We purchased the travel club membership after a presentation which misrepresented what is actually available. The presenter described the ability to purchase travel at "cost", using the analogy of a box of Cheerios which costs the consumer over $3, but in actuality the "cost" to General Mills is only about 3 cents to produce. His presentation included a whiteboard filled with excursions which were excellent bargains. As it turned out, those "bargains" are rarely available, if at all. The website was unavailable to us at first. When we were able to log in, we found it useless. We had to call in to get help with vacation planning, wait sometimes 2 or more days to get a return call (and during limited hours while I was at work), and the catalog of items for which to use our reward points was very limited and did not include any items of interest to us or any restaurants within or near our local area.
The travel consultants with which we dealt could never find a deal for travel as cheap as I could find myself.in most cases, their search did not even find the same deal I would find until I revealed it to them. I do not understand how the $7995 we paid was to have benefited us, as there certainly has been none. Our sons did not even get a notebook or membership card which was promised at the presentation. The standard answer from Sherry Carpenter in Member Services is that we do not understand how to use the network to benefit us, but I am a savvy travel consumer and know that Grand Crowne's website and travel expertise lack much from others I have used for free.
I requested a release form which would allow us to get out of our contract but with no refund. However, we are unwilling to sign this form which relinquishes our rights to file any complaints against the company in agreement that the issues have been resolved to our satisfaction. If a class action suit were to be filed, we would then have no recourse to recoup our money. Also, I feel that other consumers should be warned about such deceptive companies.
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