Holiday Rentals Direct is a name that keeps on popping up lately in emails from concerned timeshare consumers and in comments on our blog.
This supposed “rental” company seems to have changed their tune and are cold calling Timeshare owners to recommend them of the guaranteed buyer they have lined up for their timeshare and ask an upfront holding-fee of €1195 to get the papers sorted.
Holiday Rentals Direct seems to be based in Torrox, a coastline village of Malaga, Spain. Their address is a post box: Apartado 66 Sur 1, 29793 Torrox and their contact number is a Spanish landline number: 0034952547486 or Spanish Mobile 0034622148778
The Website: www.holidayrentalsdirect.eu provides the consumer with the usual pitch on how this is the company to help them to dispose of their timeshare and it is backed up by the usual testimonials of happy timeshare owners of different nationalities. Unfortunately there is no clear identification of the company neither are the legal requirements fulfilled for websites and the collection of personal data.
Being a Holiday rental company is it very unusual though that the rental side of their website is not developed at all.
On the web they also state: “We are not a Timeshare resale company or a listing company.” Which are “strong” words for a company that cold calls timeshare consumers, offer a guaranteed resale and request an upfront fee….So what are they? Let us guess!
Taking all the above in account and the fact that they don’t seem to be aware it goes against the Timeshare Directive to request any upfront fees for a resale service, needless to say that our main advice with this company is to HANG UP and don’t even listen to the pitch.
Have you been called by Holiday Rentals Direct (0034) 952 54 74 86 or (0034) 622 148 778 ? Let us know!
Mindtimeshare 
Hi please look at my comment from 17th July 2012, I have just recieved a call from the company saying that they are going to give me a refund for the €1400, as they could nor sell my timeshare and as it was coming up to the end of the tax year they had to tidy their paperwork up. They asked for my card details that ended in the numbers i paid with, this sent alarm bells ringing, so I told them i didnt have that account any more, they asked for new card details or a credit card, so I explained my hubby had them at work and could they send me a cheque, they said that wasn’t possible as it had to go through the electronic deceive !!! When i mentioned i had being trying to contact them for over a year there reason was problems with their phone lines, can u give me any guidance or has anyone else heard back from them ?
They took money off from me guarentted me as certain selling of my dwvc shares. They never responded never picked a phone. I m in a desperate need of finances but they do not pick the above number. Help will be appreciate ed. S M
could you please help us with getting our monies back from the holiday lettings,
i used my debit card, this was in August 2012 and funny enough had phone calls back
telling me it had been sold, asking for taxes. then the monies from the sale would be deposited
into my account.
Dear Linda,
Thanks for your message.
We will reply by email in more detail but as you mention the Debit Card, please note that for payments by Debit Card you only have 120 days to request a refund. So if you are still on time, do contact your bank as soon as possible and file the refund claim.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hallo erst mal 9.3.2012
Ich gehöre auch zu den jenigen die vermutlich reingelegt worden sind.
Ich hatte bei Holiday Rentals Direct eine Anfrage gestellt zwecks Wiederverkauf meines
Wohnrechtes auf Gran Canaria.Mir wurde telefonisch mitgeteilt das ein Vertrag zum
Wiederverkauf erstellt wird.Dieser wurde Mir zugeschickt und ich sollte ihn Unterschreiben
und zurückschicken.Ich sollte eine Sicherheitszahlung von 1395 € leisten die mir dann
bei erfolgreichen Verkauf wieder zurück erstattet wird.Ich glaubte dieser ganzen Geschichte erst,wiel nach kurzer Zeit sich die Firma Holiday Rentals Direct meldete
und einen Käufer hat.Ein Hr. Hunten kontaktierte uns und hatte angeblich zum Käufer kontakt aufgenommen.
Er sagte es würde jetzt nur noch die Zusage vom Käufer fehlen.Auf die Zusage warte
Ich heute noch und bei Holiday Rentals Direct kann man keinen Menschen mehr tele-
phonisch erreichen eine Frechheit ist das.
I was contacted a while back and paid them over £1,000 to pay admin etc to sell my timeshare. I spoke to a man called James Clark and they took payment directly from my bank account with the promise that they had a buyer. I then phoned them on 0034952547486 and was told things had fallen through and that the market was very slow. I left it for a couple of months and phoned again to be told the market was still slow so I asked if I could withdraw from their company and be given my money back to go to someone else that could help but was told that things would pick up very shortly and to trust them to sell my timeshare. So again I left it for about a month and then emailed them at admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu and asked for my money back as things had become very tight at home and needed the money back as they had not fulfilled their promise but the emaile was returned to me??? So alarm bells started ringing and I have been trying to get in touch with them now for a couple of months and the telephone line is now dead. I am at my wits end as I borrowed the money to pay them in the first place and I am really struggling to repay it. I would appreciate any help that I can get on this matter. I have a reference number HRDS542. Please can anyone help????
I too was “conned” by Holiday Rentals into parting with 1800 Euros to sell my time share in Malta supposedly for a ready buyer. I realised after parting with the money and then receiving the contract, it was in fact an “open-ended” agreement to sell without guarantee. they were very apologetic, etc. but would not refund my money. It was after a time that I discovered Mindtimeshare and following Senor Garcia’s advise claimed against my Credit card Company. I had to send a claim to Holiday Rentals by recorded delivery, but this was returned as “unable to deliver”. I then had to chase my Credit card Company a few times, but they have just paid me IN FULL now!
Hi I just wanted to say that thanks to Alberto’s help I managed to get all of the money back that Holiday Rentals Direct and Travel Connect conned from my mother and father in law. Nationwide processed the complaint quickly. It took me a long time to get the paperwork together (80 pieces of documentation in the end) but it was worth it to receive over £8k and the peace of mind that my in laws had not lost their money. I could not have done this without Alberto’s guidance and support, for which I am very grateful. I didn’t think I would be successful with the claim so please if you are thinking of not bothering don’t, it is worth it and the more we complain about con artist companies like these hopefully the more people will be aware and more will be done. Thanks Alberto!
We are the same. My wife dealt with it and parted with two payments for 1800 and 1820euros. a good factor is we still have our original paper work and a new set that was the exchange and to the value of 11,750 “Principle travel”. on a basis that it should be returned signed and then a sale could go ahead. For some reason we didn’t, myself I hadn’t been party and had no idea of the process that was discussed 8 months on we are here. Now I will need to check if these are legit.
I have been contacted by these people AGAIN. The lady is allegedly called Rebecca White and she tells me they have a buyer for my timeshare but they ONLY want £950 as a retainer. I have not given them anything. They say they will send a courier over to collect the paperwork and then I will have to sign a contract AND the credit card authorisation slip. Doing it this way would mean they have the DEEDS, A CONTRACT, AND THE MONEY !!!!!! I don’t think so..
As I’ve said before, this is the second time these people have tried to get me to sell it to them. Rebecca does come over as very plausible and friendly ( unlike the first guy ) but she also claimed to have got my name off the “database” .
I am NOT proceeding. BEWARE !!!!!!
Good for you – terrible thing to say but – TRUST NO-ONE!
We too have been c***d by holiday rentals direct, paid 1400 euros as a holding fee, when they claimed to have buyers, only for the so called buyers to pull out !! I asked for the holding fee back and was told they keep it for a year, this time is nearly up and now I can’t get in touch with them the line is always busy !!! Can you help please ?
Thank you for your replies! When i got in contact with these people it just didn’t feel right. So i got in touch with my bank and asked them about these kind of matters. My bank strongely advised me not to pay anything to these people. Your replies aknowledge that my feeling was right. I’m glad i didn’t pay anything. I hope all victims get their money back!
Stone.
I to seem to have been taken in by the glib talk of Holiday Rentals Direct sales girls and am now out of pocket by 1795 euros.They offered me £25200 for my 16500 diamond points I signed their contract as they said they had a buyer and said they were getting the money off them and then nothing. I have tried phoning and emailing them but get no reply. As others I wish I had found this site first. Where do I go from here.
2 years on I have eventually sat down and put together all the paperwork and a letter setting out dates, names, promises (in particular their promise of a guaranteed sale)
and sent it to my credit card company. Within 3 weeks I have received their offer of a full
refund £1543 and also the interest charge on it for the last 2 years. They agreed that
HRD had misrepresented me as implied under the section 75 of the consumer credit
act 1974. Hooray but why did I leave it this long?.
Hi
I just been contacted by 2 girls that actually know witch other, but they give me different company names and different contact details: Anne from Time share World 08712445199 and Kelly Davies from Holidays Lettings 0034952547124.
They talked the talk, very convincing until the point Kelly ask me to pay 1800 Euro’s for holding fee. I told her to call me another day, This away I had time to research them, and I’m glad I did.
I wouldn’t pay, because I don’t have the money, but its really annoying how my contact details can be assessed by this so called company’s.
I am now fed up and tired with companies cold calling me will so calls for them to buy or retieve money, so this week i contacted my home resort and told them that i would not be paying the maintenance this year, and they could if they wish rent out the 2 weeks to recover the cost of the fees, i also said I would be willing to relingish my timeshare send back my contacts and deeds. They have replied and asked me o fill in a form signed return contacts and deeds. They also said they was a company in manchester legal who would try and sell my weeks, but I am aleady registered with them and have been for a year and nothing as come of it, so i gone down the route of returning contacts and deeds. As anyone down down this route?
How I got my money back from Holiday Rentals Direct
I think like most people, that found their way to this site. I thought, If only I had found this site sooner! Those words rattled around in my head as I felt my blood pressure rise. If only I’d gone along with my first suspicion.
The problem that I had already parted with 1,800.00 EUR = 1,455.99 GBP
After reading one, after another, after another comments all describing the same things that I’d just been through. I thought I would never get my money back.
But I didn’t give up. I searched the Internet for information and wrote an e-mail using as many legal jargon, as I thought necessary. Two days later, I received a phone call.
I was informed that the money would be returned to me under the European Directive 2008/122/EC guarantee me 14 days cooling off period. I had informed them of this in my e-mail and i made them aware. That any and all expenses incurred in order to get back my money, would be passed on to them and they would be unable to duck this possible expense in the future, as I have forewarned. That there would be a foreseeable expense in the future should I have to fight for my money back and win. I hope this helps.
Thank goodness I found this website because to be honest I was pretty much sold on the spiel “Keith” gave! Now when lettingsdirect.eu call back today I can have a little fun and see just how high I can get the price, in fact I’m going to put £5000 on my asking price within the first 20 seconds of the call. Let’s see just how far they’re prepared to go……
I have unfortunately been conned by these people today and they have taken £1449 off my card i have already cancelled my card and reported it to natwest who will start to try and recover my money for me next week,i have not signed any contract so can you please send me any information that might help me. Like everyone else i wish i’d seen this sooner
I too have become victim of holiday rentals direct!!! I am £1300 out of pocket and totally down in the dumps!!!! How do.I get my money back…how do I get shut of these god awful vermin????
My ‘buyer’ has not paid…now she has given.my details to a corporate company kudos 5??? I have.no idea what to do next!!!?
Who do I report this scum.too???? I feel so foolish!!!!!
I’ve been contacted twice this week by Sandra de Wit from holiday Lettings and Sales, http://www.lettingsdirect.eu, CIF number is: B-93083996. Tel: 0034 92 547 124. So sounds exactly the same as previous victems. Thanks to this website I did not yet pay the 1500 Euro’s.
Martin.
Ive paid over 2 thousand pounds to holidayrentals direct,as im so desperate to get rid of my clublacosta points,they said they would be sold but i cant even get in touch with them. Any ideas?
Hi, I have been called today by a chap named Bryan Windsor from Holiday Lettings, – same address as HRD in Torrox, Malaga, tel number as Mark stated above, – .to swop my unused membership of Club Class to their “customer ” the Wilson’s, , but wanted a surety fee by credit card to pass onto their legal dept to process and they would ring me 10 mins later. I told him about HRD but he said that wasn’t them!! about 20 mins later I got a call from their “legal Dept” I said that I had changed my mind and did not want to proceed and not to take any money. About 20 mins later i got a call back from Bryan to say that he has been told that I wasn’t proceeding, but he has just taken a non-refundable deposit from the young couple,”Wilsons”,as part of “our contract” and got quite aggressive saying he will be proceeding with it and will be sending me the papers. I told him emphatically that I was NOT going ahead with the transaction and put the phone down on him. Their legal dept then phoned and told my wife that Bryan had told her we were going ahead. My wife said that we were not proceeding and the woman rang off. I hope this is the end of it.
Been contacted today by Clare Harris from ‘Holiday Lettings & Sales’ on Tel No: 0034952547124 quoting their website address as : http://www.lettingsdirect.eu. We received the usual inflated offer to buy our studio apartment at Fairways in Tenerife for £5500 and Clare advised there would be an upfront Insurance Bond payment of £1500 repayable on receipt of certificates. We asked for details of their company registration and she advised that their CIF was B93083996. This actually led us through to this website! Very cool customer, not phased by our questions.
