We received a letter from Celebrity Resorts marked final notice and dated 27 December. We never received the previous notices.in the letter Celebrity resorts asked us to contact them at an 800 number from 8 AM to 9 PM EST Monday through Friday. I called at 11 Am on Thursday and got a recording that no one was there. I left a message and someone phoned me back two days later to say that their computers were down which is why they did not call back immediately. Computers and phone recorders? Odd combination.
When they called back on Saturday, they informed me that I had to meet the Celebrity Resorts people at a Marriott Inn on the U of Maryland campus as soon as possible to discuss the significant changes with the club's affiliations, the special assessment and the effects this would have on my membership interest concerning the American Vacation resorts. They stated that the meeting would take 90 minutes. As I was leaving town a couple of days afterward, they told me I should go that very Saturday afternoon. My wife and I went to the Marriott Inn at the U of Maryland.
At the Inn, we registered and were told to have a seat in the lobby. We waited about 45 minutes and then I went to inform the Celebrity Resorts people that no one had spoken to us yet although they had spoken to other people. Finally, a man named David came to talk to us to explain that American Vacation Resorts had gone bankrupt and that a court had given the accounts to Celebrity Resorts to settle. He explained a lot of details that I will spare you but the long and shrt of it was that we had to give Celebrity Resorts $10,000 that very afternoon or lose everything we had invested in American Vacation resorts. I asked David to give me his card and the information in writing and he said he had no busines cards. He also said he had nothing in writing that he could give me. I replied that I could not make a decision at that moment and he informed me that unless I did, I would lose everything.
Given the facts of the situation, I walked away stating that I could not make a $10,00 decsion right there and then. I have no idea what would have happened if we had written them a check but I did see other very disgruntled persons who were presumably members who also refused to pay another fee.
There are many things in play here. First, we were never notified about anything concerning American Vacation Resorts going into bankruptcy and then having the courts award the client list to Celebrity Resorts. 2) Celebrity Resorts sent nothing in writing except a letter asking us to meet them. 3). Celebrity Resorts personnel (we can only presume they were Celebrity resorts personnel because we never saw any business cards or ID to indicate that.) wanted a large sum of money then and there which is wrong for a legitimate business. 4). Celebrity Resorts indicated that if we did not take advantage of their offer, we would lose everything with American Vacation resorts even though we have no information about American Vacation Resorts. 5). The Celebrity Resorts person stated that we would have to pay an additional assessment to maintain our membership with Celebrity after we paid them the $10,000.6). Not only did the Clebrity resorts person, David, refuse to give us his business card, but he refused to allow us to take the notes he had written about the Celebrity Resorts arrangements he had explained to us when we said we wanted time to think about the issues. 7) He also stated that he had nothing in writing to give us. Our interview was conducted while we were all standing int he lobby of the Marriott Inn, an unusual arrangement indeed.
All American Vacation resorts members should join in a class action suit to sue Celebrity resorts for invasion of privacy and to redeem their balances.
0 comments