Narrow escape? - 'Club la Costa'

blue_monkey_2

No, you will not have won anything and if you have it would certainly not be worth £4000 - much, much more, it is a trick to get you in. I reckon you have won a 3 or 5 year 'trial' membership. If there are absolutely no string attached other than the meeting - and you can say no at the meeting - then go for it. But stick to your guns, they are very pushy. If you can ignore this then you get a decent holiday.

You pay up front to 'buy' the timeshare and yes, you pay a fee each year, whether or not you take the holiday. There are holidays in the UK though so if you cannot get overseas you can still holiday in the UK.

I would never buy into 'points', we are ini Destinations and have a week and we usually bank it. You join RCI and they run a 'bank' and you put your weeks in and you can save them up or use them to go different smaller units to get more holiday, 2 for 1's etc.. by using other properties deposited in the bank. If you really want to go somewhere you put a search on for the date and time you want and you get first refusal. We are having 2 weeks in Disney DVC properties in Florida next year - to book the week with Disney is £2500+ per week, but it'll cost us £175 exchange fee (our 'pro rata' fee for the week we 'bought' and our annual fees is around £550), we spent a week last year in Disney's Animal Kingdom with our one week and that would have cost £4000 - we could never have done that without our unit. This is how we make it work for us.

It can work for you but you need tor research everything inside out and upside down - everything - to make sure it is right for you. Do not buy 'new' but buy from someone who is selling, find out why they are selling and ask to see previous years invoices for the maintenaince fees so you can see what they paid and how much they have gone up, fees are due Dec/Jan time so beware that is clashes with Xmas but they have started letting you pay in 3 monthly amounts since the recession starts (I think that because they are based in Spain you can just wak away and they cannot chase you for the outstanding annual fee but someone else will verify that, I am sure someone said this and I think this is why they bought in the 3 monthly DD scheme).

If you take expensive or decent holidays (accomodation over £900pw), it is an option for you might want to consider but if you only take cheap holidays then no, it'll not be for you to be honest and you are best off just chucking it in the bin. You do get to stay at some pretty exclusive resorts so this is why we like it.

skid112

Yes, this is a valid promotion to allow people to "try before they buy".

they won why would they buy if they won?

We believe that timeshare membership is, for many people, the ideal way to organise their holidays and have created this promotion to offer a chance to test it out before committing.

err they won why would they test and then commit?

blue_monkey_2

skid112 - because they have won a trial of the membership as I already stated, if they like it and feel it worth the money they can then buy full membership. We are in our 12th year of membership now, we took ours out longer before there was reviews on the internet but we have no complaints really, we always bannk out weeks and our annual fees for our 'free' week costs much less than even a weeks holiday like for like in the UK, even out of season - there are 3 or 4 places to holiday in the UK if you do not want to go outside the UK or you can back and then swap for holiday cottages, spa resorts, country estates and barges in the UK too.

geoffky

I also love scamming the scammers so much that i have been offered a job with the company when at a presentation because i also had the ability to make something it is not appear that it is so.Its great if you just treat it as a game and try and wreck the salespersons heads.But if you are easily persuaded do not go as the guys are very good at what they do...my first one i went to in the 80s you got 400 cigs and a cheap bottle of brandy..

skid112

because they have won a trial of the membership as I already stated, if they like it and feel it worth the money they can then buy full membership.

so this trial membership costs £4000? And if the letter states they have won then they have won or as you say they have not won.

blue_monkey_2

They have 'won' a trial membership - £4k would pay for 10 years of our membership (Destinations), give or take a year depending on the Euro rate, however it would only pay for 3 or 5 years if you had a high number of points. Unless that poster calls and finds out then we'll never know exactly what it is they are offering. They have probably won the chance to go to their resorts for a couple of years and see what they have to offer. We got a free holiday way back when we did it too and they paid for our flights too then.

I believe that now they offer a 3 or 5 year trial membership now which I think is a good idea, if you like the product then you commit to longer at the end of the trial - although I guess it is on points and we do not have points, we have a 'week'. They never had the trials when we joined. When we get too old to travel overseas we'll either stay in the UK or let our kids enjoy it. We have more than had our moneys worth and we paid for our unit 12 years ago too - but we are in 'credit' for all the places we have stayed and have paid a small price for (if that makes sense).

RCI now convert our week to 'points' for exchanging and we can now get 2 or 3 weeks holiday for the 'value' of our one, depending on where we stay and in what size apartment so now we get more holidays for our money too.

I think it has changed a lot since we signe dup and also the economy has changed, people do not have so much cash, do not want to buy a unit when people are giving them away and do not want to commit for a long time. I think people can just walk away as well, because they are based in Spain (someone may confirmt that for me), so they make it more attractive to stay by offering shorter memberships and things like that.

So they have 'won' something, but they have not won membership for a lifetime, just a trial, so they can go to the resorts and check out what is on offer. The Trial is probably worth 4k when you factor in the points and membership fees for the entire year.

Again I would recommend from buying from someone who is selling rather than from them and find out why they are selling too. It works for us but it is not for everyone so, as with everything, research what you are buying.

paddyrg

Considering the kicking the Euro is likely to have shortly now Italy are in the news and Ireland demoted to 'junk' status, it may be better at the moment to keep away from anything with any commitments (even 3-5 yrs) as the markets will change significantly soon.

paddyrg

Oh, and clublacosta, this forum has rules about 'official representative' postings, so MSE forum crew can verify you are who you claim, and not somebody sullying your name. As such, you need to get in touch with the forum team to get authenticated, otherwise your posts will be treated as spam.

Mavds9

hi there,


I have just received a recorded delivery letter from the above saying I have just won £800 holiday accomodation, from a competition I entered.

Scam no Scam ????

dealer_wins

Mavds9 wrote: »

hi there,


I have just received a recorded delivery letter from the above saying I have just won £800 holiday accomodation, from a competition I entered.

Scam no Scam ????

If you entered the competition and the prize includes all taxes/charges etc then its genuine.

If you didnt enter the competition, or taxes,fees, attendance at a sales pitch are required then it is a SCAM.