Calypso Cay Resorts

I recently won two airline tickets as a result of a lottery drawing. Remembering that I hadn't used my vacation package, I decided to make the best of it and fly to one of the areas that was a part of the package. We settled on Florida. When I contacted the travel agency to make the reservations, they told me that if I wanted to be in close proximity to where the welcome center was (because we had to listen to a 90-minute "presentation"), I should upgrade my standard package to the deluxe package, which would put us right across from the welcome center and give us access to free shuttle service. They also described the amenities, which sounded nice. The upgrade was $160.

We arrived at the resort and thought it was okay. However, five minutes after getting there, a customer was expressing his frustration with the front desk staff. I looked at my husband like "oh boy, here we go...". One quick note: I noticed right away that the front desk staff did not appear very chipper. After all, this was called the Calypso Cay and the colors were festive; I expected the staff to at least be smiling. Anywhoo...

We get to the room and were immediately disappointed. Mind you, this was an "upgrade" from the standard accommodations. I am afraid to see what we upgraded from. The room was drabby, there were sheets on top of a blanket, and the fitted sheet did not fit right because it kept coming off the corners the whole time we were there. The carpet was old, and I commented to my husband I wondered if it had ever been changed. However, we decided to make the best of our stay there. I was taken aback by the fact that they charge 15% gratuity on EVERYTHING at the tiki bar, even a hamburger.

Here is the kicker: we checked out on June 9th. Since we didn't even pick up the phone to call the front desk, we knew that there should be no additional charges for us. We'd budgeted ourselves down to the penny, having enough money left to take a cab to the airport, because Florida is expensive. The front desk clerk says, "your balance is $59.60". My head almost spun around. Balance for what? They explained that we had to pay taxes on the room. Now, when I was making the arrangements and paid the additional fee to upgrade, not to mention the $99 booking fee, nowhere did it come up that these fees did not include taxes.

When we were checking in, this never came up. It only came up after we were checking out. So, we had a nice little complaining session going on. We were then asked to go in the back room and talk to the GM, Michael P. He must be very practiced in these issues, because he was calm and listened. Bottom line, we had spent all of our money paying for gratuities and all the other stuff there and had enough to get to the airport. He told us if we didn't pay the (surprise) balance, they would have to call the authorities. He did offer to work with us though. He told my husband, "well, you could leave something here as collateral, such as a cell phone". We live in Illinois! Why would we leave a cell phone in Florida for a $59 bill! We told him over and over that we were never told taxes were not included and even showed him the confirmation from the travel agency. It didn't matter. Eventually, I had to call my best friend and she emailed this man her credit card information so that we wouldn't have to go to jail.

While we were in there being held hostage for $59, another family was going through the same thing as they checked out, and he had his clerk to call the authorities on them. AND, as that was going on, another family had the exact same issue. 3 families in a row during checkout!? That should tell you something! Thank God for my friend being able to help us out, although she was on a fixed income! I paid her back, but nothing could quell the embarrassment from this!

Contracts numbered 13148 & 13171. 2 3-bedroom units were purchased at a presentation on 6/14/07. The 1st year we paid maintenance fees of $532 per unit. This year (yr.2) we were contacted in August, 2009 by Meridian, a purported collection agency, indicating that the maintenance sum was $1,385.92 PER UNIT. We contested this sum.

By September 30, 2009 we were again contacted to now pay $1,526.58 for BOTH UNITS. We again queried this sum and was advised that late fees of $379.08 and interest charges of $114.98 were applied.

I refused to pay these punitive charges since 1. Our efforts by phone to pay via customer service failed. 2. I received no bill in the mail. 3. No one call when the bill was due. 4. Meridian claims that the bill was due in April but the anniversary is June. We gave specific and clear instructions to pay the sum of $1,032.92 from my credit card but $1,191.74 was charged on my visa card.

Bait & Switch. For our yearly vacation, we purchased a package to stay at their resort.

