Bon Voyage Travel
"Stephanie Stone" Vacation Scam - Associating themselves with a Grocery store

About a month or so ago, my mother received a phone message on her phone stating that she had won a prize because her name had been drawn from a contest she had entered at a local store. The answering machine hung up on the person, so there was no number left and the caller ID said, "Unknown".

Today, she received a call again stating that she had won and needed to claim her prize. The woman sounded very legit and sounded like she was from the corporate office of the store my mother had submitted the entry at. My mother returned the call and was told she won a vacation package to either Orlando or Las Vegas or a cruise to Cozumel. She was also told that this trip was for "a couple".

My mother has been a widow for 8 years now and said she was a widow. Next she was told that she had to be married or have a significant other to get the trip. She was told that the vacation could be put in someone elses name (mine and my boyfriends names) and then transferred back to her once the prize was claimed. I thought this was "odd"... Anyway, I called the number and the woman explained to me that Bon Voyage was a discount travel agency and that we needed to come sign the papers today to claim the prize. She also asked how much money I made per year. I bought this all pretty well. They did a great job of sounding legit.

I decided that I needed to know if I should bring any documents with me to the office for my appointment. I checked the internet for the local office number and low and behold, there isn't one easily accessible and all I came across was complaints and scam reports about this company. This prompted me to call the corporate office of the store and ask them about this contest and I was told that they no longer did any business or held contests with this travel agency and a few others because of their unethical business practices.

Then I read all about these other people who had been scammed into this. They may actually not require a credit card or anything, I don't know. They may wind up giving you a vacation after all. I can't say for sure since I won't be going to the office now. What I do know is that "Stephanie" said it would take about an hour and half to get the paperwork done, but that if we didn't come to the office today the prize would become forfeit. Now it all sounds like bull to me If you really win something it shouldn't be this dang complicated.

What I'm most concerned about is that my mother is 68 and a pretty trusting soul as I tend to be, which might have been a really bad thing in this situation. She could have gone to the office. Who knows what she or any other unsuspecting naive soul might have signed up for. What really sucks is that we were really excited about it as first.

It all sounded legit. It sounded like they were associated with the store since "Stephanie" mentioned the store in the call a few times. She never said she represented the travel agency. She just kept referring to the store the contest was won at. This store has a great reputation so people may automatically trust its legitimacy as we did... Really upsets me... Thank goodness I researched it a bit before I actually went there.

Company: Bon Voyage Travel
Country: USA
State: Texas
City: Austin
Address: 7000 North Mopac Expwy
Phone: 8777771618119

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