Have just been called by “Holiday Lettings Direct”, who are using the same CIF number as “Holiday Rentals Direct”. A slight name change to try and confuse people, a new phone number though 0034952547124, but still the upfront fee request.
1st call, the guy called himself Keith Lennon, and I asked him to call back later, to give me a change to talk it over with the wife, but when he called back 15 minutes later, he was calling himself Darren.
Thanks for this Mark!
So we have a Holiday Lettings Direct, a Holiday Homes Direct and a Holiday Rentals Direct!
Do they really think people won’t find them on the internet?
Thanks for your quick action!
Kind regards
Customer Care
I almost enjoy these calls now, I keep them hanging on, get them convinced I’m hooked, ask them to call back when I’ve found my credit card, anything to waste their time. I try to sound like a vague old lady, but they know I have a timeshare and I stress I am keen to sell it, so they are ‘kind’ to me. Ha, as if taking £1500 from a vague old lady could ever be kind. Well they are never getting their hands on a penny from this ‘vague’ old lady.
Angela
Hi Angela,
Good for you! You make us smile!
Almost feel sorry for the telemarketer calling and thinking they have you in their pocket!
Thanks for sharing this with us!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Many thanks for your website. I got the HRD call today – standard pitch from a very pleasant lady called Sandra Forbes – she had a buyer who wanted to pay me £6000 for my timeshare. The security retainer would be 1500 euros. She was a little offended when I said I would have to check out the company first but she suggested I did rang her back when I had done so. i don’t think I’ll bother. When will European law get to grips with these people?
Hi Stuart,
Funny the caller did not have a problem with asking for money but was offended by the comment that you wanted to look up the company.
Shows that she perfectly well knows that you were not going to be here next paying customer (victim) on her list!
The European law is accepted, hopefully it is just a matter of time now
Kind regards
Customer Care
My mum was scamed (87 years) Easter Monday) , by a low life called Mr Ross Clarke , Holiday rentals Direct .Same old speel as above , mum gave all her debit card details , totally out of character!! , they took appox euros1300 plus a knock in her confidence I think that hurt her as much as the money . Ater many phone calls and e mails (,none answered ) to HRD .We informed fraud dept of mums bank .Norwich & Peterborough .they contacted Visa they paid money back from HRD account into her account on 1st may ,
I had a call from HRD a few days ago. The same pattern as others here. Unsolicited call saying they had a buyer lined up for my timeshare in Scotland, price £4500 and would I accept that price. The proposal is that I get the full price in cleared funds in my bank before I have to send them my ownership certificate. I said I would accept, and the next day they called back to say they had received the 20% deposit from the buyer. (That was very fast!) Only at that stage did they say they wanted me to pay €1200 as security in case I did not send them the ownership cerificate once I had the money, as they have had problems with this in the past and it costs €1200 to sort out. This set the alarms bells ringing. They assured me that I would be fully protected under the Consumer Credit Act 1974, but I said I would have to check that for myself. I have now seen how many other people they have tried to con. They are due to phone me again tomorrow, and I will suggest that they retain the €1200 out of my £4500 sale price until they receive the ownership certificate from me. If they are not crooks they will accept that offer, as their risk will still be covered, but somehow I doubt it! If by some miracle I get the balance of around £3500 and never see the withheld €1200, I will still be quids in!
Having done a bit of research into Section 75 of CCA 1974, I reckon I would not be protected by it, as it does not cover payments to intermediaries, only payment to the vendor of the goods or services. HRD would be an intermediary.
Hi Alistair,
Thanks for your comment about HRD.
They are very quick as well with pointing out that you are protected for a credit card payment.
Well, surprisingly they are the ones fighting the hardest when it comes to the bank claiming a refund on behalf of the consumer!
You can claim yes under the consumer act, but you have to proof mis-representation or breach of contract and HRD will certainly dispute that.
What about the Timeshare Directive? If HRD would at least go by the law, there would be no need for an upfront fee as this is not allowed.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I am in the process of trying to sell one of my timeshares on Costa Del Sol. I have just received a very aggressive, unsolicited phone call from holidayrentalsdirect asking me for personal details in order to “check that I actually own the timeshare.” I refused to give any details simply because the call was totally unsolicited. I asked him to tell me his company name so I could check out his website and asked him to call me back in 10 minutes. He then became very aggressive saying he wasn’t going to waste his time if I didn’t actually own it and that I had a negative attitude!!!!!
To me THAT says it all. I’m glad I decided to check them out and found your site. SELLER BEWARE.!!!!!
I too have been a victim of this disgusting company ,we are pensioners , and it has caused hard ship. They said”that the sale had fallen through” and that they passed us onto a Richard Kendall
from a company called kudos , he then wanted a further £2.500 to deal withour sale .So be aware
Ive dun it again they sounded genuine they hav taken 1300 euro from my credit card i havnt signed any of the paper work wot do i do?
My husband and I have definately been duped by HRD and a company called Millenium Marketing.
Millenium contacted us in November 2010 to by our holiday rental package. Needing the money we paid 1300.00 euros. We received the documents and all looked in order so we signed. They kept ringing us telling us that the sale was all going through and we should receive £4700.00. In April 22011 my husband was contacted by HRD who said they were selling on behalf of Millenuium and conned him into yet another 1700.00 euros as they had a buyer willing to pay £7800.00. He signed the paperwork and since then I have rung them several times for progress and always get a convincing we wll be in touch. However the last few times I have rung I have got a spanish answer machine and today unobtainable. I have emailled them on their website asking them to send our money asap as I am disabled and need the money to do things in our home to make life easier. Having read this site now I know that the chances of getting our money are about the same as me flying to the moon!
I think a relative of mine has been conned by the same companies half moon holdings and holiday rentals direct, as they asked for money upfront as soon as i heard of this i immediately thought it a scam. Also before this they were approached by club class and they offered another timeshare for the diamond points, they also had to pay a fee to deal with there case. Are club class a genuine company? By reading the other comments i now know that half moon holdings and holiday rentals direct are scams? Any advice on how to sort this out would be greatly appreciated. Thanks
Hi, Does the fact that we have actually given them our crerdit card details over the phone, but NOT signed or returned any document sent to us for Signature, reassure us that any payment will not be taken from our account WITHOUT our signature? We were “half -way” through their “fraudulent action”, when thankfully because we were VERY suspicious of this firm, that we fiound your website, and all the comments from other owners of timeshare, have literally stopped us in our tracks. Please can you reassure us on the above asap!
Hi Jean
Thanks for your comment.
No, unfortunately this does not mean they will not or cannot take the payment.
Obviously when claiming it back from the bank you can at least proof you didn’t authorise it with your signature.
Best is to call the bank and talk to them on how to stop the payment if the money hasn’t been taken yet.
If it has been charged to your account, start claiming it back.
Send the company a cancellation letter by recorded delivery and we will also contact you by email for further advice.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi again
Okay, since I last E Mailed you, my Husband has checked with his credit card acct and already £1500 has been withdrawn without any authority from us. He rang his bank and they have advised we cant do anything until Tuesday after Easter as they are now shut for the holidays. My question is they could do a similar withdrawal tomorrow, Sat , Sun and Monday if they felt like it! What do you advise us to do now please? If we forward a letter to Holiday Rentals direct by Registered post cancelling the contract (which has not been signed or even returned to them) how can they state that we would lose 20% admin charge when clearly no contracts or attached visa slip have been returned to them.
Hi Jean, my husband and I were in the same situation last year December, so I totally sympathize with you guys but within a month of the transaction we received all our money back. Just act quickly and send the contract back to HRD, persist with getting your money back and follow the advice given by Customer Care. All the best. Heather
I too have been conned by HRD. I paid them £600 by credit card. I feel such a fool to have this done to me again but when they dangle the prospect of getting your hard earned money back it is very tempting. What to do now cause chalking all this up to experience is starting to cost me a fortune – you’d think I’d have learned my lesson by now :o( Can anyone help?
Hi Claire,
Thanks for your comment.
We will send you more information by email tomorrow.
If you receive any paperwork from HRD please do not sign anything!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Wish I’d found this site sooner Iv been conned I paid £600 to this company and they said the customer needed a 14 day cooling off period and it was Debra jones who contacted me. I paid the money by a bank transfer what can I do to get my cash back
I was contacted today by HRD, they were very abrupt and refused to say who they were to begin with until I insisted that if they are going to contact me then I have the right to know who they are! The woman gave me the saga on how they work and it all sounded very convincing, as my membership is joint with my partner she advised me to contact him at work and go over the details as a buyer is immanent. He came home from work with his bank card and we processed the payment!! I Anne Sharpe eventually told me her name and gave me a big speal about her recently being in hospital with pneumonia! I felt sorry for her. She told me that I would receive a phone call to confirm the payment that I had just given her…. I am still waiting!! About an hour ago alarm bells went off in my head (yes I know I’m abit gullible) I found this website. When my partner came home from work I told him my thoughts and we contacted 24hour banking. They have cancelled his card!! What I would like to know has this ever worked out for anybody, in that they have actually got a genuine buyer or is the whole thing a complete and total scam? I know they will contact me tomorrow to tell me there is a problem with my card, I am looking for some good advice on what to say to them.
Thats easy, just tell that you know it is a scam. You were lucky the card was cancelled, or you’d have been conned like so many people on here.
Dave
I was contacted out of the blue by Owen he has sent me contracts to sign and asked me for £700
after reading all these comments i don’t think so
Hi all, wow thank the lord for this site, I just by chance went to my mums for lunch on a work break and became nosey about who she was on the phone to.
Holiday rentals in Torrox nr Malaga have advised they can get them £6000 back on £10,000 they lost years ago, the funny thing is they are nothing to do with the company that my parents lost their money to in the first place!! How can they sell something they don’t have the rights too??
They also told my mum that ‘if they pay by credit card this is protected’ which Barclaycard did confirm, however to me there are too many gray areas over this and as someone has suggested previously ‘Barclaycard do not refund THIS KIND OF MONEY’.
My mum was in Contact with a girl called Chloe who apparently sounded ‘very genuine’!!!!
Don’t they all was my response.
Unfortunately my mum has given over Credit card details already this morning, luckily due to me being sceptical of everything these days this payment can be stopped shortly however at the moment the money is pending!.
This was also an amount that worked out to approx £900 GBP.
Facts –
No win no fee
Would a well founded and legit company need to take £900 when they should have it sat in the bank account and can just take it out of the money they are supposedly paying you back.
Thank you so much for starting this blog, you deserve a commendation!
Mel
hi sue
we have just been contacted by the national claims group claiming they can sell our
membership for club class but want 2225 up front it was only november that we got stung for 1200 pounds by holidayrentals direct cliaming they could sell it also what a crock please stay clear of any of these companies they take your money and you just end up in debt
I am kicking myself – No, not because I’ve been ‘conned’ by HRD, but because I didn’t get the details of the company who called me today! International something, or Something International?(maybe someone else has heard of them) No, they didn’t want money up front he insisted, no they were not a scam, he insisted, but they do road-shows where you have a one-to-one with an advisor who will help you sell your ‘product’ (not heard it called that before). THEN they ask for a fee up front? Iasked, NO he said, we don’t do that. He asked me for my post-code and was put out when I wouldn’t give it, I asked three times where they got my name and number, the first two he just said “Well, it’s like this…” and changed the subject. The third time I said that I insisted on knowing where they had got my name and number, he rang off!! Come on, try and con me PLEASE! I could make a hobby of winding these people up, and while I am keeping them chatting, they are leaving some other poor devil alone,only wish I had prolonged the experience.
Hi
I was contacted by Deborah Jones from Holiday Rental with regards a Travel Connect Software we were conned into buying whilst in Tenerife in July 2010. Luckily we cancelled that and got our money back. She said we were still the registered owner and thats how she found my phone number and that she had a buyer willing to buy this from me for £8000. I replied I had no paperwork and would not be able to transfer anything as I was not the legal owner, she replied that this was not a problem and that on her database I was the registered owner and Travel Connect were notorious at not doing their paperwork. I could benefit from the transaction all I needed to do was agree, she was being wholly paid by the buyer and that there was no cost to me in this deal. Then came the catch, I would need to pay an amount for a temporary insurance retainer to protect all party interest which would be refunded as soon as I signed the documents over to them , this could be between 2 to 4 weeks and if I paid by Credit Card I would be perfectly within my rights to get this back should there be problem.
I have asked for her phone number and have said I would need to discuss this with my husband before releasing 1395 euros to her. She has arranged to call me back.
Smelt a rat and started to search for them and found your forum, and as a lot of the people on this as timeshare owners thought I’d highlight that if there’s anyone who was also conned into buying the Travel Connect software to get travel agents prices on hotels and flights may also be targeted.
