Access to leisure scam www.a2l.biz

dvdfan

Hi,

Ill try and keep this brief. my Dad was on holidays in Malta, guy approaches them and offers them free wine etc if they hear a presentation (i know they should have a run a mile)

Anyway, the parents are in their 50's and travel alot to the likes of Salou and Bulgaria, they were offering dirt cheap accommodation if they become a member, i think the full price was about 3.5k which is taken out monthly over 3 years and since they holiday regularly this seemed like a good deal.

Heres some of the things ive issues with:

1) Part of the deal was the 1st Holiday must be in Malta or Lanzarote. This didnt suit my Dad as they had a holiday planned although not at the time booked for Salou in August (they were in Malta in march) Rep said not a problem, weve tons of availability in Salou but what you can do is book Malta sometime in 2010 and once you make the booking you can then book Salou for August. When he got home, the company insisted that he couldnt do this but after alot of hassle eventually agreed however they had nothing in Salou available until March (think that was the only month available next year)
2) My Dad has a heart problem and uses a mobility scooter, he said all the Hotels were very close to the beach and were all wheelchair accessible again this was not true on checking out the website
3) He said all the hotels were 4 or 5 star, not a big deal but again completely untrue.
4) And i though this was pretty sick, the parents said theyd have a think about it and come back to him later, he said that he was working with the Maltese Tourist Board and under there rules they couldnt offer the deal again to the person until 18 months later so if they didnt sign today they wouldnt be able to come back tommorrow. Now i know at this stage me and you and most other people would have laughed and walked off and my Dad isnt usually this gullable but he was good at selling hes story and they signed up.

Hes paid 1200 to date in deposts and monthly installments, credit card company said they can only try to seek a refund when the contract expires in May 2012 as until then it cannot be proved they didnt offer what was available in the contract which is a bit rediculous. He cant afford to pay this and also to pay for a Holiday so aswell as paying for something he wont get hell also probably lose a couple of holidays he could have had with that money. Hes thinking of closing the credit card but that will lose him access to the cards credit which would leave him tight. Im trying to give the company the benefit of the doubt that its over zealous salesman and the company arent aware of these actions and sent a polite email to one of the directors whose names i managed to get hold of although he was told over the phone that if he didnt keep paying he would need a solicitor.

Heres a thread on people with similar issues with the same company
http://forum.holidaywatchdog.com/Timeshare-&-Holiday-Clubs-club-access-2-leisure-Thread-11449.html

So since this is an English company working out of Malta what are hes options to try and cancel this and get hes money back as waiting until 2012 to request a refund is just rediculous? The next payment is due the 15th of next month so he wants to either close the card by then or check out what other options are available. Is closing the card likely to present any problems later on?

jor el

Since he signed up to this, legally there's not a lot he can do to get out. Canceling the credit card is about his only option.

dvdfan

dvdfan wrote: »

Hi,

Ill try and keep this brief. my Dad was on holidays in Malta, guy approaches them and offers them free wine etc if they hear a presentation (i know they should have a run a mile)

Anyway, the parents are in their 50's and travel alot to the likes of Salou and Bulgaria, they were offering dirt cheap accommodation if they become a member, i think the full price was about 3.5k which is taken out monthly over 3 years and since they holiday regularly this seemed like a good deal.

Heres some of the things ive issues with:

1) Part of the deal was the 1st Holiday must be in Malta or Lanzarote. This didnt suit my Dad as they had a holiday planned although not at the time booked for Salou in August (they were in Malta in march) Rep said not a problem, weve tons of availability in Salou but what you can do is book Malta sometime in 2010 and once you make the booking you can then book Salou for August. When he got home, the company insisted that he couldnt do this but after alot of hassle eventually agreed however they had nothing in Salou available until March (think that was the only month available next year)
2) My Dad has a heart problem and uses a mobility scooter, he said all the Hotels were very close to the beach and were all wheelchair accessible again this was not true on checking out the website
3) He said all the hotels were 4 or 5 star, not a big deal but again completely untrue.
4) And i though this was pretty sick, the parents said theyd have a think about it and come back to him later, he said that he was working with the Maltese Tourist Board and under there rules they couldnt offer the deal again to the person until 18 months later so if they didnt sign today they wouldnt be able to come back tommorrow. Now i know at this stage me and you and most other people would have laughed and walked off and my Dad isnt usually this gullable but he was good at selling hes story and they signed up.

