United Reservation Services Wasted our time. Gave us worthless gifts. Tried to scam our money Internet, Texas

 My wife and I were contacted by United Reservation Services via postcard that we had won a free 8 day trip to the Caribbean plus free airfare, plus another free three day trip if we would attend a 90 minute sales pitch at a local hotel. Along with 5 other couples we watched a PowerPoint presentation and the pich man promised they could save us 40% to 60% on vacation costs, including cruises, hotels and airfare. We were asked to joint a travel club that cost $8995 plus other fees and yearly dues. They also asked if we owned a time share, which we do.



It sounded like a very good deal as we would save that amount of money in a few trips. An additional plus was that we could bring unlimited numbers of friends and family on these trips for the same reduced rates. They even hinted that we could actually make money off our friends by charging them a reasonable fee for their deeply discounted rates.



After the presentation a sales rep spoke to us individually but immediately handed us over to the manager when he found out we owned a time share. This individual offered to buy our "worthless" time share for $4000 credit toward the club fee and harped on and on about how time shares were such a bad deal. He showed us lists of "free" time shares on e-bay. He could actually buy our time share and rent it back to us for less than we paid in maintenance fees. This raised a red flag for me because if it was so worthless, why was he offering us $4000 for it?



When he found we still owed some money on the time share he stated that he couldn't make the deal but that for slightly reduced club services he would bring our fee down to around $3500. At this point it sounded like a marvelous deal and we were very close to buying in. Then he handed us back to the original sales rep who wanted to give us back the club services of the reduced price in lieu of the free travel packages promised. More red flags! If they were willing to drop the club initiation fees so dramatically, why didn't they offer us that deal in the first place? Also, they were offering us a lower deal than they had offered when trying to buy the time share, which meant they were trying to get our time share for free. Also, and this was highly suspicous, this deal was only available in the next few minutes and we had no opportunity to research their reputation or to talk to any of the more than "50,000" people that had jointed the club, or visit their website with all the great travel deals. More red flags.



Then we were told that the free airfare could not be used to get to the free cruise port, and that both the "free" trips and free airfare were subject to fees, taxes, and blackout dates. My spidey senses were calling out, "If it sounds too good to be true," and "The free trips aren't free." But the final flag was that if they were the big dogs in the travel industry, "largest in the world," why did they need to use an outside vender to to issue us the "free" trips and airfare? So in the end we walked out without giving them any money. All we lost was an evening of our time. My sense is, these guys are scam artists who can't deliver on what they promise. But I have no proof of that. I would love to hear from people who have actually paid their roughly $10,000 about their experiance with United Reservation Services.