Thanks
Saz
Just a quick question. Did anyone had to sign a refund letter by HRD to get the 80% back? They are saying now that they post a refund letter to be signed to get 80% back. Please advise, I don’t dare to sign anything anymore.
Klara,
We will reply to you as soon as possible with all the relevant information. But please keep in mind that HRD had no right to take your money upfront, so why should you lose a 20% out of that if the payment should not have been taken at all?
Read the comments on the blog of HRD as I am sure there are comments from consumers who were in your same situation.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi klara. I did sign and send the documents back and received 80% of my deposit but after receiving Mr Garcia’s advice I wrote my bank for the 20% as he rightly state HRD do not deserve any money from you in the first place. I received my 80% deposit and later received the last of it this last week. Call your bank and ask what address you should write to regarding “Charge backs and Disputes” and prepare a letter as advised by Mr Garcia giving full details of who called you from HRD what they said to you. I find that writing was more effective than speaking on the phone as when I initially called my bank they did not want to help me. Customer Care sent me a standard letter which I used as a base of my complaint. It worked perfectly. The first thing I would advise you do is email admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu saying that you have received their contract and demand a full refund NOW as you have been misled as you have now learnt that there was no buyer for your timeshare at all. Keep pestering them emailing every day. Keep all the correspondence in the email chain and if you get no joy within a week print off all of your emails and enclose a copy of these, and a copy of the HRD contract and send this off to your bank. As I said before the Customer Care letter is really good follow their instructions. All the best Heather
tried to send a email to you with regards to our dealings with Europe leisure& travel the email was sent back to us is this the right email
customercare@mindtimeshare.com Please let me know
Hi Dennis,
Thanks for your message.
Strange as we are receiving numerous emails on this address and continuesly.
Try again please customercare@mindtimeshare.com and if it bounces back again let me know.
Regards
Customer Care
I was contacted initially last week by HRD Dave Wright who told me they are working on behalf of Club Class Concierge as we were not usig our Gold Membership and could sell it on to someone that would use it. I challenged and asked what it would cost me and he assured me that it would cost nothing. Yesteday we were called by Simon Walker from HRD telling us that they had a buyer prepared to pay £9950.00 for our gold membership. Great we thought money in the bank. Then they asked for a retainer. They called back today about the retainer which I said no havent got £1000 to hand over (1300 euros) I would be happy for them to take their 10% from the sale money before they send me the cheque. I wasnt going for the bank transfer as that gives them more of my details. I did mention that other copanies do the leg work and encounter the costs then retrieve this once everything is settled. Surprisingly they then said that they could lower the retainer to 700 euros again I said no and Simon Walker said just pay it on your credit card and should anything go wrong I would be covered and would be able tp claim the money back. At this point alarm bells went off and I said no take the commission/retainer out of the sale money and send me whats left.
Surprisingly he said that couldnt happen and the sale could not go through but he will keep us on their books. We wont be gettging a call back!!!!!!!!!!!!! Am I bothered………..NO
Had similar experience as others on this site, cold call, a buyer waiting, need a deposit of £1,200 for and insurance policy as there would be a period where I would have the money but they wouldnt have the deeds and long explanation that I could pay on credit card and it would be protected. Having spoken to Barclaycard they said this type of transaction is not covered. Amber Thomas was the contact name and has sent several emails and made several calls. Each time either increasing the offer for the timeshare or lowering the deposit/insurance policy. I asked whether, if the deposit was needed because of the insurance policy of me keeping the money and not sending the deeds to conduct the transaction through a solicitor as this is how property exchanges work in the UK and she said it made no difference they would still need the deposit on a visa card. 3 yrs ago I fell foul of a similar scam luckily it was for only £300 so have been wary about any timeshare offers that require money upfront and also have been approached by Half Moon Holdings so it looks like I am on their hit list. Does anyone know how to sell or rent out a timeshare? Are there any reliable companies?
Had a call today from HRD wanting to buy our connections 6 travel for £6100.00. She gave her name as Annie Frazier said she had a buyer in the office and was I interested in selling, .she had to check out to see if we had any outstanding monies owing to connection 6.rang me back to every thing was ok ,then said the client had paid a non returnable deposit of £2500.00.Gave the company registration no D93683996 which is different to other nos quoted in early comments she then ask for a holding fee of 1195 Euros on my credit card.I then said I needed to think about the offer and would ring her back .I checked out your site and you confirmed my suspicions about this company.. She has since rang me back and I told her i was not going ahead with this offer
She then ask what she should her buyer. i replied tell them i do not want to sell ,she the replied thank you for wasting my time and she hung up .I would like to thank you for your site and the comments made on it i hope other people read this and become aware of this scam.
Regards
Denis Stevens
.
Good news that should bring cheer to others who have fallen for this scam. Two months after the initial sting and a month after contacting Barclaycard, I have just received confirmation from Barclaycard that they have credited my account with the full amount – £1153.00 – paid to HRD. If you paid using a credit card please feel free to use this as a reference for a FULL refund (not just 80%) The culprits still need to be brought to justice though…
Thanks for sharing this with us Richard!
Excellent news, and you are right, don’t settle for the 80%!!
Regards
Customer Care
How on Earth did Barclays agree to credit your account, they are surelly not willing to do mine, is it because i have used a debit card? the fraud team says they cannot help as this transaction cannot be considered as fraudulent? why not?
Klara
richard. did you use c/c or debit card to pay with.
I have also had phone calls from the very same Company, I have a points membership with RCI. They offered me an initial payment of £10,000 for 12000 with a surety payment of 1300 Euros and when I stated I had much than that they, went away to the supposed buyers and came back today with an offer of £25,000, I am glad I was sitting down when the lady Lucy spoke to me!! Of course this was very tempting and I asked her to email the details. Whilst I was waiting, I came across your website and the uneasy feeling I already had was confirmed by all the information sent in by other people. The email arrived and I replied declining the offer, and I then received another phone call from the same lady and reiterated my views and told her what had read on your website. She immediately said I should not pay attention to what I read on the internet and I said why should believe someone who has rung me out of the blue with this unrealistic offer. At this point she ended the call and although I have still not sold my points but I have not lost 1300 euros either.
Hi all,
I’ve just been contacted by Amy Mills at HRD, who offered to match a buyer to my Club Class membership, with the sale value being £8k – £9k. They said that there would be no upfront fee and were able to market my membership this week, if I gave them authorisation. I said I would check out the company and ring them back if I wanted to sell through them. Like many others I offer thanks for your website. Can you tell me if there is a legitimate company who will market my Club Class membership. My membership is dormant, as I have refused to pay any fees for several years, this is due to me not extending the initial period of the service contract.
I can not believe the cheek of HRD this is the second time where they are trying to scam me. They tried last year and now just a lady phones me up asking if I still own timeshares, when i said yes she then tells me that she can sell them for me for £4000 but will require a 20% deposit and goes on to say her boss will call me later if anything with her is ok. I then asked who she was again and then she says from Holiday Rentals Direct in Torrex Malaga Spain . I can not wait for her manager, so I can string them along.
Well.well, I am so glad I found this site, nearly fell for their SCAM yesterday. I had received quite a few calls from HRD and I had discussed with my wife about selling, I had always suspected that it may be a scam as they kept asking for money up front, then yesterday they rang again and i asked them for some proof of who they were, they sent me an email with a CIF number: B-9308399. I then put this number into Google and lo and behold this site came up. I returned their email accompanied by some strong expletives and told them where to stick their company.
John
Today 31st January 2012 I had a phone call from a well spoken lady, who told me she was with the company HRD, and advised me that she had a client ready to buy our timeshare for £6,300, straight away I thought this was too good to be true, so I let her ramble on, until she wanted me to give her my cc number and £1350 for insurance as part of the transaction, I think I wore her down when I explained that on no account would I do such a thing,as this was a cold call and I had never heard of them, I then became rude to her on the phone, because she could not answer any of my straight questions, and she hung up. Hope I do not hear from her or them again, if it sounds too good to be true, it is.
Had a telephone call today from direct holiday rentals they were not very pleased with me for cancelling the card they said they were a ligitemate company and they was going to report it to the police as they was getting a bad name but i said i had the rights to cancell and did not want to go ahead with it at least i never lost my money thanks to your web site mrs kenny
Dear Mrs. Kenny,
Thanks for your comment and we are very happy you didn’t lose your money.
Of course HRD is not happy with that, but by now they must be getting used to refund claims and cancellations.
Kind regards
Customer Care
As anyone come across a company called Silver Point Promotion Holidays offering a week holiday in Tenerife at Hollywood Mirage Beverly Heights or Beverly Club for an administration fee of £129, cost at your own cost.
Received a call today about 1200 from an ANNE RYAN (sounded more like anne robinson) at HR Direct telling me there was a prospective buyer for my week 16 in Florida. I said i no longer wanted to sell, so she asked how much i paid for it and i told her $11000 in 2003. Suddenly she asked if i was sure i didnt want to sell as there was a buyer for $15000 who had already paid them the money, so all they needed was my signature/documents and all would be processed in 4-5 weeks. So i said ok then and she went on and on and suddenly she mentioned a £1500 insurance fee which i would get back once they received my signature/deeds and my alarm bells started ringing. So when she got to the end she wanted my payment details but i said i wasnt at home and didnt have my cards on me, but she was eager and asked if i could call anybody or make a bank transfer and i said no and plus i wouldnt be back till 0200 this morning as i have a ‘proper’ job. So i told her to call back about the same time tomorrow as she wanted to call me first thing in the morning but i told her i would be asleep.
Now im thankful that i found this website which has asserted my suspitions and am only waiting to see if she will call back so i can greet her ‘nicely’.
What do you think i should say to these scammers?
Thanks for creating this site.
The most fun (if you have time) is to keep her dangling, First ask lots of questions as if you are going to take the bait, then keep her waiting while you ‘look for’ your card, tell her you think it is in the car so will be a few minutes going to look, then even give her a totally made up number!!!
Think hard about it, was no fun when I just said I knew it was a scam and to go away. Next time I’ll be ready with my ‘little old lady who doesn’t quite understand’ so you have to make it al clear before I gfive you my card number, which I will do as soon as I understand exactly what it is all about…….
Good luck! Lets muck these nasty folk about a bit.
Oh dear Angela, you sound like you are almost enjoying these calls now!
Forgot to say the name of the company direct holiday rentals mrs e kenny
I was telephoned three times yesterday the last at 4oclock to get me to pay a retainer of 700euro to sell our holiday club so i paid it on my visa card with all the promises i have just read on your site a lady called deborah jones had got a client ready to pay 33percent of the 8000pounds he was giving to me she even let me speak to him then i read your site i got in touch with my credit card company today and put me through to the fraud department up to then no money had been taken and she stopped the card so i hope i have been lucky but i shall get in touch with them again on monday to make sure withouy a site like yours i would not have known i wished i had looked first E kenny
Could anyone tell me please meanwhile where I could report a fraud/scam? To whom/where should be the call made to get an incident number to help getting back the retainer fee taken by HRD?
thanks a lot for everyone being so helpful, klara
Hi all i went a bit futher i copyed & pasted all of the comments on this web site & sent them to HRDS & told them here are your real testimonials & not the bull **** you claim to have on so called web site.
I have been contacted about 8 times by this company, and before that Half Moon Holdings. Fortunately I read the comments on your site and forwarded the link to them to explain why I wanted no more to do with them and certainly no more harassment!
Thank you for alerting me to the risks, and My sympathies go out to anyone who has been scammed by such disreputable practices.
My wife was called yesterday by HRD offering to sell her Club Class Memberdship going price being about
£6000-£9000. Phoned today with a buyer at £9600 but needed a “retainer” of 1395 euros, to guarantee
that she returneed the paperwork in time, saying this was guaranteed because they took the payment by credit card.
After she gave her Barclay card details I found this site and immediatly got her to cancel her card.
Fortunately she was in time, the money had not been taken, lucky escape! HRD have just phoned to say they was
a problem with the card , I spoke to them and told them she had cancelled the card because of
this site, she denied any knowledge of the site but then said that no one on this site gave their names and it could be
their comptitors posting the comments.
COMPETITORS? They are having a laugh surely? Or do they mean other scammers using the same tricks as they are to con people out of their money? Pathetic, and I would happily give my full name and address on here – mind you, they already know it having tried, unsuccessfully, to con me too.
I’m interested you got a response within a month Mark. I cancelled within 14 days in early December but have heard nothing, and have left it to Barclaycard to chase up. Did you get confirmation from HRD direct when they refunded, or through a credit card company?
Hi Richard, email them now at admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu and ask them if they received the documents and ask that you expect your refund. I got my refund today.