Hes paid 1200 to date in deposts and monthly installments, credit card company said they can only try to seek a refund when the contract expires in May 2012 as until then it cannot be proved they didnt offer what was available in the contract which is a bit rediculous. He cant afford to pay this and also to pay for a Holiday so aswell as paying for something he wont get hell also probably lose a couple of holidays he could have had with that money. Hes thinking of closing the credit card but that will lose him access to the cards credit which would leave him tight. Im trying to give the company the benefit of the doubt that its over zealous salesman and the company arent aware of these actions and sent a polite email to one of the directors whose names i managed to get hold of although he was told over the phone that if he didnt keep paying he would need a solicitor.

Heres a thread on people with similar issues with the same company
http://forum.holidaywatchdog.com/Timeshare-&-Holiday-Clubs-club-access-2-leisure-Thread-11449.html

So since this is an English company working out of Malta what are hes options to try and cancel this and get hes money back as waiting until 2012 to request a refund is just rediculous? The next payment is due the 15th of next month so he wants to either close the card by then or check out what other options are available. Is closing the card likely to present any problems later on?

Just to add some feedback on this, there was one thing i left out, the parents left half way through the presentation to pickup my aunt and uncle, at this point he mentioned what i said above that they had to sign today or they couldnt join for 18 months, so although they didnt make the decision on the spot they were under pressure to make the decision on the day. Thought it only fair to mention that as i didnt know at the time of writing.

Anyway i contacted them with a polite email, they responded quickly although definsively but said they would investigate over the weekend. They came back with the reply that the fact that they left and came back before signing disproved undue pressure (even though they had to leave to pickup someone at the airport and i could prove this)

That they have contacted him with accommodation offers recently so they are still providing their service (they did contact him with a 1 bedroom apartments that sleep 4 people, not surprisingly the rep told them that the sleeps 4 package is 2 seperate bedrooms and not 1 bedrooms apts with a pull out bed/couch)

And finally there is a clause in the contract that prevents counterclaims or possiblity of claims.

He never apologised or even mentioned the behaviour of the rep, the false promises he made or anything of that nature so to say im disappointed is an understatement.

Basically the contract is binding and does what it says on the contract however the rep just told him whatever he wanted to hear to get him to sign the contract but none of those are included in the contract. If only we all read these contracts, just like i didnt read my phone,rent,TV,gym,loan contract etc when i signed them, i guess we should just tell people to shut up when theyre selling us something unless you can show it to me in writing in the contract.

So nothing can be done to help my dad in this case however since this is now the 1st listing in google for leisure and access scam, 5th in google for leisure to access then hopefully it can prevent people in the same situation before they sign to ask access to leisure to show them in the contract where it says exactly what there offering. Ill add a few keywords at the bottom here so more people pick it up on google.

Heres a site dedicated to people who have been stung by this:
http://www.access2leisure.info

Apparently the Maltese Tourist Agency are taking legal action against them
http://www.maltatoday.com.mt/2009/08/09/t3.html

access to leisure
club access to leisure
club access 2 leisure
acce4ss 2 leisure
a2l
www.a2l.biz
www.access2leisure.info
http://www.access2leisure.info

jor el

dvdfan wrote: »

They came back with the reply that the fact that they left and came back before signing disproved undue pressure (even though they had to leave to pickup someone at the airport and i could prove this)

The fact that they left and came back does show that no undue pressure was put on them, in fact, it shows willingness on their part to go through with it. If they felt that anything was wrong about the deal, then they needn't have gone back. The time away should have given them time to think about what they were signing up to, without any sales pressure being on them.

I'm afraid that there really does look like nothing can be done. It looks like they willingly entered into a contract, they had adequate time to think it over, they weren't under constant pressure to sign, but they chose themselves to not watch the full presentation. There's not going to be a way out of that.

dvdfan

Well i have to disagree about the undue pressure, if i didnt explain it properly basically they went to the presentation, when they said they had to leave to pick someone up at the airport he mentioned that as they work in conjunction with the Maltese tourist board they had a law in place that prevented them from selling the deal for 18 months if they dont choose to sign the deal on the day or something to that effect, so they knew they had to sign today or basically never, this is not true but a tactic he used. If there was no pressure he wouldnt have returned that day.

They would have signed there and then because they were happy as he basically told them everything they wanted to hear, yeah its a 2 bedroom apt deal (when it wasnt), yeah weve loads of accommodation in Salou (i.e in about 1 year well have 1 apt free during off peak season) and all the other lies i mentioned etc etc etc

They would have been happy had they got all the things the rep promised them, of course this wasnt detailed in the agreement as it was verbal. Similar stories have happened to tons of people if you read the links and threads.

