings point to purchase any type of product I could find on vacationpriveleges.com. In addition, I was promised the price would be equal or less than the price of our current timeshare. The point system does not provide any option to purchase merchandise and the offers do not meet the "Best Value Guarantee" #7 of the signed contract. I am able to find better deals for vacations packages, car rentals, and cruises on other websites. Also, I was told I would have a larger inventory of timeshares to exchange. I have Interval International as my exchange company and based on reviewing the vacationpriveleges.com website, I have a larger selection of exchange options with my current exchange company. I was charged $5300.00 and gave them the current timeshare I own and in return was mislead and given a product with much less value than I currently have with Interval International.
We have attempted to resolve this off line numerous times and have been met with silence. The reason Ms. Rose stated my pleas will be ignored is because I have chosen to use a third party, this Ms. Rose states is "company policy". This is just another example of Vida taking advantage. As is any dispute a consumer has a right to seek counsel from anyone who may add depth of knowledge to their particular situation. Your contract does say I will need an attorney if I choose to fight this in a Mexican court, but you won't allow me to seek assistance otherwise.....absurd. Is this Vida's stated position, to deny consumers their rights?
Ivan if by chance you have not been involved in the decision making on my case up to this point we please ask you to review its facts.
1) Putting me on the phone with one of Brokers on the list your sales people so highly tout. This was done to overcome my reluctance to sign your contract, the brokers validated all the claims of rental demand/income made by the sales rep and his manager.
2) The Broker also guaranteed the resale of my Marriott timeshare through a program in which Mexican citizens who were seeking U.S. travel visa were paying top dollar for such weeks. Owning these weeks would guarantee them approval of said visas, and because mine is in the Orlando area he stated it would be sold in less than 60 days....guaranteed! No I don't have it in writing because I believed I was dealing with a truthful legitimate organization.
Sadly this is a pattern all to familiar when it comes to Vida sales tactics. As you can see I have never used my weeks nor received one dime of rental income and what has recently come to light about one of the listed brokers being indicted on federal fraud charge should only bolster my claim. Although I did not use Resort Rentals, the broker that was put on the phone with me during my presentation was GGC, also another scam operation based on the volume of complaints.
I asked for your intervention and have been met with silence. Are we to accept this as your approval of the duplicitous sales tactics employed by Vida's sales teams?
Every year my fiance and i celebrate our birthdays in wonderul Mexico, sadly we will end this tradition after our last visit. If you are reading this -- you were ripped off or doing some research because your gut feeling is that you may be getting ripped off. Well please listen to your gut feeling!
My fiance and I stayed in the Grand Mayan and we were greated by Katerina and right away she invited us to a "timeshare disclosure" meeting. We quickly declined becuase we currently own timeshare (US property). She was not pushy and promised us we would find it interesting specially since we were already timeshare owners. We were offered two tickets to the "Fiesta" dinner, since it was something we had planned on attending, we accepted the offer. They recommend you attend the very next morning in order to attend the dinner or they will run out of capacity. This is where the lies start! The reason why the Vida Life ("Vida") staff wants you to attend a meeting upon arrival is to hopefully trap you into buying a --- non-existent luxury golf resort timeshare.
The day of the presentation we were paired up with Eduardo Vega. Eduardo claimed to have traveled the world through Vida Life and even showed us pictures of various vacations. He even cried when he got to a picture of his so-called ex-fiance that was killed in a car accident. My next comment may sound cruel but i think this was all part of his sales tactic!! How can I believe anything this man said when everything he represented was a huge SCAM!
Through out the walkthrough of the premises we got to know Eduardo and he got to know us. Little did we know he was gathering all the details for his sales pitch. We shared the fact that we had recently gotten enganged. Worst mistake we did! Once we said this Eduardo promised us a honeymoon vacation anywhere in the world through Vida Life or SFX. He even printed out resorts in Bora Bora, Turks and Caicos and Thailand with availability in the timeframe we needed. These were all locations we listed as "dream" honeymoon locations. These print outs were sent over during the presentation from a fictitious concierge department.
The hotels Eduardo showed us do not participate with Vida Life or SFX. We discovered this once we were back home. We could not book our honeymoon and now we are out of our honeymoon fund = $5,000. Vida Life claims to have access to 5 star resorts all over the world. If you are already an RCI member, you will see that it is no different. By the way, RCI is the same company Vida tried to discredit during the presentation but at the end of the sale they give you one year membership for FREE. They said it is given away for free so you can compare the sites and see that SFX is a better deal.