Hi Heather,
So far the process of getting back my money is not going well 😦 I have sent back the original documents unsigned to HRD by recorded delivery (tracking royal post says – letter delivery attempted on…’ ). Barclays sent me a paper to clarify if the £1200 taken off by HRD is a fraud or not – I sent them back together with copies of all document sent by HRD – still Barlcays fraud team says that they cannot take it as fraud and after two weeks of holding the money they released it to HRD. Barclays customer service states that they must authorize every payment first and then we have to despute against the transaction. How stupid is that if I clearly stated on they fraud request form that it is fraud and I don’t give authorization for this payment – they still released the payment. Now I desputed the transaction – still waiting for any response from the bank. Barclays is not very keen to sort out this problem for me – even though we are premier customers – I am so dissapointed. Could you please let me know what you have done to get your money back? Is there something I am not doing correct? Hope to hear soon from you.
Kind regards, Klara
Hi Klara, also wanted to say that I couriered my docs to HRD and these couldn’t be delivered at the address in Torrox either. See if you can email Royal Mail and ask them what happened. Keep correspondence with the Royal Mail as well. Did you keep a copy of what you sent to HRD? If so. email this to them at the address I gave you earlier and say that you have attempted to have these documents delivered but they haven’t reached you and here is an email copy. Demand your refund as you have followed their instructions and it is not your fault that the letter did not reach them. That worked for me. Hope this helps. Heather
Thanks Heather for your fast repply, I really appreciate it. I will try then customer care see if that ‘ll help me out. Thanks again, Klara
No problem Klara, one more thing, when i wrote my bank I printed off all the comments on this website re HRD and enclosed this with my letter as proof that HRD were using illegal practices to take money from timeshare owners, I think after my bank read this they returned my money, no further questions asked. Best wishes Heather
how i got my money back was i sent 2 recorderd letters on the 20th & 21st of December1 before i got the contract & 1 with the same letter & the contract to them to asking to cancel & for my money back it was receved by them on the 4th Jan because i checked with the post office then sent them a e-mail giving them 14 days in which to put the full amount of 1.395 euros back into my a/c they then told me they didn’t receive them & i called them liars & then told them to look on the corrios web site with my ref numbers & then they happend to find them & paid the full 1.395 money back to my c/c but in between all of this i kept sending e-mails to them with the same letters i also blocked my c/c Lloyds has a disputs team & i got in contact with but didn’t need them. i hope this works for you .Mark
Well i would like to say i have just receved all my money back from HRDS & it took about a month to get it back if you cancel within the 14 day cooling off period if any body needs help get in touch.
Hi Mark,
Even cancelling within the 14 day cooling off period they still gave you all the money back without holding back 20% as you have cancelled? Can you help me plesae to get my money back? 😦
Klara,
Don’t panic. Your email is on it’s way and we will guide you through the process. Don’t worry!
Regards
Customer Care
I just gave my debit card details and when I called to cancel the card bank said that money went off already. Please help, cannot get in touch with holiday rentals and i’m affraid my money is lst forever.
Hi,
I have today been phoned by a Jack Nickson from Holiday Rentals Direct Tel: 0034952547496 offering me 14,100 for my timeshare, only if I put down a 1395 euros retainer, and I need to sign up straight away as the buyer is going home today! I am so glad for your site as I would have been tempted by this offer, so thank you for saving me money!!
is there nothing that can be done about these people, there must be someone somewhere who knows how to stop people like this doing this things
My mother in law also received a phone call from Holiday Rental Direct offering to buy her timeshare. Thank goodness for this website and also that she phoned us – they are very plausible, it was the upfront fee that rang alarm bells and the speed in which they contacted her for card details. Whilst omitting that they were doing that when talking to us. My mother in law did give her details fortunately she rang us to tell us what was happening and we cancelled her card before any payment had been made. It makes me very cross that companies like this are conning people especially someone like my mother in law.
Unfortunately I too was conned by this company and gave them my card details. They said they would take £1,550 out of my account and took out £1,585. Alarm bells rang straight away and thankfully I found this site. I wrote to them immediately and cancelled my contract. Contacted my credit card company and explained what happened giving them the details of this site. Today I had confirmation my credit card company has refunded my money, and guess what. HDR rang me within minutes saying they did not accept my cancellation they had a buyer waiting with £8,700. All I need to do is sign the form. No way am I ever going anywhere near them again. I am just hanging up every time they call me. 6 calls so far within 30 minutes.
We have been approached by Holiday Rentals Direct, they have a buyer for our Club Class, membership, a couple have offered £11950, but I have to give them my Credit Card details to show I am willing to sell, double dutch or what, I have told Sally Morgan @ Holiday Rentals Direct, I need time to check them out, boy am I glad I did,, We have been taken for 6K by GB Marketing, upgrading our Club Class Membership, so PLEASE IF IT SOUNDS TO GOOD TO BE TRUE IT IS….If we all spread the word about these scum, people will not get ripped off like we have, so dont go near Club Class or Holiday Rentals Direct, you have been warned.. Thank you for this site and all comments posted
I raised the fact i had phoned and emailed upon initial contact and had no response – she blamed the admin dept, being closed for the christmas hols.
These people phoned me again today to say that there had been a problem with my form returned – i hadn’t signed it. they are going to sent it out again. yet again she stressed she had £11000 waiting to pay me they just needed my signature to authorise the transfer of money to my account.
I have had a call from Rebecca Barnes at HRD and was told there was a couple in Spain who were looking for Club Class Concierge membership cheaper than what they had been told, and a returnable fee of 1320 would have to be paid upfront which would be returnable when the courier turned up for the certificate.Like other messages it sounds the same spiel except that she said they had got our details and 14 other members to try and find a seller for this couple.
Luckily I have not paid any monies to them as I said I had to check with the wife first and Rebecca would the call again tomorrow. I hope this helps others who will probably be on their lists to call .
We too, appear to have been conned by HRD. Being very aware of all the scams out there concerning timeshares we tried to find out about this company after the initial call from John Wyman, claiming he had a guaranteed buyer for our membership. He already had all our personal and timeshare details (even mobile phone numbers). We searched the internet at the time of this call, but could not find any adverse information about HRD. As they appeared to have all the information they required, including the fact that we had not, as yet, used the Elite Club Class membership we purchased 18 months ago, we agreed to pay a deposit of Euro 1071.00 as a security retainer, after we were assured it would be re-imbursed on completion of the transaction. The documents John Wyman said we would receive would be the contract to transfer ownership of the timeshare to the purchaser. However, what we have received today, is a contract for signature between HRD and ourselves to market our timeshare for a year.
Still being very wary, we put in the same question into the search engine as before and have now come up with your site with numerous concerned timeshare owners.
We did request from Mr Wyman the details of the couple who he claims wish to buy our timeshare and he assured me they would be sent on to us – we have not yet received anything. We have today emailed HRD querying the contract document, together with its terms and conditions and questioned whether they do have a genuine buyer. We await their response.
Meanwhile, today we have been in touch with Barclaycard and have had the Euro transaction cancelled on the grounds of mis-representation.
Hi John and Trish,
Sorry to hear that you have been taken for scam as well. I have been contacted last week and gave them the security retainer and got the contract today – which I did and will not sign. When I called Barclays they said that I will not be able of doing anything untill 1feb two weeks of taking the money as the debit did not show up yet on my card however there is minus eur 1395 off my bank account. There was unfortunatly a very not kind man at Barclays who first just told me ” am sorry we cannot do anything you have lost your money, you shouldn’t have given your details” , however I did not give up and called back two more times to see if I can do anything to get my money back. Should I indeed wait the two weeks and call Barclays again or what should I do?
I have just had a call from Holiday Rentals Direct, offering me £7,000 to buy my share of Travel Connect (as the company had gone into liquidation). The lady said she got our details from Travel Connect and they were contacting all of their clients. All I had to do was give my CC number and they would deduct a holding fee of £995 (1100 eur), then they would send the paperwork out for us to sign and we would get the money in our bank. Once they had received our paperwork from a courier they send we would get our holding fee back. Sounded to good to be true. They are supposedly phoning us back. I then found this site and am wondering what to do.
We also got contacted by a company called Mediation Solutions based in Cheltenham who have a base in Tenerife. They reckoned that they could get us our money back on Travel Connect and CLC as we had been mis-sold, this was last September and we are still waiting to hear from them.
Have we been done? Feel stupid if we have, but they sound so convincing!
Surely we know if we read this site that if ANYONE asks for money up-front we JUST SAY NO!!
hi there we have just had a call from HRD asking if we wanted to sell our DWVC so we said yes and paid the 1.395 euros by cc only to find this site had more testimonials than them so i contacted my cc company who said if was a scam i could get my money so i have sent them a letter asking for a full refund as iam with in my 7 day cooling off period recorded of course so i will see how i will get on has any body got any other tips please
any succes getting your money back?
Be aware of someone called Sally Morgan from HRD of course this name could just be fake as they are a fake scam company. This is the person who called me last week and took my money.
I think I have been had by this company. Is there any recourse? I like other chap I have just read about fell for their patter. Feel very stupid.
Dear Heather,
Thanks for your message.
Sorry to hear you fell for this and paid to Holiday Rentals Direct.
We will send you the information on how to go about claiming the money back.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Two days ago I was contacted by Ann from Holiday Rentals Direct to see if I would be interested in selling my DWVC membership. This came as a surprise as I thought that this was valueless but said if she had a buyer willing to pay £4000 I would be happy to oblige.
Today Jack Nixon phoned – twice, the first time to see if I was interested in a deal at £7-8000 with no cost to me and the second time to tell me that someone was willing to pay £8200 and there would be a ‘Security Holding Fee’ of 1295 euros which would be returned as soon as my documentation was handed over to their UPS or DHL courier. My fee payment would be protected by using a Visa or Mastercard as they had fraud protection – my Visa card provider assures me that if I give the number of my card this is not fraud but a dispute and may well not be refunded.
A Google search covering the company has brought me here, among other places, and none of the information that I turn up is reassuring.
This is the point where I pack up and walk away – not having sold something that I believed to be worthless anyway!
Hi Teddy,
Thanks for your comment. You are so right, it is really dodgy when they try to make you believe there is a buyer jumping to pay for a DWVC membership.
Glad you researched the internet and found the comments that are posted all over.
Kind regards
Customer Care
A new name for you – Half Moon Holdings. Has anyone else been contacted by them? The same chat line as before. I just told them I knew they were ringing from Spain, that they would be asking for money up front and that their scam was well know, then put the phone down.
Hi Angela,
Thanks for keeping us updated. Half Moon is on our list unfortunately! And hanging up the phone is the best thing to do!
Kind regards
Customer Care
HRD took 1400 Euros by Credit Card (£1229.26) on 16 NOV but have not replied to 7emails. The paperwork was accidentally lost, so they have NO Authority to hang on to our money, a fact which was given them by phone.They have dug in, so we would dearly love to know to whom we can put our grievance. Can you help?
Dear John,
Thanks for your message.
We certainly can help you and we will email you the information over.
Don’t sign the paperwork!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi Kirsty,
Thanks for your message.
Strange ITRA would give the details to HRD, sounds more like somebody got hold of a list of clients through a dubious source, but who knows..
We will send you more information by email and let’s see if we can help you with claiming the money back!
Kind regards
Customer Care
I have been contacted by holiday rentals direct and offered a good price for the sale of a platinum membership of club class concierge.
All I need to do is pay 1395 euros for an insurance policy which will run until the sale is complete and their courier has arrived to collect the membership card.
Supposedly the courier confirms that I have the card ready to hand over and then holiday direct do a transaction to have the 1395 euros repaid to my MasterCard. I confirm with my bank that the 1395 euros is back on my card and I then hand over the card.
I pretended to.have left my card at home.
Holiday rentals are going to phone me back at 5pm to get my card details.
I assume your advice is not to give my card details?
Hi George,
Thanks for your message.
Certainly no payment should be made to these people.
Please let us know how it went.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hello Kirsty, we’re in the same boat (see my message above from November 23). You’ll find in the contract a cancellation clause stating you have two weeks from receipt to cancel and get your money back, minus a 20% ‘admin charge’. To stop them deducting this charge once they have your money, which currently they do, legally or illegally, is the next challenge. I have asked for proof of a sale having been confirmed, which they claim to be unable to provide as details of a buyer would “breach data protection”. This sounds what it is, an attempt to hide behind a bureaucratic smokescreen. I don’t believe it’s sustainable and am taking legal advice.
Hi Richard,
Thanks for your message.
Please do send us the information requested and we can help you to start the refund claim.
There is no sale, but these people will do everything to avoid a refund.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi
I fell into the same trap today and feel so, so stupid and not knowing what to do for the best?
Realised the offer was to good to be true and still went ahead with it!
What can I do I have contacted my credit card company to stop my card and request new cards but they said there is no way I could get this money reimbursed any advice as to whether this is possible?
Also what action should I take with Holiday Rentals Direct?
Many Thanks
Karen
Hi Karen,
Thanks for your message and sorry to hear you’ve paid them.
