H10 Hotels
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Beware. Premium Travel Club Jamaica
I traveled to Jamaica for the first time this month with my husband and our son. We stayed at Ocean Coral Springs Resort in Trelawny, Montego Bay JA. My family and I had a great time.The room we stayed in was clean & we had a beautiful balcony view overlooking the ocean and the kid's water park and pool. Now, let's get to the point of this review. It is not really the resort/hotel that was the issue for us. It is their Premium Travel Club (part of the H10 hotels). We arrived in Jamaica hungry, tired, hot, and sweaty but eager to get our vacation started. As soon as we turned away from the check-in desk to get started towards our room, we were approached by a travel club employee (we didn't know who she was at the time). She was super friendly and personable, and she and my Jamaican husband were chatting about how long it's been since he's been to Jamaica. She had a notepad in her hand and invited us to breakfast the next day at 8:15 in the morning. I found it odd, but since she was very nice, we hesitantly agreed, wondering what this was all about?! We did arrive to the lobby as agreed the next day and met with the same lady who invited us to breakfast. She then introduced us to another lady who we learned we would be dining with at breakfast. All of us headed over to Martha's Market, a breakfast buffet on the resort and we sat down with her and chatted about things like where we are traveling from etc. She was very nice. At breakfast, my husband asked her what this is all about and she shared with us that after breakfast, she'd like us to head over to the travel club for a 1 hr presentation. I looked at my husband because I realized that they were eventually going to try and sell us something. But,we went to the presentation. At the travel club, called "Premium Travel Club", we were seated at a table and the young lady gave the presentation. They market it to you in a way that makes it seem as if you become a member of the travel club, and have future plans to travel, you would get huge savings by booking through them instead of sites like Expedia, Booking.com, etc. They kept noting that the amount of money that I told them we spent on this trip would pay for the membership in no time, which was originally offered at 17, then 15 thousand. Yeah, that wasn't happening! what happens next is the big problem. As part of their "workflow" a manager is called over to help sell you on their package. The manager was also a nice lady but she was very pushy. And I mean pushy. Even though the lady who did the presentation heard us out, and understood my hesitation and the reasons I listed that it wouldn't be a good idea for us to sign up, that manager kept forcing herself on us. For example, I explained that my husband had just been laid of literally a couple of weeks before our trip, she responded something like "oh, he'll get another job in no time in that field" *That should have been a red flag to me*. Then I also explained that though we hope to travel more often now that we've broken in the suitcases, it's not guaranteed and I wasn't feeling 100% sure the travel club would be a good fit for us. She then kept disappearing from the table and coming back with lower offers. I kept shaking my head no and she would respond, "look at her shaking her head. No it's a good deal. We can work with you. You're not saying no". What did not help is that my husband was showing excitement about what they were promising with their membership and he was ready to sign up. I feel she played of of his reaction too. By then, I started tearing up a bit because I felt so pressured to make a fast decision. Typically I stand my ground &I still can't explain why I caved. I asked about the cancelation process and was told multiple time by multiple people that I would just need to email their board of sales team and its that simple to cancel. I signed up (kicking myself still). We enjoyed the rest of our stay. We arrived home 4 days later and I got to do the research I needed to do and found so many bad reviews on not just this but travel clubs in general. The half truths, the outright lies, the false marketing. I sent that cancelation email. A few days later, I got a phone call staing that had I canceld while on the resort, I would have received my deposit but since I left, I forfeit my deposit. This was purposely withheld from me. Its sneaky and misleading. The series of phone conversations and emails that followed were just as sneaky. They tried to word things a certain way and I had to constantly correct them about what I had said or agreed to. The "contract" that I went home with was NOT the same one they presented to me on their tablet to sign. They purposely withheld it until I requested it to compare the 2 documents. Maybe not a scam by definition, they are untruthful & will take your money and refuse to return it. They trap you and lie to you. BEWARE. Just say no to breakfast