American Dream Vacations Beware! RV broke down 1000 miles from home; still not repaired after 3 days; refused to compensate for cost of alternative return home for family of 9 Houston Texas

 We rented a Class A Motor Home from American Dream Vacations for a family trip to South Dakota last summer, with a reasonable expectation of a safe and sound unit.  We had issues with rough handling, a damaged outside storage door flying open, A/C that only worked sporadically, problems with slide-outs working properly, & a bad tire, all of which we simply dealt with.  The final straw was when the motor home overheated and shut down on the interstate on the evening of Wed., July 4, 2012.  We located an inexpensive hotel for our family of 9 (including 5 grandchildren & my pregnant daughter) and so began our extended stay in North Platte, NE, over 1000 miles from home.

Thursday morning we located the only repair facility that could even look at it before Monday.  It was determined that the fan clutch housing had fallen and they needed at least the next day to complete the repairs.  Taking pity on our plight the repair facility worked on the RV until 8:00 pm Friday night, but still needed more time.  They came in Saturday morning to complete the repairs, though they are normally closed on weekends (and this was a holiday weekend as well).  At noon we thought we would soon be on the road, but bad vibrations on the test drive revealed that the U-Joint/drive shaft connection was bad and unsafe to drive.  Parts would not be available until Monday at the soonest.  (It’s understood that breakdowns can occur, but there were indicators according to the repair facility that faulty repairs or maintenance may have been the culprit.) American Dream Vacations wanted us to continue to remain with the unit, but we had already lost 3 days and would be late returning to our jobs and other important commitments.  We lost the food in the refrigerator, had been doubled up staying in 2 hotel rooms, and had to buy all of our meals out, instead of cooking as planned and staying at inexpensive campgrounds.  Their agent was sympathetic and advised us to obtain transportation home, including a trailer to transport our belongings, and they would “hot shot” the unit back when the repairs were completed.  We had a pickup with us, but with 9 people in our party had to have the 2^nd vehicle in order to get home.  She assured us that “we will take care of you”.  In our haste to get home we failed to get that commitment in writing. Big mistake.

One way vehicles and trailers are costly ($950.00), as are meals, even at fast food restaurants, along with hotel rooms, campground cancellation fees, extra days of dog boarding, etc.  Even being frugal, it cost us over $2000.00 to get home, not counting the additional days away from work.  This, on top of the original cost to rent the unit.  It doubled the cost of our trip.

Upon our return we submitted our request for reimbursement, even whittling it down to $1600.00, which was less than the actual itemized expenses.  They did not reimburse us one dime for any of our unexpected out of pocket expenses to transport our family home.  They reimbursed us for the bad tire that had to be replaced, 3 days of non-use of the unit and a proration of the unused mileage charge.  The owner kept insisting they had been fair and equitable.  It seems he did in essence comply with the terms of the contract, but some circumstances should demand some decency and ethics and further compensation.  We work in a service business and it is not uncommon to go beyond the contractual liability from a good will standpoint.  Our negotiations with ADV stopped in September as I just could not deal with it any longer.  So just be wary of American Dream Vacations, we did not find them to be an upstanding, reputable business to deal with.