We already tried disputing the $5k deposit we gave to Vida with our credit card company. These funds were supposed to go towards our honeymoon and unfortunately they were not able to help us recoop our loss. Even the 2,000 Vida points that were promised were never deposited into our account. I wish I could paste a screenshot to thi review, the current balance is 3 points. When using the Vida website all hotels, car rentals, airfare rates have been inflated. There are no discounted rates on this site ($300 yearly membership fee we also paid in full) (AGREEMENT CPRT0448)
Additionally, Vida claims to acquire US based timeshares for wealthy Mexican business owners. Owning US property will allow these business owners to be granted US visas by the Mexican government. Another LIE!!! This is where Equity Acquisition ("EAS") comes into the mix. This company applied a $12,500 credit towards our Grand Mayan purchase. However, when EAS received copies of my timeshare contract they stated they have a "vast amount of properties to transfer and resell" so now they are selling my timeshare back to me for ONLY $700. If I decide to move forward with my transfer then I have to send them my original deed, power of attorney, original membership contract, certificate of use, copy of my ID. They basically want all documents and money up front but there is no guanrantee that the transfer will go through. I have gone through the purchase process in the US and closing fees are paid at closing of a deal and nothing up front. Another SCAM! Tatiana Kay and Oscar Fink seem to have pre-scripted responses when replying to any of my emails. (EAS 34720 RM)
I wish I had done more research!!! I feel i was manipulated by the sales representative - Eduardo. He knew we were looking forward to our honeymoon and advised us to purchase the timeshare putting down only $5,000 and we could go anywhere in the world. Even Bora Bora that would normally cost approximately $10,000. How could we do our due diligence if there is no wifi in any of these 5 or 6 star resorts?!?!? Initially I was happy to be disconnected from reality but his is part of the SCAM. You can only cancel within 5 days of signing but by the time you get home, it's TOO LATE. When we contacted Vida they offered to lower our debt from $11k to $4k. This sounds great but it will not solve my problem. I still cannot book my honeymoon and i'm out of $5k and now stuck with the US timeshare I thought i had traded in and $4k debt. We are at the mercy of these people and no one has offered a fair solution to this problem.
Even if we keep this property, we have discovered we will not be able to rent out the weeks we will not use. The five companies Vida suggests you contact for ownership rental or resale are: Golf Network, Resort Rentals, Vacation Time Company, Destination International and Global Golf Connections. These companies are all listed on this site as possible ripoff companies. From reading other complaints these firms will ask for money and you will never hear from them again.
All this explains why you can't go back to the resort for the first 5 years from date of purchase! Little do they know, I don't ever want to go back to any of these properties and will make sure word gets out there of their SCAM. I will use any site and all social media possible. Hoping i also reach someone that may be using a hotspot while staying at these shady resorts and help them!!
Payed them more than $16,000 for membership at The Grand Mayan. Some time later I called them, paid all the unexpected fees and reserved my 2 weeks. When I arrived to the hotel I realized it WAS NOT The Grand Mayan, it was a resort with brown grasses and smelly rooms.
When I called to complaint about it and asked them why they sent me o this ugly hotel they said it was because The Grand Mayan was still under construction. Back at home I called them again and asked why who would the sell me a membership for a hotel that doesn't exist yet and they said I misunderstood my contract and that what I really bought was a membership to Mayan Resorts so hung up and called back again. This other representative said something completely different; she said she I could use my membership in any of their hotels and resorts, for an extra fee, of course.
In summary, I am not getting what I paid for and every time I call I get a different story from their represntatives.
We went on our vacation in August/Sept. 2014 to Grand Luxxe. We were invited to an "update". The update ended up being the "entire day". We called our salesperson and went back the second day to return to our original, "paid" contract! Instead, they talked us into a 3 bedroom Spa Tower room by "feeding us lies"!!!!
The salesperson, Aaron, said we could use the VIDA dollars to purchase airfare. After returning home, we called to check and found out that is "not" true!!!!
The saelsperson's boss, Shane, also told us our credit was very good and we could get 0% long term financing once we returned home! He also said that if we couldn't, then we could return to our original "paid" contract! After we returned home, we tried and could "not" get the long term 0% financing! We also contacted the sales department and " no" return to original contract!!!!
After a second entire day of "lies", they told us to answer "no" if we were promised anything else not stated. So, they tell you to lie just as they have done!!
We could "not" contact Aaron or Shane once we returmed home!!! Beware of an invitation to an "update" or a 90 minute "review"!!!! Stay away!!!!!