So in that context i could sell you a PC, tell you all about it specs and how amazing it is and charge you 4 times what its worth, get you to sign a contract for the price and detail on the contract its price but not the specs and give you a bog standard dell PC for €2k. Yeah id be in the right but its not fair, but your right theres probably not much i can do.

Im sending emails to the Maltese Tourist Board, Minister for tourism in Malta, the consumer and competition division there, the Maltese Times which already posted an article about them and RTE's buyer beware programme and BBC watchdog.

Im not arguing that the contract isnt legal and does what it says, but the agents are just telling pure lies in order to sell their product. Of course if i was to go around and insist that everything someone told me verbally when signing a contract for a new phone provider, broadband provider, window cleaner, gym subscription etc then i would look like an idiot.

The difference with most companies is they wont tell complete lies. After all hes going to pay circa €4k for something he hasnt used or wont use, hes already been on holiday since he signed with them but they didnt have anything suitable. They didnt provide him with anything yet, for all the attention there going to get and bad publicity from this thread alone on google it would have made better business sense to just refund him. He didnt use anything, theres no costs but im sure if they were to refund even 1/4 of the requests they would probably be out of business as im sure most of there customers fall into that category.

mcaul

Basically we all know its a scam. But what many people don't know is a company like this wil NEVER defend itself in court as it would set a legal precedent for all of its customers to cancel.

Your father has a fairly waterproof defence case, corroborated by your mother & possibly others who were in the room. - It would be easy, via the courts, for a laywer to obtain details of all people who signed up that day and get statements from them about the sales techniques.

As there was undue pressure placed on you to sign (even if you did leave & return) it would be highly unlikely that a case would be lost.

Best option is to cancel the credit card used, accept the loss of money paid to date and if they attempt any legal action, respond with a counter action for a return of monies paid.

This was covered on Joe Duffy and similar advice was given. Also go to european consumer agency for further info.

http://www.eccdublin.ie/topics/timeshare.html

As for credit card leaving him tight on credit - should be no problem switching. Some banks offer both VISA & mastercard, so you could even switch within your bank. - A word about the scam to the bank manager would see it through.

jor el

dvdfan wrote: »

Well i have to disagree about the undue pressure, if i didnt explain it properly basically they went to the presentation, when they said they had to leave to pick someone up at the airport he mentioned that as they work in conjunction with the Maltese tourist board they had a law in place that prevented them from selling the deal for 18 months if they dont choose to sign the deal on the day or something to that effect, so they knew they had to sign today or basically never, this is not true but a tactic he used. If there was no pressure he wouldnt have returned that day.

I think the lie is all they have the sellers on. Undue pressure would be if they didn't let your parents leave without signing. Since they let them away, when they could think about the offer with a clear head, and still came back to sign, this doesn't really show undue pressure, in my opinion anyway.

If they want to fight this, they're going to need to get a solicitor, and one in Malta at that. If they just walk away and refuse to pay, I don't know what kind of trouble they could find themselves in.

From mccaul's link, regarding Holiday Clubs:
They are often confused with Timeshare as there are significant similarities between the two products. Unfortunately Holiday Club contracts are not protected by legislation and you are at the mercy of unscrupulous fraudsters who will take your money and run before you even attempt to enjoy the so-called holiday.
It sounds like this is what your parents signed up to. How you go about fighting this, I don't know. I doubt they'll get any money back, all they can do is stop paying any more.

ytpe2r5bxkn0c1

They stop paying, contact a solicitor (here to start with) and see what develops.
To be honest, I'm very surprised at two people in their 50s (there myself) ,who travel frequently, falling for this type of selling practice. But rather than us debate "scam or no scam" let them seek professional advice.

dvdfan

Yeah thanks for the comments, i was surprised too they got caught and when i heard about it alarm bells rang imediately however as you can see from the amount of people caught, they were very convincing and had a professional setup. Neither here nor there i guess at this point.

1 thing quoted from the newspaper:

After several complaints to the MTA and the Consumer Division, Lamont was informed that Access2Leisure had allegedly committed an offence while processing his contract, by taking a deposit on the first day when no payment should have been made before a 10-day ‘cooling off’ period.

