Festiva Hospitality Group This company took my points without warning because i did not use them or defer them as i was unaware that they had to be used within the year. Asheville North Carolina

I purchased a time share from Festiva about 2 years ago. The day of purchase was very hectoc as we really did not want to buy but did end up getting talked into it but at that point we just wanted to get out and they where just throwing one paper after another at us to sign away. Apparently one of the papers stated that if we do not use our points in the calander year and/or defer them for one year then we would lose them.

When we signed up we were given 4,000 points and 3,000 bonus points and every other year we get 4,000 points. We where under the impression that we could role our points over year after year so that we could take a really nice trip to another country. Keep in mind we have never owned a time share in our lives so this was all new to us.

Well after 2 years of paying almost 200 a month and maintenance fees, we only have 4,000 points. This year they sent us a bill for the maintenance fees so when we logged on to pay the fee we notices there was only 4,000 points in the account when there should have been 11,000. after looking through my contract again i notices there was a paper in there that stated that if points are not use within the calander year or defered by December 15 of that calander year you would lose your points.

Our biggest problem with this is because we only get points every two years how are we, for one supposed to remember to go on and defer them for another year, and two if we only get 4,000 points every two years then we can only take a small vacation every two years because the points required for some of those trips we don't get enough yet im paying them 200 a month for 84 months and everyother year maintenace fees that are around 900. To me this is a huge rip off.

Another thing is why can't they send out a notice to remind us to use our points or defer them, we heard nothing from them yet they had no problem taking out my payments everymonth and they have no problem sending us (In the mail) a bill for the maintanence fee. 

This company does not do very good buisness at all if they have no problem taking money but not making sure that their owners are utilizing everything that they are paying for.

So needless to say i have spent 5,000 on monthly payments so far and 1,600 on maintanence fees for the last 2 years and have not used the time share once. and i only have 4,000 points now to use by the end of 2016 which i have already defered so i won't lose them this time.

I think that the company should return my points that they took and start sending out reminders to the owners to make sure that they are aware that there points will expire on a certain date, especially new owners as they are not formiluar with how time shares work. It is only far that they do this seeing as we only get the points everyother year, hard to remember our monthly bills never mind the everyother year ones.