On July 29, 2013, we were victimized by a team of salespeople representing Vida Vacations. We purchased a timeshare (or “vacation membership,” if you insist) due to the false and fraudulent claims made by these salespeople, in particular by our second-level salesman.
The theme of the sales presentation was using the membership as an investment. The sales person insisted throughout that we would be able to rent out our four weeks for a profit of $1,500 a week. The Grand Mayan was in the process of building a huge theater to house a new Cirque du Soleil show, a city walk, and a train for kids, he said, all of which would greatly add to the value of the resort and its desirability as a rental venue.
The sales person recommended The Golf Network by CVM as a company that would handle rentals for us. He cautioned us not to mention his recommendation, as it was against company policy. Later we received a document recommending five different rental companies!
They also highly touted various companies, and told us we would be able to travel easily anywhere in the world. This was after we told him that we were only interested in returning to Mexico once every 3-5 years.
The sales person and his cohorts kept us there for over eight hours, without once giving us the time to talk it over in private. They insisted that this “deal of the century” had to be done that day. They served us drinks to help with our decision, all the while stating that this, too, was against company policy. On top of everything, the senior salesperson flirted shamelessly with our friend who was with us, and then spent several days in our company, ostensibly to show us how much he liked us but obviously so that we wouldn’t rescind on the contract.
The renovations described by the sales person have not been made. We paid The Golf Network $500, with the guarantee of the $1,500 per week rental windfall; it has now been over a year and our timeshare has not been rented one time. We deposited our points, and then searched for several months to find a location of interest, with no success. Meanwhile, within six months of our purchase our maintenance fee went up by $26.38.
In short, everything we were told was a lie or a failure to disclose important details. We have never used our membership, and will not use it.
We have been working on a resolution for the last few months and was generous in requesting only a partial refund. I received a call today stating they are not willing to negotiate at all. My membership will be cancelled without a refund. Vida Vacation/Grand Mayan Resorts will not take any accountability in employing a sales staff that’s mission is to lie and mislead unsuspecting tourist. Their practices are appalling and unscrupulous! Please stay far away from this company - they cannot be trusted. I do not want any tourist to fall into a trap like we did, you cannot trust these people.
I am lodging my complaint here to raise awareness about what’s going on at Vida Vacations.I made the mistake of believing what my Vida sales rep told me.
When I was looking at Vida, I told them we rarely used our 2 weeks per year that we already had with Shell Vacations. The Vida sales rep told me that this was not an issue at all, that we could easily sell our Shell timeshare through a recommended broker for cash and that this was a plan that many of their members sucessfully used. We could then use the cash procedes to replace the money we would use to buy the Vida timeshares. Plus, Vida was different because whatever weeks we didn’t use from Vida could be rented out through the same broker, which seemed like a safe bet to me.
A year and a half later nothing has happened—I now own 4 weeks that I don’t use, cannot sell and cannot rent. I feel like fool because I believed them… I couldn’t imagine how the developer Daniel Chavez would allow his sales people to do such things. But after reviewing the internet, sadly I’m not alone.
In fact, I have just seen the Youtube video “The Philanthropist and his Mayan Empire”, which is an indicment of the entire fraudulent Mayan sales process.I’m originally from Guadalajara and it’s sad for me as a Mexican to see how a man capable of such greatness has allowed this.
They usually are offering gifts at the airport such as bottles of tequilas, trips to many touristic places like: chichen itza, tulum and other activities...During a recent trip to Cancun, A Vida vacation representative offered us to tour one of their hotels to buy a timeshare and ask for $100 dollars deposit which was 100% refundable.
Also VIDA VACATION representative promised three bottles of tequila after touring their hotel, and of course to give our money deposit back. However, this NEVER happened. It was a scams....
Please don't accept any invitations to tour Vida Vacations timeshares they are SCAMS..And won't give your money back.Be careful and don't accept any offers at the airport.
My husband, 3yr old son, and I bought into Bliss Resorts in Riviera Maya, Mexico on November 18th, 2013. My husband is Mexican so we spoke spanish during the entire sales tour. My husband was most involved since our 3 yr old son needed to be take care of and occupied. They the salereps and managers made it sound so easy that we could get money back from the timeshare weeks that it seemed like a good deal so we bought. They said that the company has agencies who buy the weeks back from us for a set amount.
The contracts are brought to us but they are in english only and not spanish so my husband cannot read them. Since I speak english they asked me to go over it, while attending to our 3yr old. I could not concentrate on the contract so my husband went along with the sale representative translation of the contract more. They asked us to sign many papers. It was all so rushed. By this time now we had spent way more than the 1 1/2 hours they originally promised.
