Victim Location 39520
Total money lost $3,995
Type of a scam Travel/Vacations
A scam which promises a free vacation if you sit in a 90-min sales presentation. The presentation is for a travel club which promises deep discounts to members in return for 8995.00 memberships. They offer you discounted memberships (6995.00 and down all the way to 2500.00) for different variations of club membership and benefits. These offers are only good if you surrender your credit card and pay on the spot for the membership.
There are dozens if not hundreds of these ‘clubs’ selling memberships around the country. They claim to have been in business for more than 30 years, but a quick Google search shows that they just opened FB pages and websites 4 months ago. They prevent you from finding out this information ahead of time by never telling you the same company name, and advertising as local familiar entities. The one we attended originally claimed to be a ribbon cutting ceremony for the Golden Nugget Casino (a very well know regional location). I have found several that are operating under a holdings company called WSW Holdings. They also branch themselves out into "ISO companies or Independent Sales Offices" to further confuse potential targets and divert legal action. The ISO listed on our paperwork is called Ultimate Excursions. The fine print on the documents relieves Coconut club of any liability for any promises made by Ultimate Excursions and relieves WSW holding from any liability for any of the services delivered by Coconut Club Vacations.
In the end we paid 3995.00 to a company that was never mentioned in the advertising or the presentation and then were unable to call back the numbers from the service representatives or call the "24-hr concierge" number. So, we went back to the casino where they are STILL selling memberships and asked for a refund. They refused and claimed to be legitimate. We called security and the police, but no one will stop the scam presentations.
What is more, my parents attended a later session of the same presentation and did not buy. They got the voucher for the free travel that was promised. The free vacation is NOT free and actually requires you to mail in a check just to "activate" the program. It also states that there will be additional fees and surcharges and restrictions applied to all flights and vacations.