Let us send you the info by email and see if we can help you regarding claiming a refund.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I too have just been taken in by the plausible sales people at Holiday Rentals Direct, Torrox. I wish I had found this website earlier. My wife and I returned from a week in Tenerife at the weekend, largely paid for by Club Class holidays. We hadn’t used our membership for years, and they wanted to sell us an upgrade which we declined. This Monday HRD contacted me – strange coincidence – to see if I was interested in selling our membership. Fed up with Club Class hard-sell tactics I said yes if the price was right. Yesterday a woman called Lucy Edwards got back to me to say HRD had lined a client up with an offer of £4300. Was I interested? I said yes, and having been given details of their mail address, licence number etc. etc. to establish credibility, made a Barclaycard payment of 1300 euros to go ‘ untouched’ into a holding account, as a guarantee I would supply the necessary paperwork to complete the transaction. After putting the phone down I had serious second thoughts, and contacted Barclaycard to try to get them to stop the payment, but have been assured by two separate advisers this can’t be done whilst the money is in transit. Their legal section will take up the case once the transaction is complete. My only excuse is that I was feeling particularly dozy recovering from flu – contracted on holiday last week. But is there any more I can do at this stage?
Hi Richard,
Thanks for the comment.
I would say that contacting the bank was indeed the right step and also send HRD by recorded delivery a letter cancelling the agreement.
You are inside the cooling off and apart from that they shouldn’t be asking for an upfront fee..
Do this by recorded delivery though.
We will send the resot of the information by email.
Kind regards
Customer Care
We have been trying to see out points for a long time and were promised of a sale lomg time ago on the proviso that a holding fee of 110 euros was made – which we did on the credit card hopng for a quick sale – apparantly the buyer dropped out and did not hear for two months until a mail prompting them for a refund. This evening got a call from Susan Green of the “Corporate” office to say a 100% guaranteed offer of £19200 has been received through another company called Principle Travel, they she said do not buy the timeshare from us but swap it for membership of their scheme and after 90 days we can sell the “new” deal. On top of this they want 1500 euros to cover the sale which has been guaranteed as a refund upon full sale in 90 days. They are presurrising for us to take this deal as the “corporate” office will send the paper work out and we are promised that all will be complete in 90 days. My concern why 90 days when in the UK is always 21 days. From the comments on the website i will not take this option and require any help and guidance here – thanks in advance.
And another one bites the dust. We are very intelligent people who did consider that if it was too good to be true then it was. We still payed a deposit. We are within the 14 days (and like others we wish we had looked them up better before we paid). Can you please send us the email you mentioned giving us whatever help you can so that we can at least attempt to recoup some of the wasted money.
There must, there simply MUST be a way for the big timeshare owning companies (including Hilton who own mine) to send a warning to all their people about this! I simply cannot understand why they have not done so. So many people are so desparate to sell that they are only too happy to hand over their money in the hope of a sale. A lot of the responsibility has to be laid at the door of the timeshare companies for not loking after the interests of their owners and I would love to get some input here from them. PLEASE?
Hi Sheila,
Thanks for your message.
These people are very active and a lot of consumers have fallen for their pitch.
We will send you the info by email.
Kind regards
Customer Care
hi, could you send me the email you are sending to help these innocent people who all fell for this scam. i am still within the 14 days of contract – not signed yet.
desperate mum 😦
Hi Klara,
We will send you the information by email.
You have already contacted the bank, that is good as they are now aware of the fact you will claim a refund.
You should also send urgently a cancellation letter to HRD and send this by recorded delivery.
Kind regards
Customer Care
We were caught by this scam on Monday have reported to our credit card company and sending them full details by post, so hopefully we will get our money back. Have also just received a call from a David Russell at Timeshare Equity Release telling me Club Class are in administartion and they can redeem our cash back. Told him I have already been subject to a scam this week and not interested. Can you send me any information on how to report these fraudsters please
Dear Margaret,
Many thanks for your message.
We will send you more information by email, first things first, let’s see if you can get your money back from Holiday Rentals Direct.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Just to let you know that we have received a full refund from Holiday Rentals Direct. We sent a letter of cancellation and then continually bombarded them with letters emails and phone calls. Finally received a full refund two weeks ago, so don’t give up.
Excellent news Margaret!
Many thanks for letting us know and congratulations!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Well done Margaret, my bank has agreed to refund me the 20% cancellation fee that HRD initially deducted from my refund, so I too have now received all my money back. Thank you Mr Garcia for all your help – I won’t be fooled again!
Hi all on the blog, while reading to the bottom of the blog to keep my self informed a thought came into my head, maybe someone out there could give some advice,
As the government in both Spain and this country are not really doing much to catch up with the scammers….what would the responce be if I tok my complaint regarding HRD to the Spanish and British embaceys, on the grounds that that is what the embaceys of both countrys do, although I feel that the red tape would take so long to nagaicate that by the time something was done them scammers would have found some new way of carrying on their dirty work!
or as mebers of the ECC it would be intresting to see what all the ministers that the way pay through actually got off their fat backsides and do something constructive for once….
Not very impressed so far…..it cant be that dificult to “sting” the scammers and track down the guilty partys???
M J Campbell
It is a joke to suggest these posts are fabricated!! What do we have to gain from fabricating them? If people read them, then they KNOW not to pay anything at all ‘up front’ and that is the main point. If you are taken in after reading these posts, then I have no sympathy. No decent company would ask you to pay anything up front – when they could take the money from the deposit. Oh I forgot, there isnt really a deposit being paid into your account, sorry!!
To Geoff R,
We are Mr and Mrs Johnson and the Irish lady is at this very moment trying to get some money out of us to offload our timeshare so has obviously used our name. I am expecting a call from them in the next 10minutes
But how can they justify themselves when there is NO justification! Hopefully the authorities will soon do something about it – if enough people shout loud enough maybe, just maybe, something will be done.
I still want to know exactly HOW they get names and phone numbers of owners. Any ideas??
HDR are aware of these posts. Presumably they have no balls to reply and justify themselves on here. Despite knowing that so many people have posted about being ripped off, they still continue to spout on about how legitimate their company is and that all these posts are fabricated. How can these companies be stopped from ripping customers off like this?
Hi Geoff,
Thanks for your message.
Yes you are right, they just go on and on and even state this is all a lie.
Well not so many people would react and write comments day in day out if it wasn’t true.
How to stop them, well keep on claiming back the money, reporting them and not giving up!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Can I just add one further thing – if anyone is reading this blog who has jus paid the 1195 Euros by credit card, I would say get in touch with your credit car company IMMEDIATELY. It may well be easier to claim if it is a recent transaction, and refer them to this site.
Thanks for the tip Angela, you are right, a lot of times the bank / credit card company is willing to cooperate and the transaction can be cancelled.
So yes, always do contact your bank!
Kind regards
Customer Care
A warning to all the staff and all Club La Costa members following this blog,
My Father was cold called on Tues at home in the evening!
The caller reported to my Dad that they were calling from “Club La Costa……….!”
unable to get intouch with me on my mobile and one again had a “buyer” for my time share!!!!!!!!!!!!!
As any CLC member will know CLC DO NOT DEAL IN THE RESALE OF CLUB LA COSTA POINTS!
So when my dad passed on the message I was very suspiceous and so sent an e-mail direct to CLC and I was correct it was confirmed that CLC do not resell points so once again yet another scamm in the making.
Only this time they did not get away with it!
I am afraid the word I would use to describe these people would not be acceptable to use here….
Wish that James would ring me back, I’d love to tell him exactly what I think. How do these people sleep at night? Obviously they are sub-human
Dear Martin,
Many thanks for the warning, you are so right, this time they didn’t get away with it but they do a lot of other times and they need to be stopped and people need to be warned!
Thanks again
Customer Care
A small PS – If this was genuine, surely the could take the 1195 Euros from the 30% deposit?? No point in suggesting it – they’d just say “That’s not the way it’s done”.
Am going to write to the managers of my timeshare asking if they could email all members warning of this company.
Yes Angela, of course, but there is where you can see the genuine offer is not that genuine at all…
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi Angela
Having read your comment and noted you are going to write to your timeshare may I suggest you also tell them of about this blog as I feel the least we can do in repaying our debt of gratitude is to spread the word to as many as possible in the hope we can crush the scam companies or at least interfere with how they operate and reduce their effectiveness.
In my case I have the following as a signature on my emails both private and company:-
IMPORTANT…..If you own Timeshare or Holiday Club/Points,
Please visit this site it could save you a lot of money and heartache.
https://mindtimeshare.wordpress.com/
Hello Brian, yes I sent this link to my timeshare resort. They replied that hundreds of their owners, and thousands Europewide have been taken in by this scam. Do they care? I think not! They should be emailing all their owners and making this link known to them all.
Like your idea of the sgnature on your emails. Unfortunately (or fortunately) I know that I am the only one on my email address book stupid enough to own a timeshare!!!! I love my timeshare resort, but if I didn’t own it I could rent it for less than I pay, and not have to bother with the initial expense! If anyone knows of any small way in which I can help this campaign, PLEASE TELL ME! I have years of secretarial experience and feel passionate about this scam.
Thank God for the internet! My story is so similar, the names the same etc. Yesterday a lady rang about my timeshare, did I want to sell etc etc. I said the price would have to be right, at least £4.000. Have tried to get rid of it for years – even tried to GIVE it away, but if someone genuinely wants it – I’ll be happy with 4 grand! Then today had a follow up call from James Clarke, very pleasant, VERY plausible – offered me £5,700 nett. My timeshare (in Scotland) is just what his customer is looking for (naturally). The price was the first thing to alert me – as you all know it is not easy to sell a timeshare, so to be offered £1,700 more than you mentioned would be some sort of miracle. Told him I was busy, but would listen to what he said, so he gave me the spiel about the 1,195 Euros, to be taken and held ‘just in case’ I didn’t release the certificate after the total had been paid and they had to use legal action to get it. I said I wasn’t happy to give my credit card details to someone I didn’t know, and from a company I hadn’t heard of. He was very reassuring saying it is safe paying by credit card as you can reclaim the money within a certain period. I suggested he rang back later as I was off to pick up my grand-daughter. I rang my bank who recommended I did NOT give my card details, it all sounded dodgy to them, they had never heard of such an arrangement, and it is not too easy to reclaim that money – as we can see from all the posts above! Also at the banks suggestion we searched for “timeshare sales Holiday Rentals Direct” which led us to you. He rang back in the afternon when I was out and my partner informed him that I had decided not to sell. He was a bit put-out, and said that I had seemed very anxious to sell earlier. When told I would ring back if I wanted to sell, he just rang off. Had I been here I would have told him that we had looked on the internet for details of his company and it appears to be a scam. Wonder what his reaction would have been? I’ll never know – unless he has not given up.
One thing I kept thinking (while I was busy spending the £5,700) was IF IT LOOKS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE – IT PROBABLY IS TOO GOOD TO BE TRUE!
So happy I was cautious. Good luck to everyone trying to get their money back.
Dear Angela,
Thank you for the detailed comment, this will help so many other consumers when searching the web, as they will recognize the pitch and know not to go for this!
I must say, your bank was also very good by telling you not to do this. Good for them!
Really glad you’ve found the blog.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi
Exactly the same as Hazel above, I am Somewhat too late finding this Blog, having already paid the retainer fee on the basis of a confirmed buyer I have received my contract through the post only to find that holiday rentals direct and the salesperson Kelly did not inform me:
1. that my security deposit would be held by the company for the contract period (one year) in the event that the buyer they have does not proceed.
2. That should I cancel then my security deposit would be returned less a 20% admin charge.
There is nothing in the terms and conditions about what should happen if they cannot sell my timeshare within the contract period.
Please can you tell me
1. I paid my security deposit by Visa, they told me to ask company for credit. I Spoke to Jenny who’s tone soon changed when I asked to be Credited and said there would be a 20% Admin charge deducted from the 1,195 Euro fee. Duocuments to be returned with reason for cancellation
They would then send out forms to Credit us.
2. I am within the 14 day cancellation period and will cancel the contract with this company, should I specify the real reason for cancellation at this time.
Another scam, thats how I ended up with the time share in the first place, just want to get rid of it.
Please can you give me advice
Dear Clifford,
Thanks for the message.
Sorry you didn’t see the blog before.
Of course we will email you over all the information.
Kind regards,
Customer Care
Was called by Chloe at HRD last week. No upfront fees to market my Timeshare. However, today I got a call saying they had a purchaser for me at £5600. I said I wanted more like £8k or £9k and got a call a few minutes later saying they had secured the maximum I was looking for at £9k. No quibbles, £3.5k more no problem at all !!!!
I realised this was particularly unlikely in the timeshare marketplace. She then asked me for a holiday deposit of 1150 Euros. The woolly explanation she gave me was something to do with the couriering of documentation and for them to ensure that I was who I said and I had the correct deeds when they came to pick up the paperwork and that they deposit the purchase price directly to my account, plus a load more garbage that just began to sound very whiffy..