During Christmas we spoke with family in Mexico and afterward suddenly became worried. They told us to research Profeco and the Bliss Timeshare company. We then called one or two of the agencies and found out that the agency does not buy our week from us like the salesreps explained to my husband. In fact, the timeshare weeks need to rented which involves a process much different then what we were led to believe. It may or may not happen but the salesreps said that the agencies buys our weeks back from us. We found out that the agency tries to sell the week and will only give us money if they have a buyer for the timeshare week.
Well during our research and family calling government agencies, we find out that it is ILLEGAL for a timeshare resort to not provide contracts in the SPANISH language as my husband requested and was SUPRISED that in Mexico, a mexican company did not have a spanish language contract. Well as per article 73 of the consumer protection laws and article 85 of consumer protection of adhesion contracts, it clearly states that all contracts celebrated in mexico must be in spanish and can have another language as translation but that the spanish language contract comes first in the court of law.
BEWARE of this company that appears to NOT be following Mexican Consumer Laws! We think that they purposefully did this so that my husband could not read the contract. They say that their contract complies with Norma Oficial Mexican NOM-029-SCFI-2010, BUT as per the website Diario Oficial de La Federacion, it CLEARLY states in CLAUSE #5 CONTRATOS that established BY LAW, THAT ALL CONTRACTS SHOULD BE IN SPANISH LANGUAGE and can have translations into other languages but there HAS TO BE A CLAUSE SAYING THAT IN ANY DISCREPANCY THE SPANISH LANGUAGE CONTRACT IS THE LEGAL CONTRACT LANGUAGE. How could it be that when we asked for a spanish language contract, the salesreps said they did not have one!
They say that we cant CANCEL now since we have passed the cancellation period of 5days. They are using consumer law against me BUT ARE NOT following other consumer laws that are made to PROTECT MY FAMILY. If they would have provided Spanish Language contract so that my husband could read it then we would have seen the difference in the salesreps translation and the actual words of the contract. WE FEEL THEY ON PURPOSE DID NOT GIVE US A SPANISH LANGUAGE CONTRACT AND ONLY GAVE US AN ENGLISH VERSION SO THAT MY HUSBAND COULD NOT READ IT WITH THEM KNOWING I WAS PREOCCUPIED! We feel they did this to get us pass the 5 day period to say then say we cannot cancel something they did illegal to us!
I don't even know where to begin. It was our 2nd time at Cancun Mexico and we should have learned our lesson to not get sucked into those ""body snatchers"" at the airport where they promise you of discounts to tour tickets, and free lunch. We cave in and went to the supposedly 90 min presentation which took 4+ hours!!! After 4 hours of telling them ""no thanks"", we again caved in because of all the promises they told us about their company, how they're different from other time shares. The sales rep we dealt with was Virginia Garcia. We were told that this timeshare would only have to be paid when used. With much reservation, we agreed on 1 week plus 2 residence weeks and 2 extra weeks thrown in for free with the promise of no maintenance fees unless the weeks are used. There's a lot of promises about perks of the resort like discounts on golf park, travel benefits. But were not aware of yearly maintenance fees for 10 years. That was either not explained or intentionally left out. They kept telling us about the perks and usage fees only. We've also told them that we currently owned another time share so we weren't interested into getting another. So for us to agree, they said that they will give us discount on the total amount of the VIDA time share and that we would only have to pay if we use the property.
So, come this February, we got an email about some maintenance fee of $521 that's due by the 22nd of this month (Feb 2014). We were all shocked. We've been trying to contact someone from customer service and it took them almost 2 weeks to get back to us. We were contacted by 3 different representative telling us the same thing. That we signed two contacts, one explaining about the residence week and anothe about the registered week which took us by surprise as again, we were not expecting to be paying this yearly maintenance fee. We kept telling them that we don't want this yearly maintenance fees or to cancel the account all together and refund us the downpayment and some monthly payments (close to $3500). They finally responded when we told them that the credit card acct we registered to get the payments deducted was cancelled and that we will report them to the authority.
Now, they're saying that they can't remove the registered week but they can waive the first year maintenance fee. This is unacceptable. We're requesting our contract voided and all payments refunded.
