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Timeshare Consumers Association

Holiday clubs are booking systems for which you pay a large joining fee to enable you to book holidays.

The promised availability, quality and prices of the holidays are seldom realised in practice. It is generally cheaper to book holidays off the Internet or in the High Street.

. It is a CRIMINAL OFFENCE for a trader to take any payment during the 14 day cooling off period.   See HERE .

The enticement may be when you are at home or when you are on holiday :-

• a scratch card on the street  - usually whilst you are on holiday
• a telephone call offering to buy your timeshare - ending with "you need to come to our offices etc.."
• a telephone call offering low cost holidays
• a telephone call, possibly claiming to be from RCI, inviting themselves into your home under some pretext

Key reasons for avoiding membership of a holiday club:

• lack of certainty that you will get anything, let alone what is promised. If the club goes "bust" tomorrow, you have lost everything
• the lies told by salesmen to get their commission
• the lack of any "club" structure to enable members to influence how the club is run
• the inability to check what the club can offer until after all the money has been paid (the Scots phrase "buying a pig in a poke")
• there is no "second hand" market to enable you to recover some of the capital sum when you want to "get out".
• the cost of taking holidays in the club  is generally no cheaper than in the open market (teletext, internet or high street)  - the membership fee is therefore worthless.
• many purchase agreements appear to be void in law, lacking certain essentials of an enforceable contract

The introduction of the Consumer Protection Regulations on 26 May 2008 and the Timeshare regulations 2010 on 23 February 2011 - should ensure that most of the UK based sellers in the holiday club industry will be forced to cease trading.  If you are caught by a holiday club sales team then you should report this to your own local trading standards officer who will be able to use the Consumer Protection Regulations to stop their activities.

Holiday clubs come in three flavours  -  recognising which flavour you are involved with is almost impossible:

Bogus

with neither a formal structure nor an administration service, they have no arrangements for delivering the promised holidays. In legal terms they simply do not exist. Run by unsavoury people, often with with criminal records, they eventually “disappear” having stolen a LOT of money. The majority of holiday clubs fall into the “bogus” category.  Many thousands of consumers are defrauded every year.

Fraudulent

a superior version of the bogus club – where a formal structure may have  been established (usually a limited liability company or proprietary club) and a small administration service has been set up. These clubs last longer than the bogus ones – because they initially appear to provide a service – but close down when complaints about failure to deliver the promised holidays get too great. Many tens of thousands of holiday club members have already been “left in the lurch” when their club disappeared.

Established

where a legal structure exists, an administration service is in place, and members do get holidays – but generally not where, when or at the price promised by the salesman. Although very poor value for money, they may survive for a number of years.

An increasing number of holiday clubs are Internet based - booking of holidays can only be done using a website. These internet clubs are no more reliable than their "land based" cousins.

Holiday club salesmen tell lies for a living. Typically:

• lies about where in the world you can take the promised holidays
• lies about the time of year you can take the promised holidays
• lies about the quality of accommodation
• lies about the costs of the accommodation
• lies about the savings they offer for flights etc.
• lies about who endorses the club -  Disney, Marks & Spencer  and other highly respected organisations.

Those holiday clubs that DO provide some holidays usually  operate by renting spare timeshare or hotel accommodation. They find it near  impossible to rent periods in high season (ie. school holidays when most holiday makers want to go away) and places in high demand (the very places you want to go).

And claims that they are members of ABTA or IATA (even if the claim is true) does not provide any comfort as the joining fee and the membership fee is not covered by the bonding schemes run by these two respected organisations.

Holiday clubs that do provide holidays either:

• pay a full rental fee (which they pass on to you with an uplift) which is exactly what you could do for yourself using the internet or teletext.
• Or they book timeshare weeks on the understanding that you attend a timeshare presentation (6 hours of sheer hell) from which they  receive a commission if you buy.

TCA Advice - AVOID  becoming a member of a holiday club.

• If you do not get an unconditional written 14 day cooling off period - walk away.
• If any attempt is made to take any money during the cooling off period - walk away
• If you do not get the opportunity to take the purchase agreement away to read it before signing - walk away
• If all the verbal promises made to you are not in writing - walk away.
• If you are not given, in writing, detailed examples of places, times and prices that are available to you - walk away
• If you do not get written proof (bonding, trusteeship etc.) that club will honour all the promises for the full period of membership - walk away
• If you feel the need to use a lawyer to help you get out of a holiday club contract (and get back any money paid) talk to any solicitors here

If you want to see what happens to your money when you buy into a holiday club - click here

If you are enticed to sign up then please read   How to cancel