She said they needed to act fast to secure the deal because the clients are only with them for a few days. I then asked who the client was, after a very telling hesitation, she replied Mr and Mrs Johnson. I asked where they were from , London, of course, nothing more specific. She wanted to send the paperwork tonight, take the holding fee and she explained this was of course covered by the credit card company in the event of a problem , we could of course easily reclaim this so I was completely safe with the transaction. As soon as they had the paperwork, the money is then refunded to my card, job done.
I asked for some paperwork to be sent by email, surely large companies can do business by email? After some hesitation and another reason why courier was the best approach, I forcefully requested a sample contract be emailed to me. And, lo and behold , I have the email sample contract. 2 seconds later, she called back, was it ok, can she run through it, can we conclude so the client doesnt lose the sale, blah blah blah. I said no I needed to discuss this with my wife, we are in no hurry to sell the property to anyone else for £9k (no one in their right mind would – oh yeah, I did 10 years ago). Then I went exploring the wonderful world of the internet and presto, this site popped up on my second page of search results.
I’m hoping that I would not have been taken in by this scam, I certainly would have put up a good fight to get them to take their costs from the clients payments and settle the rest with me at a later date, damn it , £8k in my hand and they could have kept the 1150 euros for all I cared. Luckily, this site confirmed all my worst nightmares, and its really sad to see so many people fall down the same trap before they lifted this particular rock. I hope they all got their money back in the end.
What amazes me is that Chloe (real name I’m almost 100% sure) was so damn convincing and played the part like butter would not melt in her mouth. Unbelievable that the authorities cannot trace these people and bring them to book for their criminal activities. Can it really be that difficult to find them all and knee cap the lot of them, the IRA were good at that stuff, not very PC, but the perpetrators rarely came back for more.
I have the copy contract if anyone wants it, drop me a note on here and I will send it to you, I dont charge for this, but if anyone wants to donate 1150 euros that will pay towards the next scam I fall for that I dont see coming.
Dear Geoff,
Thank you so much for the detailed message.
Of course they sound convincing, they have done it so many times before, they are getting really good at this!
Glad you did find the blog on time!
Kind regards
Customer Care
just been contacted by somebody called Kelly Hutchison at Holiday Rentals on a cold call offering me £15,000 for my 1100 Club La Costa vacation points, all seemed good until she asked for the holding fee, she was very calm and smooth with her sales pitch but i was stung by Simply Timeshare sales earlier this year, these people make me sick, even when i explain I have a very sick husband and we have no spare money they don’t care, I wish I had never ever heard of Club La Costa, worst mistake of my life, don’t think I will ever get rid of it.
Hi Shona,
Thanks for your message.
Don’t pay an upfront fee to anybody!
We will send you more information by email.
Kind regards,
Customer Care
Hi
Somewhat too late I have found this Blog, having already paid the retainer fee on the basis of a confirmed buyer I have received my contract through the post only to find that holiday rentals direct and the salesperson Kelly did not inform me:
1. that my security deposit would be held by the company for the contract period (one year) in the event that the buyer they have does not proceed.
2. That should I cancel then my security deposit would be returned less a 20% admin charge.
There is nothing in the terms and conditions about what should happen if they cannot sell my timeshare within the contract period.
Please can you tell me
1. I paid my security deposit by Visa do I have a right to claim this back.
2. I am within the 14 day cancellation period should I cancel the contract with this company.
If I understand your blog correctly then you are saying that holiday rentals are quite simply a scam
Please can you gove me advice
Thank you
Dear Hazel,
Thanks for your message.
Contact your bank and try to cancell the payment.
Cancel the agreement with Holiday Rentals direct but you have to do this by letter and RECORDED DELIVERY.
The rest of the information we will send you by email.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi
I have followed your recommendations.
Contacted my credit card company and in the process of trying to make a claim.
Retrned the contract cancelled with a letter tracked and to be signed for cost £43.00 to do this. Surprise surprise the address provided is a PO box in Malaga so spanish postal service have been unable to deliver my documents.
Sent everything to you by e-mail last week but not yet had any response or further advice. Why is this company still being allowed to trade.
Thanks
We are in ecactly tye same situation as this last email (except we are sorting through my recently deceased father’s paperwork and it is his time share).
To quote Hazel Carter….”1. that my security deposit would be held by the company for the contract period (one year) in the event that the buyer they have does not proceed.
2. That should I cancel then my security deposit would be returned less a 20% admin charge.
There is nothing in the terms and conditions about what should happen if they cannot sell my timeshare within the contract period.
Please can you tell me
1. I paid my security deposit by Visa do I have a right to claim this back.
2. I am within the 14 day cancellation period should I cancel the contract with this company.
Please can you also send me the information you sent to Hazel. I have asked the credit card compay to stop paymentbut we are too late. I intend to pursue as a fraudulent action against my father.
Thanks Sean.
Hi, i just found your site in the nick of time! I’ve been having conversations with a bloke called Owen at Holiday Rentals Direct in Spain. He had a buyer interested in our 5,000 DRI points who had offered £1.25 for them. I did a search but found nothing about the company at all which seemed odd to me so today when i spoke to him i asked for some more info about the company and he sent me an email with link to their website which could have been constructed by anyone. Once i had their full name though a search revealed your site and several others all warning about the upfront fee that hasn’t been mentioned yet, he told me there was no cost to me and that the only situation that would incur any cost was if we reneged on sending them the points certificate with the transfer document on the back signed by us. We were assured that the money would already be in our bank account before we had to send the documents. I am now waiting for his call back feeling much better informed and not at all inclined to take it any further or give him any of our financial details. Thank you.
Dear Gary,
Thanks for your detailed comment.
Glad you did find our website eventually because this company has no record at all of having sold anything or money paid to customers for a sale.
So no upfront fees! If they want to sell your membership great, but no upfront money. You’ll see he won’t be interested anymore..
Kind regards
Customer Care
I am with you on your comment, why did I not find this site sooner? I searched for scams regarding resale of timeshare but did not find anything to say that Holiday Rentals Direct is one to look out for. We were looking to sell our timeshare and the very same Debbie Peters that William called a “lady” convinced us to part with half of the so-called retainer fee! We are still in no position to pay the retainer fee but after the “Guaranteed buyer” did not deliver on their side of the contract we were told that they will put our timeshare into the corporate market and this is where we are now some two months after 50% of the retainer fee was paid by credit card. We received a call from Susan Green of the “Corporate” office to say a 100% guaranteed offer of £8200 has been received through another company called Principle Travel, they she said do not buy the timeshare from us but swap it for membership of their scheme and after 90 days we can sell the “new” deal. My mind must have left me at this stage as I agreed to pay the 50% retainer fee by credit card and the papers arrived this morning, without the T&C. HELP PLEASE!!
im so glad i found this site as im at my mums today & she got a phone call from holiday rentals direct & asking for her to pay X amount & she asked me to lend her the money & i was er for what? she told me & i was like no as its a cone & the lady on the phone could hear my & said to my mum no its not blah blah & i just said im not lending u the money.
so i come on her laptop to see what i could find out about this company & come across this site 🙂
Hi Lizzy,
Glad you found the blog!
Saved you a lot of money and hassle!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi all on the blog,
I thought for a laugh I would send an e-mail to holiday rentals direct asking for a call back and for information as to where my time share is being advertised…….and as I suspected got no call back no e-mail no response of any kind; not the kind of service one would expect from such a reputable company as this….ah well I guess they don’t want to talk to me, not even to discuss the contract that they claim is water tight and there to protect me, them and their non existentt buyer……Mr X who they claim pulled out……and what has happened to the deposit that they took from Mr X?
Club La Costa have beein touch requesting copies of all the paper work I have as they are now carrying out there own investigation as I am not the only member who has been defrauded by HRC!
M J Campbell
After this company took the upfront fee of £1200 from me I saw this blog and immediatley cancelled my card. I reported the incident to action fraud and got a crime number. My bank (Barclays) has since been in touch and investigated the payment and I have now got the money back in my account. A huge lesson has been learnt and will never be duped again and will not be taking such calls when I am running a fever again!
Dear Charlotte,
Great news though you’ve got the money back, we are very pleased to hear that.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi, Charlotte
Unfortunatly last week I have made the same mistake as many others in this country and fell for the same scam 😦 I have been made an offer of 6250 to sell my weeks owned in Dominican Repulic. The money which they call legal blah blah blah deposit is eur 1395 went off my barclays account. When I called Barclays to cancel the card unfortunalty the money was already taken ‘as hold’ into some account. I was told by Barclays that I have to despute the transaction as soon as it will show some details on my barclays acount. So far, I just got a contract sent out by HRD which I will not sign as that will mean I have lost all my money for ever. But could you help me please how do I have to go on from now? Should I inform the police first and is there any chance that Barclays will give my money back?
Besperate mum of two little ones, third is coming
Hi Klara
Dont panic there is still a chance of getting your money back.
Firstly whatever you do dont send the contract back to HRD!
Cancel your card-didnt say whether you had actually done it?
Go on-line to action fraud to report the incident. You will then get a crime number (keep this safe).
HRD take a while to take the money from teh bank so if you have cancelled your card you should get an automated call from barclays fraud. Say you havent authorised the payment and they will then send you a claim form. Put your crime number on this form and send it back.
You should then have your money returned.
The process can take a month and your money does stay out of your account in a holding area until the issue is resolved.
Good luck!
Thanks Charlotte!
Of u can, Email a copy of your unsigned contract to admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu and tell them u are cancelling the contract and want your money back send the originals back asap. Either way, notify them now that I are.cancelling. I got my money back last week.
Thanks for the help Heather, Nice one!
We always recommend to also send a letter by recorded delivery…as you never know…better safe than sorry.
But yes the sooner you tell them Klara, the better
Regards
Customer Care
Angela(Preston)
last sentance should read “have HAD NO RESPONCE FROM THEM”
Martin.
Angela (Preston)
the e-mail address you want is (www.holidayrentalsdirect.eu) It will be very interesting to see if this company get back to you with a copy of the contract,but I would not count on it!
I was also a victim of this company and they are now under police investigation in this country.
Good luck with that can you keep us informed as to how you get on.
It was to late for me to get anywhere, and now that they know the police or on to them I have sent them e-mails and haveresponseonce!
Martin.
thank you for the info martin ,so sorry you lost out also .i wish my brother had asked me to check them out before he parted with any money or signed anything i,m afraid he has probably lost his money also.
i will update if we hear anything.good luck.angela
my brother is as i type being conned by these people he has already gave them 600 pound and the paperwork they sent him to sign he had to send back to them and he never made copies….i am trying to help him as is his bank,we need holiday rentals direct to send him a copy of the terms of resale of his time share ,for my brother to give to his bank ,but i dont have an e,mail address for them …help please angela in preston lancashire
Hi Angela,
Thanks for the message.
We are sending you all the information by email.
Kind regards
Customer Care
To Charlotte,
And to anyone else following this blog,
Lets remind ourselves that it is very easy to beat yourself up and feel stupid after the event!
WE ARE NOT STUPID PEOPLE! WE ARE ALL VICTIMS OF A VERY SOPHISTICATED AND HIGHLY LUCRATIVE FRAUD…(FOR THE PERPATRAITORS)… WHO WILL GET WHAT THEY DESERVE IN THE END IF WE ALL WORK TOGETHER AND PASS ON ANY INFO THAT WE CAN NO MATTER HOW SMALL!
SO AS THEY USED TO SAY IN THE ARMY “EYES FRONT, CHIN UP, CHEST OUT…….DON`T GET ANGRY(WITH YOUR SELF) GET EVEN!!
MJC..
Thanks MJC, Totally agree!!
When reading the blog and seeing how many people have fallen for this and other dubious companies, it is more than clear it is nothing to do with being stupid.
These people are out there to get your money and they are very convincing!
We try to warn as many consumers as we can and help those who unfortunately did pay the money.
It is though with the help of consumers like you and the information you provide us that we can build a case and put a stop to these kind of dubious businesses.
Regards
Customer Care
Good morning to mindtimeshare team,
No I did not personally report HRD to the police.
I reported to “Action Fraud UK” who took down all the details and THEY REPORT DIRECT TO THE POLICE (Thames Valley or MET as I recall) on my behalf and gave me a crime ref number and access to victim support if needed!
They are collating info on the impact that this fraud is having on the victims such as me and my farther!
Can you set up a link to ACTION FRAUD UK from this blog?
Action Fraud is the official department set up by the government to counter fraud and is well worth reporting to!
My actions so far
(1) Reported to Action Fraud.
(2) reported to CIFAS.
(3) Sent all e-mails to CLUB LA COSTA as requested by them to find out how HRD got my details in the first place!