VIDA Vacations Reviews
On December 14, 2014 I attended a timeshare presentation. I agreed to a 90 minute presentation. For over 4 hours I told the sale representative I did not want to purchase a timeshare and after meeting with a 4th individual, we agreed to purchase a vacation package based on the information they provided, both written and verbal. On 1/7/2015, I received the information on the package and reviewed the benefits. Unfortunately, the sales representative misrepresented the the products and services. It was explained I could use $3000 in savings point to purchase any type of product I could find on vacationpriveleges.com. In addition, I was promised the price would be equal or less than the price of our current timeshare. The point system does not provide any option to purchase merchandise and the offers do not meet the "Best Value Guarantee" #7 of the signed contract. I am able to find better deals for vacations packages, car rentals, and cruises on other websites. Also, I was told I would have a larger inventory of timeshares to exchange. I have Interval International as my exchange company and based on reviewing the vacationpriveleges.com website, I have a larger selection of exchange options with my current exchange company. I was charged $5300.00 and gave them the current timeshare I own and in return was mislead and given a product with much less value than I currently have with Interval International.
Dear Mr. Ivan Chavez,
We have attempted to resolve this off line numerous times and have been met with silence. The reason Ms. Rose stated my pleas will be ignored is because I have chosen to use a third party, this Ms. Rose states is "company policy". This is just another example of Vida taking advantage. As is any dispute a consumer has a right to seek counsel from anyone who may add depth of knowledge to their particular situation. Your contract does say I will need an attorney if I choose to fight this in a Mexican court, but you won't allow me to seek assistance otherwise.....absurd. Is this Vida's stated position, to deny consumers their rights?
Ivan if by chance you have not been involved in the decision making on my case up to this point we please ask you to review its facts.
1) Putting me on the phone with one of Brokers on the list your sales people so highly tout. This was done to overcome my reluctance to sign your contract, the brokers validated all the claims of rental demand/income made by the sales rep and his manager.
2) The Broker also guaranteed the resale of my Marriott timeshare through a program in which Mexican citizens who were seeking U.S. travel visa were paying top dollar for such weeks. Owning these weeks would guarantee them approval of said visas, and because mine is in the Orlando area he stated it would be sold in less than 60 days....guaranteed! No I don't have it in writing because I believed I was dealing with a truthful legitimate organization.
Sadly this is a pattern all to familiar when it comes to Vida sales tactics. As you can see I have never used my weeks nor received one dime of rental income and what has recently come to light about one of the listed brokers being indicted on federal fraud charge should only bolster my claim. Although I did not use Resort Rentals, the broker that was put on the phone with me during my presentation was GGC, also another scam operation based on the volume of complaints.
I asked for your intervention and have been met with silence. Are we to accept this as your approval of the duplicitous sales tactics employed by Vida's sales teams?
We anxiously await your reply.
Every year my fiance and i celebrate our birthdays in wonderul Mexico, sadly we will end this tradition after our last visit. If you are reading this -- you were ripped off or doing some research because your gut feeling is that you may be getting ripped off. Well please listen to your gut feeling!
My fiance and I stayed in the Grand Mayan and we were greated by Katerina and right away she invited us to a "timeshare disclosure" meeting. We quickly declined becuase we currently own timeshare (US property). She was not pushy and promised us we would find it interesting specially since we were already timeshare owners. We were offered two tickets to the "Fiesta" dinner, since it was something we had planned on attending, we accepted the offer. They recommend you attend the very next morning in order to attend the dinner or they will run out of capacity. This is where the lies start! The reason why the Vida Life ("Vida") staff wants you to attend a meeting upon arrival is to hopefully trap you into buying a --- non-existent luxury golf resort timeshare.
The day of the presentation we were paired up with Eduardo Vega. Eduardo claimed to have traveled the world through Vida Life and even showed us pictures of various vacations. He even cried when he got to a picture of his so-called ex-fiance that was killed in a car accident. My next comment may sound cruel but i think this was all part of his sales tactic!! How can I believe anything this man said when everything he represented was a huge SCAM!
Through out the walkthrough of the premises we got to know Eduardo and he got to know us. Little did we know he was gathering all the details for his sales pitch. We shared the fact that we had recently gotten enganged. Worst mistake we did! Once we said this Eduardo promised us a honeymoon vacation anywhere in the world through Vida Life or SFX. He even printed out resorts in Bora Bora, Turks and Caicos and Thailand with availability in the timeframe we needed. These were all locations we listed as "dream" honeymoon locations. These print outs were sent over during the presentation from a fictitious concierge department.
