Complaint Review: Grand Mayan

Grand Mayan Vacation Club made many fraudulent misrepresentations in order to sell us a vacation club membership.

On July 2nd, 2012 we visited The Gran Mayan resorts in Nuevo Vallarta Mexico. We were offered the opportunity to tour the facilities and receive some complementary gifts in exchange of a sales presentation. They sat us a a really nice brunch buffet, gave us $200.00 credit on our room bill, and free massages.  I have been to many sales presentation in my life, but never have I felt so captive and pressured in a room with 20 other patrons.

Three different vacation plans were presented, each plan was attached with a different price tag. These Plans included the Grand Luxxe, Grand Bliss, and Grand Mayan. Although we liked and enjoyed the facilities, the price tag for each was way over our budget. After we declined several of their plans they offered a reduced price for Mexican nationals. Patricia Puerner, the sales rep., told me that Mexican nationals got a reduced price because their was a big push to get more Mexicans to purchase in Mexico since the majority of vacation owners were Canadians or Americans. Patricia Asked me if I was a Mexican national.  I responded with yes. At the time I didnt have on hand documents that identified me as aMexican National. I told them that all I had was a Mexican birth certificate at home. After 5 hours of been held hostage, Patricia gave us a new purchase price and said that they would have to have a copy of my birth certificate on file for us to get this deal. Patricia said that Grand Mayan would contact me at a later date to get a copy of my Mexican birth certificate. The Vacation club membership included 3 weeks per year for a 1 bedroom suite at the Grand Mayan, 1 VIDA week/year (through SFX), and 1 breakaway week/ year (through HSI).  The total cost of the membership finance was $431 per month for 60 months.  The down payment was split into two equal payments. First payment was for $4341.00 and the 2nd payment due September 2, 2012. Even after the price break for being a Mexican national, we still could not afford the monthly payment. At the time we did not realize it, but their sales person, Patricia, lied to us by saying that we could sell them back 3 of the Grand Mayan weeks per year, for the first 5 years, for their (Grand Mayan) marketing use. Patricia lied to us by saying that we would get $1600 per week if we gave these weeks back to them on a yearly basis, equating to $4800.00 of income per year. She calculated the cost per month and said we would only have to pay $31 per month after we received the funds for the 3 week rentals. All these costs had been calculated on an official Grand Mayan worksheet showing the total financing minus the sum of rental income. Before meeting with Brian Tait of member services, Patricia advised us to not mention that we were going to depend on the rental income to pay for the financing. At the time we didnt see anything wrong with it but now I know why.  

While meeting with Brian Tait, of member services, he told us he would email us a copy of the contract along with all the other paperwork that we had signed or initialed. Within that paperwork was the worksheet with all the calculated costs of financing and rental income. Brian Tait also suggested to allow him to send us a hard copy of the contract via DHL. He was very adamant that we not take the hard copy with us due to a risk of getting lost while traveling in Mexico. He seemed very concerned but now I realize he had a different agenda. With very limited access to e-mail I was unable to check into the documents that were sent by Grand Mayan.

By this time I had already made a down payment of $4600 dollars with a balance of $4300 due in september. And Grand Mayan had all my financial information to automatically debit my credit card for the monthly payment and the rest of the down payment. 

A week after we arrived back in California, I looked into the e-mail sent to me by Grand Mayan. I noticed all the documents were there with the exception of the worksheet showing all the rental income calculations.  As I read and got familiar with the contract and different programs such as SFX and HSI, I realized that there was only a 5 day grace period in which we could cancel the contract if we chose to. I looked in a little further and called into the Grand Mayan member services (1800-292-9446). I inquired about how to initiate the process of giving the 3 weeks back to them for marketing purposes. The Grand Mayan customer service rep said that they were not in the business of renting out weeks. Then I realized that Patricia had made fraudulent misrepresentations through out her sales presentation. To this date they still have not requested a copy of my Mexican birth certificate.

Then all the chips fell into place.

1. The lies about being able to give Grand Mayan back 3 weeks per year for marketing purposes and receiving $1600 per week. 
2. The missing worksheet with the documented financing minus the sum of rental income.
3. Patricia advising us to not mention that we were going to depend on the rental income to pay for the financing.
4. Brian Tait suggesting to allow him to send us a hard copy of the contract via DHL.
5. The Mexican national discount

All the fraudulent statements and actions, misrepresentation, and deceptions were part of their grand scheme to get us to purchase a vacation membership through the Grand Mayan.

 Merchants Response
I contacted member services on August 7th and requested to speak to someone that would remedy my situation. I received a call from Craig Silva from member services on August 9th, 2012 @ 9:55 AM. After speaking to Craig for about 25 minutes he offered to revise my contract so that the monthly payments would be more affordable. I mentioned that making the payments more affordable was not going to remedy the situation. The only remedy was to honor what their sales person, Patricia, had offered. The rental of my 3 vacation weeks at a price of $1600 per week by Grand Mayan Vacation Club. He gave me the details. I was not impressed with his mode of customer care and asked him to send it to me via email so I could discuss it with my wife. I received a revised contract on August 17th. I later requested a breakdown of the major changes in my revised contract. I received the breakdown of changes on August 24th, then realized that my vacation plan had been down graded. I was not going to be receiving the same package that I originally started with.

On August 28th I contacted CHASE, my credit card company that i used for my transactions with grand Mayan. I filed a dispute and cancelled all transactions coming from Mayan. I needed to recover my money that was basically stolen from me. A couple of weeks later ( 9-11-12)  CHASE credited back my account with the original payment made to grand Mayan. To this day Grand MAyan reps attempt to contact me for payment of my balance from the down payment. THEY ARE RELENTLESS IN THEIR TACTIC TO MAKE A DOLLAR FROM HARD WORKING AMERICANS.

DO NOT BUY FROM THEM. DO NOT BE BLINDED BY THEIR BEAUTIFUL RESORTS. THEY ARE A BUNCH OF CROOKS READY TO TAKE YOUR HARD EARNED MONEY!