What we received was a substandard hotel room in a hotel that was dirty, not-secure, and in general horrid conditions.

Hallway carpet stains every two feet, elevator floors filthy w/vents with caked on dirt, scuffed walls in the hotel room, and bed mattresses that sank to the box spring were all "standard" and "no extra charge."

We talked to at least six other families with similar feelings of being "held hostage" and similar discontent.

The problem is the strongarm or shady tactics that the marketing department or contractors do in booking. The problem is that the hotel management is excellent at ignoring phone calls. The problem is that The Sales dept. claims that Marketing Contractors and Hotel Operators are all different entities.

The company is a timeshare resort. i own a week there(23 rd week of year) the issue is over 2008 maintenence fees. they are due april 1st of year, there was a issue of the 2007 fees in feb 08. that was there fault and corrected in march 08. No one then said anything about 2008 fees. i emailed in may 2008 to deposited my week in june into interval international so i can use it another time and also to pay the 2008 fees.

i received a response the end 1st week of june to say i couldnt do anything with my week because the fees for 2008 was not paid and the account was now in collections. and i had to pay not only the fees but the collection fee as well before i could use it. iafter that i made several attempts to resolve this matter. Note: There is no documentation that says a timeframe that the fees is due by! just says its due on april 1st. but no deadline! Their was no notice to me to say if fees wasnt paid by a said date that it would then definitely go to collections,

I did not receive my first notice that the acct was even in collections until in june , several weeks after it was in collections, ( i was told it was sent to collections 05/19) by alan sherman( director of call ctr). So you can see that there is a cloud of gray everywhere with this company. The past 3 years i have paid at different times in the latter part of the year for maintenence fees and never had to pay collection fees, and the fees got paid!

Now they want me to pay $700 or so for maintenence fees and collection fees, when the main. fees is only $464.00 and even then i still lose my week/points! This timeshare i only get to use for 1 week every other year, i pay a annual maintenece fee of $400 plus, and i share the unit with 25 to 50 other owners ( the specific unit)

That resort may have 150 or more units with 25 to 50 owners per unit all paying each the $400 plus in fees. I want to pay only 2008 maintenence fees and get my week or points back to deposit somewhere else. i dont want to stay there anymore, i have learned my lesson!

I went along with it.

As soon as I got off the phone my partner Brett hit the roof because Brett is the only income earner, I lost my job in the beginning of the year because I left for a month to be with my brother in Canada as he was in ICU and not expected to make it.
He survived thank God but has lost his sight. That is another story!

We have six children and the whole idea of this holiday package for us is nuts. I was nuts.

So I contacted the company to cancel, and also contacted my credit card to stop it and cancelled my credit card.
I did everything correctly and dispite that we got our statement on the 4th of October 2005 and have phoned, every night to get our money back, explained the situation umpteen times, and lately have started to email also, and today I sent a letter in the usual way.
They never deny that I am entitled to my money returned, but have tried every imaginable method to stop me.
Now they say they have to have my new credit card number to return my money.
I said I would be nuts to do that.
I only recieved the confirmation email on the 20 of September and have never recieved the package in the post with the tickets etc.
I have never been spoken to nicely since I purchased the "prize". They stall, make up excuses like
"you have to open the package first"
"we have changed carriers and they are slow compared to fedex"
"once you send the package back, we'll refund"

etc etc.

The latest conversations have got so nasty with the berating and belittling that I have been in tears and spent the whole day yesterday crying.
We cannot afford this.
We never could afford this.
It was a terrible mistake that I did when I was really ill and heavily medicated.
My family is suffering because of this silly silly decision I made.
With our "negotiations" tonight Steve Rice is apparently getting back to me.
I have only ever had one return call after being promised each of the 26 times I called.

The one return call I got was from Louis Vargas and he was so rude I couldn't believe it.

Louis Vargas was on the customer care line and was by far the rudest man.