The hotels Eduardo showed us do not participate with Vida Life or SFX. We discovered this once we were back home. We could not book our honeymoon and now we are out of our honeymoon fund = $5,000. Vida Life claims to have access to 5 star resorts all over the world. If you are already an RCI member, you will see that it is no different. By the way, RCI is the same company Vida tried to discredit during the presentation but at the end of the sale they give you one year membership for FREE. They said it is given away for free so you can compare the sites and see that SFX is a better deal.
We already tried disputing the $5k deposit we gave to Vida with our credit card company. These funds were supposed to go towards our honeymoon and unfortunately they were not able to help us recoop our loss. Even the 2,000 Vida points that were promised were never deposited into our account. I wish I could paste a screenshot to thi review, the current balance is 3 points. When using the Vida website all hotels, car rentals, airfare rates have been inflated. There are no discounted rates on this site ($300 yearly membership fee we also paid in full) (AGREEMENT CPRT0448)
Additionally, Vida claims to acquire US based timeshares for wealthy Mexican business owners. Owning US property will allow these business owners to be granted US visas by the Mexican government. Another LIE!!! This is where Equity Acquisition ("EAS") comes into the mix. This company applied a $12,500 credit towards our Grand Mayan purchase. However, when EAS received copies of my timeshare contract they stated they have a "vast amount of properties to transfer and resell" so now they are selling my timeshare back to me for ONLY $700. If I decide to move forward with my transfer then I have to send them my original deed, power of attorney, original membership contract, certificate of use, copy of my ID. They basically want all documents and money up front but there is no guanrantee that the transfer will go through. I have gone through the purchase process in the US and closing fees are paid at closing of a deal and nothing up front. Another SCAM! Tatiana Kay and Oscar Fink seem to have pre-scripted responses when replying to any of my emails. (EAS 34720 RM)
I wish I had done more research!!! I feel i was manipulated by the sales representative - Eduardo. He knew we were looking forward to our honeymoon and advised us to purchase the timeshare putting down only $5,000 and we could go anywhere in the world. Even Bora Bora that would normally cost approximately $10,000. How could we do our due diligence if there is no wifi in any of these 5 or 6 star resorts?!?!? Initially I was happy to be disconnected from reality but his is part of the SCAM. You can only cancel within 5 days of signing but by the time you get home, it's TOO LATE. When we contacted Vida they offered to lower our debt from $11k to $4k. This sounds great but it will not solve my problem. I still cannot book my honeymoon and i'm out of $5k and now stuck with the US timeshare I thought i had traded in and $4k debt. We are at the mercy of these people and no one has offered a fair solution to this problem.
Even if we keep this property, we have discovered we will not be able to rent out the weeks we will not use. The five companies Vida suggests you contact for ownership rental or resale are: Golf Network, Resort Rentals, Vacation Time Company, Destination International and Global Golf Connections. These companies are all listed on this site as possible ripoff companies. From reading other complaints these firms will ask for money and you will never hear from them again.
All this explains why you can't go back to the resort for the first 5 years from date of purchase! Little do they know, I don't ever want to go back to any of these properties and will make sure word gets out there of their SCAM. I will use any site and all social media possible. Hoping i also reach someone that may be using a hotspot while staying at these shady resorts and help them!!
Payed them more than $16,000 for membership at The Grand Mayan. Some time later I called them, paid all the unexpected fees and reserved my 2 weeks. When I arrived to the hotel I realized it WAS NOT The Grand Mayan, it was a resort with brown grasses and smelly rooms.
When I called to complaint about it and asked them why they sent me o this ugly hotel they said it was because The Grand Mayan was still under construction. Back at home I called them again and asked why who would the sell me a membership for a hotel that doesn't exist yet and they said I misunderstood my contract and that what I really bought was a membership to Mayan Resorts so hung up and called back again. This other representative said something completely different; she said she I could use my membership in any of their hotels and resorts, for an extra fee, of course.
In summary, I am not getting what I paid for and every time I call I get a different story from their represntatives.
We went on our vacation in August/Sept. 2014 to Grand Luxxe. We were invited to an "update". The update ended up being the "entire day". We called our salesperson and went back the second day to return to our original, "paid" contract! Instead, they talked us into a 3 bedroom Spa Tower room by "feeding us lies"!!!!
The salesperson, Aaron, said we could use the VIDA dollars to purchase airfare. After returning home, we called to check and found out that is "not" true!!!!
The saelsperson's boss, Shane, also told us our credit was very good and we could get 0% long term financing once we returned home! He also said that if we couldn't, then we could return to our original "paid" contract! After we returned home, we tried and could "not" get the long term 0% financing! We also contacted the sales department and " no" return to original contract!!!!