(4) sent all e-mails to TIME SHARE ASSOCIATION to keep the pot boiling!(HRD>BLACK LISTED)
TATOC.
So I have done all I can to expand the blog. I will try CAG (campaighn action group) next!
If we all work together and using people power, and NOT sitting on our hands a swinging our feet and waiting for our lack luster HMG (Her Majisty`s government) to do something ; is just going to be time waisted and more, less well informed victims will fall foul of these criminals! (AS I AND MY 82 year old father have) I found this site to late, as I was stupid enough to believe the web site that the HRD admin team have constructed to deliberatly deceive people such as myself and my Dad!
HOW DO YOU GET A WEB SITE CLOSED DOWN?
I am going to try and contact “BANCO POPULAR” in Malaga as that is where our money ended up or so the till receipt for 1,195 EUR says!
These are well practiced and successful FRAUDSTERS!
The most daming thing of all was I was told that buyer MR X was going to pay for the outstanding service charge from the deposit that they claim to have taken from him…lie after lie after lie!
“BUYER BEWARE!” so now my account has been frozen By Club La Costa untill this mess is cleared up!
M J C..
Dear Martin,
Thanks for your detailed message. You have taken all the right action.
Soon we will have a new website up and running where we can place the relevant links to the different authorities where people can and should report this kind of fraud.
As this company HRD is working from Spain, we are collecting all evidence we can get from the timeshare consumers who contact us via this blog or by email directly in order to present it all together to the Spanish police, with who we are in very close contact.
Our blog works both ways, we warn consumers about dubious companies and we collect the evidence for the police to build a good case.The more people who provide the evidence and the more people who request a refund of monies paid, the more pressure will be put on the police and the banks for inmediate action!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi all on blog,
an update was calledd today and had an argument with some one today from HOLIDAY RENTALS DIRECT,cant remember his name but he was clearly rattled by the e-mail I sent them informing them that are now underpolicee investigation!
Got the usual spiel whe asked for our money back! The buyer has pulled out and we are now going to advertisese your time share…..blah…blahblablahblah!
we have signed contract ……blah…..blah….blahblah.
Told him to save it for the police!
to mindtime staff can we set up a dedicated site to victims of HRD so we coordinate a super complaint to OFT!
To get HRD web site closed Down!!!
Regards to all on the super blog….wish we had found this web site sooner!
Why is the general public not being warned as this now seems to be a major scam!
May be a watch dog special..
any ideas!!!
M J C.
Hi Martin
Thanks for the update!
These people have all their tricky pitches ready when you start to ask questions.
Did you report them to the police?
Kind regards
Customer Care
heck I,m so glad I found your fab site! Nearly got sucked in copy of email –
Further to your telephone conversation with our sales manager regarding your timeshare, you requested more information about our Company.
Our CIF number is: B-93083996
Many Clients email their enquiries to us via our website http://www.holidayrentalsdirect.eu/ as each clients situation is different, i.e. timeshares, weeks, size etc it is easier for our sales staff to respond to enquiries and work with clients on a one to one basis to find the timeshare/resort of their preference
Below is some information regarding your sale.
Timeshare Resort : Melford Village, Scotland
15,000 pure RCI points
15,000 Diversafied points
Sale price on contract: £16,490.00
A usual transaction for a sale to complete is estimated at approximately 4 – 8 weeks. A security retainer/ deposit (and any interest), of €1,500.00 will be reimbursed on completion of a transaction.
Yours Faithfully
Tara O’Brien
Holiday Rentals Direct
0034 952 54 74 86
Thanks all
Dear Jakki,
Thanks for the copy of the email.
Those contacted by this company all got the same one, so much for saying each client is different!
They just change the ownership details and there they go…give us the retainer fee…
Glad you found this blog on time, that is 1500€ you saved there.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Ian Burrell says
Exactly the same approach to me with my Club la Costa points. I said I wanted £1000 for them just to get rid of them (not because CLC is poor, but that my financial situation has changed). Surprise surprise!, I was offered £8,000 for them by HRD if I paid 1195 euros. I checked with barclaycard who do not have HRD on their warning list, and who told me it was my choice if I wanted to take the risk. I too am waiting for an e-mail from HRD with their offer, but luckily have found this Website first, so no harm done. Thank You.
Ian,
you are lucky!
I was not so lucky!
I am waiting for Club La Costa to get back to me to explain How HRD got my details!
I have passed on my info to the following Action Fraud who passed on to police and now have a crime reference number also CIFAS who have the same also the TIME SHARE OWNERS ASSOCIATION.
M J C
I have reported HRD to Action Fraud as well so hopefully something might get done about them.
Hi Ian,
Thanks for your comment.
Strange Barclaycard does not have them on the list, at least not yet I would say as there must be numerous refund claims.
Luckily you didn’t pay them.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I did fill in an online form on a website regarding to selling my timeshare (6 months ago). As I was contacted that time and my questions were answered I though it was over (6 months ago) up until the cold call yesterday. It seems to me that Holiday Rentals Direct got my details either from the web company or their representative.
Norbert,
I have the same e-mail from the same woman!
Same offer same SCAM!
Report to ACTION FRAUD UK!
this is the UK based company who will take your details and pass on to the police and give you a crime ref number!
Best wishes!
MJC …..DO NOT DEAL WITH THEM!!
it may help – I asked for an email…
From: admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu
To:……
Subject: FW: Holiday Rentals Direct
Date: Wed, 7 Sep 2011 18:05:39 +0200
Dear Mr and Mrs Bujtas,
Further to your telephone conversation with our sales manager regarding your timeshare, you requested more information about our Company.
Our CIF number is: B-93083996
Many Clients email their enquiries to us via our website http://www.holidayrentalsdirect.eu/ as each clients situation is different, i.e. timeshares, weeks, size etc it is easier for our sales staff to respond to enquiries and work with clients on a one to one basis to find the timeshare/resort of their preference
Below is some information regarding your sale.
Timeshare Resort : Club la Costa
Number of points : 751
Week Numbers: any
Sale price on contract: £7,510.00
A usual transaction for a sale to complete is estimated at approximately 4 – 8 weeks. A security retainer/ deposit (and any interest), of €1,500. will be reimbursed on completion of a transaction.
Yours Faithfully
Jonathon Laing
Holiday Rentals Direct
0034 952 54 74 86
Thanks! What about an explanation on how they obtained your details? And what their position is regarding the Timeshare Directive that banns upfront payments?
Regards
Customer Care
good site. Keep going …:-) Thanks. I have just been contacted by Jonathan Laing. He gave me a phonenumber (what I matched with the website http://www.holidayrentalsdirect.eu) to check that they were an existing business before my £751 “retainer”. As soon I found the website I googled is and found this forum. thanks. I dont even bother to call them…..Surprised that they are still operating….
Norbert
Hi Norbert,
Thanks for your message and your kind words, we try to do all we can!
It is so difficult to stop these companies, the police needs evidence, facts and figures and thatv takes time.
So with at least trying to warn as many consumers as we can, we hope we avoid worse and prevent people from paying.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Is MDCC the same company as Holiday Rentals Direct?
I have been contacted by both companies and as far as I know its 2 different companies doing a different scam.
Dear Ruth,
Thanks for your comment.
As far as we know there is no connection, unless you have information that could indicate these are the same people?
Kind regards
Customer Care
looks like I have been taken in, how can we get out of this and recover our bond
just found this today.
I Have just got off the phone after being offered £6000 for my weeks 51 & 52 in Tenerife, they asked for £895 upfront payment which would be returned to me on completion… felling a little uneasy i entered the phone numbers supplied and found this site… thank you so much for the information i will not be paying them anything and will be seeking other methods of selling my timeshare
Dear Adam,
Thanks for the message. I am really glad you found us! Internet is a great tool for checking out companies like this.
You saved yourself a lot of money and hassle to claim it back eventually.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I was contacted by Holiday Rentals direct since last week, the man called Darren Roberts, same story as above, they asked the upfront fee of Eur1400 which would be refunded once the paperwork is sorted…reading your comments, I think it is safer not going forward with the ‘deal’….in the past few years, have been contacted by many timeshare resale companies, went a couple of meetings, but none of them seems trustful, and I also joined the group law suit organised by ITRA a year ago, not sure what ITRA is doing, but no progress…with the increased maintenance fee year by year, is there any better way to get rid of it?
regards
Hi All,
Same as lot of you guy: I disposed of my timeshare points (Club La Costa) via some outfit called Personal Travel Group (who are now apparently in liquidation but I have no confirmation of that yet). I paid £9,000 as part of that deal on the basis that I would likely get more than that back in 4 years time via a Reclaim Certificate. If PTG have gone belly up, that almost certainly means I’ll get little or nothing back in 4 years time.
Had a call this morning from someone called Kelly at Holiday Rental Direct offering me £8,000 for my “membership” of PTG, saying they had a buyer but wanting over 1000 Euros as a “Holding Fee”. She was very smooth and not overly pushy to start with, but having already (maybe) been bitten once with PTG I had no wish to be bitten a second time so insisted on checking their website (at least) before agreeing to anything.
Thankfully, the “up-front Holding Fee” rang alarm bells and so I did some checking on the Net and found this page. One thing that also rang alarm bells was the fact that there was not a single postal address listed on the HTD website, which struck me as very “odd”.
Can’t thank you guys enough for the heads up. A swift and fairly abrupt refusal winged its way back to her :). Moral of the story seems to be this: At the end of the day enjoy your timeshare while you have it (I did – had loads of really great holidays from it), but you’ll find you’re quite lucky if it has much resale value when you decide you don’t want it any more. At the end of the day I’d have paid well over £9000 in maintenance on the timeshare points over the next 4 years so I’m fairly philosophical about it.
Regards,
Oliver
I had a call today from a company called MDCC who are a property resale company who are out to buy 8 weeks of timeshares. They have sent me a letter of introduction and are going to contact me later in the week. Any ideas
Hi Bryan,
From our blog you can guess we don’t really “like” companies that cold call, they always turn out to be dodgy.
Just be really careful and when money is requested upfront, under whatever purpose…don’t even continue listening and hang up please.7
Regards
Customer Care
I had a call yesterday to say that MDCC are no longing interested in buying my weeks that they have found someone else with more weeks, but they will keep me on file, so have they found out we know these are bogus and going after someone else, very strange.
Hi Bryan,
Maybe they also read our blog, you never know.
Regards
Customer Care
Dear Mindtimeshare,
Since I triggered this blog, I was expecting advise, help and to share my experience with you and others. I have received your advise and sharing my experience with you and others. One thing is missing! How can you help those of us who are trapped with our timeshares with huge accumulating maintainance fees? Is there any way we can get rid of our timeshares by passing these sharks such as HRD? How can you stop HRD from duping other victims who fall victims to them? Can you release a worldwide notice to warn those people who are not aware of this blog and prevent many innocent victims from being duped? What exactly can you do to prevent ongoing fraud in this timeshare business?
William
Dear William,
Thank you for your message and participating actively on our blog.
We have as main role to combat the fraudulent practices carried out by fraudulent Discount Travel Membership Clubs (holiday clubs), Resale firms, Class Action Law firms, Cash Back schemes, etc.
We work closely with the police in Spain and the UK (where most “bogus” companies are located) and we collect evidence for the police in order to back up the investigation and the eventual close down of these companies. We warn as many consumers possible through the Mindtimeshare blog, facebook and Twitter and there is also a new website in the make that will be launched shortly. We have close to 700 followers on Twitter and in the month of July we had over 12000 visitors in the blog.
For those who unfortunately have fallen into the traps of these companies we offer advice and guidance in order to recuperate the money paid or at least a part of it. All the above is a lot of work and requires a lot of “man hours”.
We are constantly looking for more back up and support from the timeshare developers and we are pleased to say that we are now starting to receive this support and the larger timeshare companies are now actively informing their members about our project.
Things are going slow, but having in mind that we only started the active prevention of fraud through our blog in February, we are very pleased to say that at this stage we have prevented hundreds of consumers paying money to these fraudulent companies (of which we know) and also a large amount of consumers have received a refund of their monies paid or are in process of getting this back.
We are on the case!
Kind regards
Customer Care
Just find out about this website, but already gave my details, please help. trying to cancel my card but bank says just got ogg the money, what can i do? desperate mum of two
email them straightaway at admin@holidayrentalsdirect.eu and say that you have changed your mind and want to cancel the contract and get a refund. As soon as the contract comes through return it unsigned within 14 days. Keep all the emails they send you. Today I have received a refund minus their 20% admin charge. I was happy to get the £880 back.
My parents have just asked me to check out an offer made to the by Holiday Rentals direct. I was suspicious when I heard the request for a returnable deposit of 1195 Euros required up front. Thank you for this web page which may have stopped my parents being the next victim in any cash upfront con.
Regards
Shaun.
Dear Shaun,
We are glad you found the blog and it prevented your parents from paying this dodgy company any money.
