At one of my favorite sub shops they have a raffle box for a 3 day / 2 night stay at Foxwoods Casino and Resorts in Connecticut. I love Foxwoods so I drop my name in the box at every visit. A week ago I was ecstatic when someone from Summit Vacations called me and left a message on my phone saying that I won.
I still have the message saved on my voicemail which says verbatim: "Hi Rebecca, my name is Linda and I am calling from SUmmit Vacations. You entered a raffle, well it must have been recently, within the last two weeks, it was for a three day / two night stay at Foxwoods. Your name was pulled out of the raffle box and you won the vacation trip! I hope you are 18 because you won the Foxwoods trip. So please call me back at our toll free number... 877.538.0569 and my extension is 157, my name is Linda. Thank you. Bye bye."
I was so very excited, I called as soon as I got it and spoke with Linda. She said that not only did I win the Foxwoods trip, but I also won a $1,000 shopping spree (no catch, I could use it anywhere), a $300 gas card, $50 cash, four movie passes and a pizza. WOW! I was very excited. I love Foxwoods and I could really use the $1,00 shopping spree. If I could use it anywhere... I could use it against a medical bill... I just had a newborn three months ago.
She explained to me that I had to pick it up at Steele Hill Resorts. She told me at first that it was a golf course and it was their grand opening, and we would just take a tour, listen to the sales pitch and once it was through we could get our gifts and go. She also made it sound like she was from the gold course. It was strange, she was not associated with them.
We have heard about these kind of deals before and have heard of other people getting valid free gifts by listening to a high pressure sales pitch. I thought it would be worth it. We made a date for the presentation and got an email confirmation, which I still have.
To make a long story short, we drove an hour and half there only to find out that we did NOT win a Foxwoods stay. We were lied to. A complete bait and switch. Thankfully, I still have the voicemail. A bait and switch is illegal. More people are getting scammed like this and if we can get enough people for a class action lawsuit, we can do something about it. If you get a voicemail saying that you won the Foxwoods trips... Save it!
The $1,000 shopping spree was not to be used anywhere. You could ONLY use it on an online store where you must pay for shipping charges (understandable) and they sold cleaning supplies and tools. Yippee. I was told, however, that you could use it anywhere. It also says on the email that you can use it anywhere, right in bold in the middle. Now, at the bottom, which I didn't read, in fine print, it explains that this is not true, it can only be used at an online store. The $300 gas card was a reimbursement program, not real free gas. You had to spend money at a certain gas station to get the free gas. Everything they told me had catches and stipulations.
If this was a real raffle, I would have won legitimate gifts. I did not. I am not sure who is to blame... Steele Hill Resorts or Summit Corp. But I believe Steele Hill since they are the people in the end whom you deal with.
Also, this was just a terrible gimmick to pull on a couple just starting out in the world with a newborn. I was told we would be listening to a 45 minute presentation. That was a lie as well. It was 90 minutes. I am a nursing mother and this is difficult. The drive, leaving our newborn at his grandmother's, taking the time and spending the gas to get there all to be completely ripped off.
This will be going to small claims court to get what were promised and to be reimbursed for our time. We actually didn't get anything because we left and did not go on the tour, we were furious about being lied to when we found out! So our goal is small claims court unless we get enough people for a class action law suit. There are many avenues we can take. I am also thinking about calling the investigation program on one of the New Hampshire News channel about them.
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