After a second entire day of "lies", they told us to answer "no" if we were promised anything else not stated. So, they tell you to lie just as they have done!!
We could "not" contact Aaron or Shane once we returmed home!!! Beware of an invitation to an "update" or a 90 minute "review"!!!! Stay away!!!!!
On July 29, 2013, we were victimized by a team of salespeople representing Vida Vacations. We purchased a timeshare (or “vacation membership,” if you insist) due to the false and fraudulent claims made by these salespeople, in particular by our second-level salesman.
The theme of the sales presentation was using the membership as an investment. The sales person insisted throughout that we would be able to rent out our four weeks for a profit of $1,500 a week. The Grand Mayan was in the process of building a huge theater to house a new Cirque du Soleil show, a city walk, and a train for kids, he said, all of which would greatly add to the value of the resort and its desirability as a rental venue.
The sales person recommended The Golf Network by CVM as a company that would handle rentals for us. He cautioned us not to mention his recommendation, as it was against company policy. Later we received a document recommending five different rental companies!
They also highly touted various companies, and told us we would be able to travel easily anywhere in the world. This was after we told him that we were only interested in returning to Mexico once every 3-5 years.
The sales person and his cohorts kept us there for over eight hours, without once giving us the time to talk it over in private. They insisted that this “deal of the century” had to be done that day. They served us drinks to help with our decision, all the while stating that this, too, was against company policy. On top of everything, the senior salesperson flirted shamelessly with our friend who was with us, and then spent several days in our company, ostensibly to show us how much he liked us but obviously so that we wouldn’t rescind on the contract.
The renovations described by the sales person have not been made. We paid The Golf Network $500, with the guarantee of the $1,500 per week rental windfall; it has now been over a year and our timeshare has not been rented one time. We deposited our points, and then searched for several months to find a location of interest, with no success. Meanwhile, within six months of our purchase our maintenance fee went up by $26.38.
In short, everything we were told was a lie or a failure to disclose important details. We have never used our membership, and will not use it.
We have been working on a resolution for the last few months and was generous in requesting only a partial refund. I received a call today stating they are not willing to negotiate at all. My membership will be cancelled without a refund. Vida Vacation/Grand Mayan Resorts will not take any accountability in employing a sales staff that’s mission is to lie and mislead unsuspecting tourist. Their practices are appalling and unscrupulous! Please stay far away from this company - they cannot be trusted. I do not want any tourist to fall into a trap like we did, you cannot trust these people.
I am lodging my complaint here to raise awareness about what’s going on at Vida Vacations.I made the mistake of believing what my Vida sales rep told me.
When I was looking at Vida, I told them we rarely used our 2 weeks per year that we already had with Shell Vacations. The Vida sales rep told me that this was not an issue at all, that we could easily sell our Shell timeshare through a recommended broker for cash and that this was a plan that many of their members sucessfully used. We could then use the cash procedes to replace the money we would use to buy the Vida timeshares. Plus, Vida was different because whatever weeks we didn’t use from Vida could be rented out through the same broker, which seemed like a safe bet to me.
A year and a half later nothing has happened—I now own 4 weeks that I don’t use, cannot sell and cannot rent. I feel like fool because I believed them… I couldn’t imagine how the developer Daniel Chavez would allow his sales people to do such things. But after reviewing the internet, sadly I’m not alone.
In fact, I have just seen the Youtube video “The Philanthropist and his Mayan Empire”, which is an indicment of the entire fraudulent Mayan sales process.I’m originally from Guadalajara and it’s sad for me as a Mexican to see how a man capable of such greatness has allowed this.
They usually are offering gifts at the airport such as bottles of tequilas, trips to many touristic places like: chichen itza, tulum and other activities...During a recent trip to Cancun, A Vida vacation representative offered us to tour one of their hotels to buy a timeshare and ask for $100 dollars deposit which was 100% refundable.
Also VIDA VACATION representative promised three bottles of tequila after touring their hotel, and of course to give our money deposit back. However, this NEVER happened. It was a scams....
Please don't accept any invitations to tour Vida Vacations timeshares they are SCAMS..And won't give your money back.Be careful and don't accept any offers at the airport.
My husband, 3yr old son, and I bought into Bliss Resorts in Riviera Maya, Mexico on November 18th, 2013. My husband is Mexican so we spoke spanish during the entire sales tour. My husband was most involved since our 3 yr old son needed to be take care of and occupied. They the salereps and managers made it sound so easy that we could get money back from the timeshare weeks that it seemed like a good deal so we bought. They said that the company has agencies who buy the weeks back from us for a set amount.