Ive checked with him and he said that they also told him had to pay a deposit on the day of €500 which he paid by credit card, they said this had to be paid otherwise people could come back next week and get free accommodation and cancel (even though you cant cancel it in reality)

Im not sure if the Maltese Tourist Board takes them to court like in the newspaper article above if they parents will get there money back or have to take a seperate case. but looks like as advised the best thing to do is close the credit card and try and get legal advise. It would probably be wise to wait until the 1st case is resolved before they spend on lawyers fees, the person in that article actually setup the www.access2leisure.info site and keeps it updated on the progress of the case as he keeps in contact with the Maltese Tourist Board. Obviously if they win their case based on the breach of law where they took a deposit on the 1st day then my Dad has proof of this too and he hasnt used their services so should be entitled to a refund. Whether they fall under Holiday club or Timeshare or whether Maltese law is different to the quote in mcaul's link is the question but the fact that the Maltese Tourist Board have contacted this guy to act as a witness is a good sign it is against the law as im sure they would be aware of these things before going to the bother of bringing a court case. It is a newspaper though and didnt see any official quotes from the tourist board.

So ive sent one last email to them showing them all the agencies ill be sending the email to if they dont refund and cancel by wednesday, i wouldnt hold my breathe though.

scamed off

can anyone help on this i am a member of access 2 leisure and not happy they way a2l works i wish to terminate my contract which i have been told a £325 fee is payable this i can accept they are saying i have to pay 2010 management fees as well even if i have terminated the contract am i being scamed :mad: and do i have to pay

gilly1045

I am embarrassed to admit that my husband and I also got caught by this company, and now £3,000 short from our savings. We were also told a pack of lies although they all seemed so sincere at the time, but obviously we were wrong. We have tried to find a suitable holiday but nothing seems to be available for the places and time of year we are looking for. I have seen an item saying that the Maltese Government are taking A2L to court regarding their lies etc, so hopefully something will be done about them, but its probably doubtful that we will be able to get our money back.

Last year they were ringing me asking for £295 for maintenance, even though they told us that it would be £245 yearly. We told them that our financial circumstances wouldn't allow us to afford this amount, and I then asked them if they would sell our subscription. I was then told that they didn't sell them, and we were told that if we wanted to sell it they would do it for us, so obviously more lies. A few weeks back they rang us again asking me for another £195 which was according them outstanding from our account. They then told me that if we wanted to book 2 weeks holiday we would have to pay another £295 maintenance on top of the 2 amounts of £99 for each week we book. Again this was never told to us at the time we bought into the club, so more and more lies all the time. I wish we had never been talked into it, and normally I would not be, but they made it seem so good and we thought it would help our children to go on holiday as well as ourselves. We are going to speak to our solicitor on Monday and see if he can offer us any advise. Apparently they have broken the law by taking money from us at our first meeting, and not giving us a 10 day cooling off period.

G

amdublin

Sorry to hear this Gilly.

I don't have anything helpful to add but hopefully the solicitor will assist you.

Best of luck.

(Ps. Don't beat yourselves up about it. You made a bad decision on the back of pressure from some very skilled con artists)

gilly1045

Thankyou for your kind words, and yes your right just have to put it down to experience now, which is what we are trying to do.

Best wishes,
Gill

dvdfan

keep us updated Gilly. The route we took was to cancel the credit card but weve been told the bills will still come through even though the card is cancelled but as of yet theyve not recieved any bills. Not a nice option since if they do send a bill they either pay it and throw away money or get bad credit for not paying it.

gilly1045

I just wish I hadn't paid it in full at the time, or at least in 2 parts. I will let you know what the solicitor tells me.

Gill

whatalark1

Have been members of A2L since 2006 and have not made much use of the club in that time,family matters having taken priority. As pensioners, my wife and I have suffered a sever drop in our finances. We are unable to continue with the cost of timeshare membership and contacted the customer services at A2L expressing our wish to relinquish our ownership. Guess what - they replied that it will cost £1,000 on top of the management fee. I can find no mention of this in the club rule book - we just want to be rid of the thing, where on earth do these people expect us to find that sort of money.

Cabaal

whatalark1 wrote: »

Have been members of A2L since 2006 and have not made much use of the club in that time,family matters having taken priority. As pensioners, my wife and I have suffered a sever drop in our finances. We are unable to continue with the cost of timeshare membership and contacted the customer services at A2L expressing our wish to relinquish our ownership. Guess what - they replied that it will cost £1,000 on top of the management fee. I can find no mention of this in the club rule book - we just want to be rid of the thing, where on earth do these people expect us to find that sort of money.

Perhaps it was outlined in the Terms & Conditions of the time share when you first signed up?

If its not then ask them where it is started that this charge would apply, where do you agree to such a charge when you signed up.

dudara

Closing thread - zombie

dudara