Tweet
We foolishly bought into a timeshare holiday club whilst on honeymoon in Mexico last year (Sept 2014). It was primarily with Sandos resorts but we could exchange to PEN or RCN also as part of our contract. As Sandos is largely based in Mexico we would not use this every year but anticipated using PEN for European holidays on alternate years.
Our contract commenced in Jan 2015 & we immediately tried to make summer holiday booking with PEN to no avail. We tried every way to contact them & raised this with Sandos via email (a communication method that was usually successful with them). Eventually in April we were informed that PEN had ceased trading & was no longer available to us. We emailed to cancel our contract on the basis that this was a breach. We had no response.
I cancelled the payments scheduled & contacted my credit provider (Santander credit card) to request a refund under Section 75. They refused initially as i had made the payments to date but the contract was in my husbands name. After reading advice on here I appealed the decision & involved the Ombudsman stating we would all benefit from this & won my appeal. Thank you!
I was reimbursed the deposit & monthly payments i had made to date but we were on a 2 year payment plan. Sandos refused to acknowledge our cancellation & sent emails demanding the balance on our account. They have now passed this to a debt recovery agency who are sending threatening emails. They state we could only cancel in the cooling off period & that although i have recovered my money through section 75 the credit card company should not have agreed this. The company we are dealing with now are in Mexico but im worried about our position in this & any repercussions for us. I believe i acted within the law / my rights as a consumer. We have never used this product nor intend to & there is a cancellation clause in our contract about Sandos not being able to provide the product.
I would appreciate some advice.
Our contract commenced in Jan 2015 & we immediately tried to make summer holiday booking with PEN to no avail. We tried every way to contact them & raised this with Sandos via email (a communication method that was usually successful with them). Eventually in April we were informed that PEN had ceased trading & was no longer available to us. We emailed to cancel our contract on the basis that this was a breach. We had no response.
I cancelled the payments scheduled & contacted my credit provider (Santander credit card) to request a refund under Section 75. They refused initially as i had made the payments to date but the contract was in my husbands name. After reading advice on here I appealed the decision & involved the Ombudsman stating we would all benefit from this & won my appeal. Thank you!
I was reimbursed the deposit & monthly payments i had made to date but we were on a 2 year payment plan. Sandos refused to acknowledge our cancellation & sent emails demanding the balance on our account. They have now passed this to a debt recovery agency who are sending threatening emails. They state we could only cancel in the cooling off period & that although i have recovered my money through section 75 the credit card company should not have agreed this. The company we are dealing with now are in Mexico but im worried about our position in this & any repercussions for us. I believe i acted within the law / my rights as a consumer. We have never used this product nor intend to & there is a cancellation clause in our contract about Sandos not being able to provide the product.
I would appreciate some advice.