The contracts are brought to us but they are in english only and not spanish so my husband cannot read them. Since I speak english they asked me to go over it, while attending to our 3yr old. I could not concentrate on the contract so my husband went along with the sale representative translation of the contract more. They asked us to sign many papers. It was all so rushed. By this time now we had spent way more than the 1 1/2 hours they originally promised.
During Christmas we spoke with family in Mexico and afterward suddenly became worried. They told us to research Profeco and the Bliss Timeshare company. We then called one or two of the agencies and found out that the agency does not buy our week from us like the salesreps explained to my husband. In fact, the timeshare weeks need to rented which involves a process much different then what we were led to believe. It may or may not happen but the salesreps said that the agencies buys our weeks back from us. We found out that the agency tries to sell the week and will only give us money if they have a buyer for the timeshare week.
Well during our research and family calling government agencies, we find out that it is ILLEGAL for a timeshare resort to not provide contracts in the SPANISH language as my husband requested and was SUPRISED that in Mexico, a mexican company did not have a spanish language contract. Well as per article 73 of the consumer protection laws and article 85 of consumer protection of adhesion contracts, it clearly states that all contracts celebrated in mexico must be in spanish and can have another language as translation but that the spanish language contract comes first in the court of law.
BEWARE of this company that appears to NOT be following Mexican Consumer Laws! We think that they purposefully did this so that my husband could not read the contract. They say that their contract complies with Norma Oficial Mexican NOM-029-SCFI-2010, BUT as per the website Diario Oficial de La Federacion, it CLEARLY states in CLAUSE #5 CONTRATOS that established BY LAW, THAT ALL CONTRACTS SHOULD BE IN SPANISH LANGUAGE and can have translations into other languages but there HAS TO BE A CLAUSE SAYING THAT IN ANY DISCREPANCY THE SPANISH LANGUAGE CONTRACT IS THE LEGAL CONTRACT LANGUAGE. How could it be that when we asked for a spanish language contract, the salesreps said they did not have one!
They say that we cant CANCEL now since we have passed the cancellation period of 5days. They are using consumer law against me BUT ARE NOT following other consumer laws that are made to PROTECT MY FAMILY. If they would have provided Spanish Language contract so that my husband could read it then we would have seen the difference in the salesreps translation and the actual words of the contract. WE FEEL THEY ON PURPOSE DID NOT GIVE US A SPANISH LANGUAGE CONTRACT AND ONLY GAVE US AN ENGLISH VERSION SO THAT MY HUSBAND COULD NOT READ IT WITH THEM KNOWING I WAS PREOCCUPIED! We feel they did this to get us pass the 5 day period to say then say we cannot cancel something they did illegal to us!
I don't even know where to begin. It was our 2nd time at Cancun Mexico and we should have learned our lesson to not get sucked into those ""body snatchers"" at the airport where they promise you of discounts to tour tickets, and free lunch. We cave in and went to the supposedly 90 min presentation which took 4+ hours!!! After 4 hours of telling them ""no thanks"", we again caved in because of all the promises they told us about their company, how they're different from other time shares. The sales rep we dealt with was Virginia Garcia. We were told that this timeshare would only have to be paid when used. With much reservation, we agreed on 1 week plus 2 residence weeks and 2 extra weeks thrown in for free with the promise of no maintenance fees unless the weeks are used. There's a lot of promises about perks of the resort like discounts on golf park, travel benefits. But were not aware of yearly maintenance fees for 10 years. That was either not explained or intentionally left out. They kept telling us about the perks and usage fees only. We've also told them that we currently owned another time share so we weren't interested into getting another. So for us to agree, they said that they will give us discount on the total amount of the VIDA time share and that we would only have to pay if we use the property.
So, come this February, we got an email about some maintenance fee of $521 that's due by the 22nd of this month (Feb 2014). We were all shocked. We've been trying to contact someone from customer service and it took them almost 2 weeks to get back to us. We were contacted by 3 different representative telling us the same thing. That we signed two contacts, one explaining about the residence week and anothe about the registered week which took us by surprise as again, we were not expecting to be paying this yearly maintenance fee. We kept telling them that we don't want this yearly maintenance fees or to cancel the account all together and refund us the downpayment and some monthly payments (close to $3500). They finally responded when we told them that the credit card acct we registered to get the payments deducted was cancelled and that we will report them to the authority.
Now, they're saying that they can't remove the registered week but they can waive the first year maintenance fee. This is unacceptable. We're requesting our contract voided and all payments refunded.