If anybody else calls, let them always check with us first.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I had a call on Wed 27th July from a company HRD and asked me if I still want to sell my timeshare I thought that was quick has I only registered it the day before with the Timeshare Shop. After agreeing £ 2300 per week, he said I phone you back once i have taken a deposit off Mr & Mrs Higgson, sure enough 30 mins later said this was all done.He was then asking for my address and then I thought,its going a bit fast i asked his name and company and where they got my details from and it was from Timeshare World not the same company. I said could you email me with the offer in writing, which they did, then I went on the web to check them out thats when I came across your website, I thought yes this is not right. He phoned again and asked me shall we proceed then I said whats this 1500 Euros retainer you forgot to mention, he went to explain but its quite safe as you pay by credit card, i still was not happy he said check with them,I didnt but he phoned again still saying its ok I said send me the cheque and I will guarantee I would send the deeds, but in the end I said I am not selling but renting out he was not a happy bunny as their client has paid a deposit non refundable, and basically said I wasted his time, no calls since.
Hi Bryan,
Many thanks for your message.
So he “forgot” to mention the retainer fee?
Real money for an non-existing sale and non-existing buyers..
Lucky you they haven’t called back!
Regards
Customer Care
I was contacted by Debbie Peters and a chap called James. Debbie pretended not to know anything of James’ phone call. James’ offer from ‘his client’ was £8000 but Debbie’s was only £5000. When I explained I had had a better offer, Debbie explained I would not get that offer again as clients are there for an afternoon only and would have bought another offer. I explained why I had not taken the previous offer due to being asked for money up front. Debbie advised she would go back to ‘Mr & Mrs Knight’ to try and up their offer for me and also see what she could do to ‘relieve my fears’ on the retainer fee. Sure enough, 30 minutes later the offer was up to £7500 but I had to take it there and then. she also advised that she had spoken to legal and got the 1500 Euro retainer reduced to 1195 Euro (seems a popular figure!) to ‘ease my concerns’. Debbie advised if I paid by Visa or Mastercard I had comeback to the credit card company to get my money back where as most ‘scam companies’ ask for cash or bank transfer. As I work for a credit card company I know that you might get lucky but willingly giving your credit card number and security code across to an organisation can be seen as authorising the company to take money from your account rather than fraudulent activity. I would advise, as do all the posts from the Mindshare Customer Care scheme, not to willingly give details to this company. I told them no for a second time and they haven’t bothered to call since!
Dear Simon,
Thank you very much indeed for your message.
I am glad that you as somebody who understands about credit card payments confirms it isn’t that straight forward as these people paint it with the ” your payment is protected”
They crate a doubt with the consumer and it is very helpful you explained the above. Many thanks!
I suppose you are not sad about the fact they haven’t called back!
Customer Care
i have been contacted by this lot asking for the 1195 euros saying that they have a buyer for my timeshare they sound very convincing but I think it is a scam any advice please
Hi,
Thanks for your message.
Our recommendation is not to pay anything upfront, not to this company or any other! It is illegal and neither does it make sense you have to pay for a sale.
Kind regards,
Customer Care
I told them this morning that with the cooling off period I wanted my money back. I have contacted the timeshare consumers association who told me what exactly i should say in the letter to them. I know it will do no good. I have also contacted action fraud who assure me the police will be investigating.
Hi Ruth,
You are doing the right thing. When sending them a cancellation letter make sure you do this by recorded delivery.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Dear Ruth.
I need to send a letter to cancel the contract which I did not sign yet with HRD, could you help me with what I need to include in the letter. I am no good in writing formal letter as English is not my mother thongue 😦 thanks a lot, Klara
Don’t worrry you will get your money back it took almost a month but persevere. Keep copies of all your emails to them. And demand all of your money back you deserve it. Best of luck.
Its true the credit companies wont automatically action a refund. I have been filling in several forms with a credit company trying to get all my money back from this fraudulant HRD. they were very unhappy that I decided to cancel without signing the agreement.
We have just been contacted by the company, a lady called Vicky. This is now the fourth time I have spoken to this lady, and she has now come back advising they have a buyer for our timeshare for £25,000.10 which was £10 per point for our ownership.
Now the original call was advising that they could possibly re-sale our timeshare, and on the second call they advised that they may have a buyer. On the third call they confirmed this and advised that the required a £1200 retainer up front for this. I was obviously off put by this and asked for a call back this morning so that I could look into them a bit further, finding this forum and also a few more bits of info.
Now using the info here I asked why they needed an upfront fee, which she advised is not an upfront fee, but a deposit to ensure that once we recieve the money for the timeshare we will then send them the contractual documents. If we fail to do this then they can use the £1200 to take legal proceedings against us. She also quoted the the consumer credit act from 1974 about the guarantee of your money for the £1200 if paid by visa/mastercard.
I also asked how she obtained my mobile number!! She advised that she got this from the timeshare database list. Does this even exist??
Our ownership is with Club La Costa, who she believed was a very reputable company, another warning sign. We have left it asking her to call us back on Monday morning, as we seek to get further information and advice regarding this.
The ownership we have is crippling us financially and all we want to do is get rid, but with so many scam artists out there we feel like we are trapped in a room with no exits.
Thanks for your comment.
These people are keeping you very busy I see by the amount of calls.
Well, there is no such thing as a Timeshare database list, one more lie on their long list of known lies during their phone calls.
Kind regards,
Customer Care
Hi
Again I wish Id found this website sooner..my father in law had just passed away when my mother in law got a call from them. I have been dealing with all the affaris and When I was asked for the ‘holding fee’ i challenged why they wanted this. Emily Wilson was very convincing. I asked her to call back. I did look at the internet but like one of the previous comments made couldn’t find anything untoward. They have always called back etc when I have phoned or emailed, until recently when I have sent numerous emails and had no response. I therefore became a little worried as obviously this isn’t my money but my grieving mother in laws and found your website. I am going to the bank tomorrow with my mother in law as we paid by credit card and have been advised that we should be protected and get our money back from the credit card company. But I wondered how we stood with regards to the document that we signed. As you can imagine I am feeling terrible about this at the moment as I have been dealing with it all and would hate for her to lose her money. I feel like a total idiot! Your comments or help would be appreciated. Thanks
DNL,
see further down on this blog!
I to am a Club La Costa points owner!
If you read this in time don’t get involved Club La Costa are investigatinging “Holiday Rentals Direct!” DO NOT SEND ANY MONEY
AsK “Vicky” some personal detailsails and pass them on!
ask how they got your Club La Costa details as CLC do not give out ANY member details…or so they Say.
Martin Campbell.
I have been contacted by this company this week who found me a buyer within 24 hours at a price way above what I expected.
They mentioned that they have gained a deposit from the buyer of 1,500 euros and are going to contact me after the weekend to organise the paperwork.
They did say (Jeremy Thompson is the gent that calls) that they do not require a penny until the funds have cleared in my bank account…………………. Does this mean that I have to release my bank details to them and would I be safe to do that?
Dear Vivienne,
Thanks for your message. If you read the comments of other consumers who have also been dealing with this company, you can see it is only a matter of time before they ask you for a fee and will call it “legal fee” or “holding bond” or whatever name they come up with.
Our advice? Do not give them any details of your bank or credit card. They are not to be trusted and there is no such thing as a guaranteed sale offered on a cold call.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I think too have been duped by this company. Stupidly I believed them and have paid the retainer.
I checked out ther CIF number which seemed to be genuine but having seen your site I realise I was wrong. Have contacted my visa company who are investigating now for fraud
Dear Ruth,
Thanks for your message. Although they have a CIF number, that doesn’tn mean they are not handling against the law by taking a deposit and making you believe that they have a guaranteed buyer. I hope your credit card gives you a positive reply. Please let me know.
Regards,
Customer Care
A lady call Debbie Peters has been contacting me for a hold down fee of 1195 Euros which will be returned to me after completion of sales. A prospective buyer has already deposited their holding fee and HRD is just waiting for my deposit to dispatch contracts to me for my signatures to proceed with the sales. I requested for their company legal registration details and Debbie responded via email stating “Our CIF number is B-93083996. What is CIF?
Debbie is very convincing and certain that the deal will go through to stop me from paying maintainance fees which was not known to us before the sales of our timeshare. Do you mean Holidays Rental Direct are bogus?
Dear Mr William,
Thanks for your comment.
A CIF number is a registration number at the Spanish Companies Housing.
The fact they are asking you for a retainer fee is not a good sign! And why did they call you? How did they get your details?
If you read through our blog, not only the comments on this company but also for the numerous other companies out there that are using the same pitch, you will see that nobody has actually sold his timeshare through a company that calls out of the blue, claims to have a buyer for your timeshare (which they don’t even know what it is until you tell them) and ask for a retainer fee.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Hi I was approached by a company called half moon holdings who said they had a Diamond resort member who wished to buy my Time share points & offered me £5200 pounds & all I had to do was put a retainer down of £1500 in good faith to secure the deal.After several months they came back to me to say the deal had fallen through & that they would move me to the top of their resale list.
Three weeks later I had a call from a company called Holiday Rentals direct who had been instructed by Half Moon Holdings to sell my Diamond points & it would cost me a further 1730 euros & at the end of 90 days I would get a cheque back for the £5200 plus my deposit giving a total of £8200 ,I paid the said amount by credit card & hence receivedMembership to a Company called Principle Travel at a cost 0f £8200 the balance being my Diamond points this is now due the beginning of November
Having checked my Diamond Resorts paperwork I find that I cannot sell to a third party so How do I stand with getting my money back as I feel I have been completely conned
Hi Ian,
Thanks for the message.
Really sorry you have been duped by both these companies.
We will send you the information by email and take it from there.
Kind regards
Customer Care
Been contacted this evening by this company offering a guaranteed buyer at £8000 who is going to pay 30% up front tonight and the deal will be done in 28 days from now. All they ask for in return is a Visa or Mastercard number for a 1500 Euros retainer!
I have been contacted by them tonight too with the same offer, I refused to pay the ‘retainer’ and asked for the details to be sent by email. I was promised them immediately and havent received them. That was over 90minutes ago.
Dear Andy,
They won’t give up that easy, so yhey will probably send you the email later. But you know now what they play at!
Regards
Customer Care
If only I had found this site sooner! I have been conned and feel really stupid.Like an idiot I believed them and paid the retainer as somebody keen to sell their timeshare. I paid by switch and not credit card. I have contacted my bank Narclays to get the payment stopped or disputed but as I gave them the details they cant do anything to help me.I have to contact the company direct to get them to give me my money back. I have done this by e-mail but we will see if I get any response or my money back. Could you suggest anything else that I can do? Can you report the company to anyone?
Hi Charlotte
Thanks for your comment. Sorry to hear you paid these people.
We are going to send you the information straight away by email.
Regards
Customer Care
I am with you on your comment, why did I not find this site sooner? I searched for scams regarding resale of timeshare but did not find anything to say that Holiday Rentals Direct is one to look out for. We were looking to sell our timeshare and the very same Debbie Peters that William called a “lady” convinced us to part with half of the so-called retainer fee! We are still in no position to pay the retainer fee but after the “Guaranteed buyer” did not deliver on their side of the contract we were told that they will put our timeshare into the corporate market and this is where we are now some two months after 50% of the retainer fee was paid by credit card. We received a call from Susan Green of the “Corporate” office to say a 100% guaranteed offer of £8200 has been received through another company called Principle Travel, they she said do not buy the timeshare from us but swap it for membership of their scheme and after 90 days we can sell the “new” deal. My mind must have left me at this stage as I agreed to pay the 50% retainer fee by credit card and the papers arrived this morning, without the T&C. HELP PLEASE!!
Dear Hanlie,
Thanks for your message, I am really sorry to read what has happened to you with Holiday Rentals Direct.
We will send you the information by email.
Kind regards
Customer Care
I have been contacted today by Sue Miller telling me she can offer me £5800 for my Club Class Gold Membership. All sounded really good so agreed to sell and started the transactions. At the end I was then asked to give my credit card details so that £1395 can be taken. I will get this back, however when the courier arrives with my paperwork. I stupidly gave my details then went onto the internet to look for any scams of this type. I contacted Barclaycard and they have cancelled my card so no money has been taken. If they try to later Holiday Direct rentals wont get any money.
Dear Cathy,
Thanks for your message
Wow, that was a very close call! You have been lucky you could cancell the card so quickly!
Kind regards
Customer Care
I Have just been contacted by the same company and thought I would check them out. Again I asked for an email to confirm the details and the “Insurance policy” I had to purchase for E1500. I’m still waiting!! Thank goodness for sites like this!!
I’ve been contacted today in exactly the same way as above. I realised it must be a con when I couldnt find a decent website for them but have to say “Vicky” is very convincing!! I will not be giving them my visa details!
Just wish someone could recommend an honest, regulated company to sell my fathers timeshare and relieve him from this nightmare.