Marriott Vacation Club - promotion for purchase of time-share was misrepresented

Complaints.com received the following consumer message on January 2, 2003:

From: Subhasis B. Biswas [Email User]

RE: Marriott Vacation Club - promotion for purchase of time-share was misrepresented

On 11-28-2002, while we are residing in Fairfield Inn at Orlando by Marriott corporation, we were approached by a Marriott agent to attend a time-share promotion by Marriott Corporation. On 11-29-2002, myself and my wife attended the time-share promotional tour at the Horizon by Marriott Vacation Club Inc. property, owned and operated by Marriott Vacation Club Inc (MVCI). During the 90 minutes tour, the MVCI sales agent, Mr. Jason C. Myers, informed us that if we sign a purchase contract that day (12-01-2002), MVCI will give the buyers (US) $4000.00.

This information was very important in making our decision to buy that day. During the signing of the contract papers, we noticed that there was no mention of $4000.00 and we asked Mr. Meyers about the promotion. He stated that MVCI is giving us equivalent MVCI points instead of decreasing the price by $4000 and this points can be used for vacation and miscellaneous other items. The amount of points they gave us was 120,000. According to him that was equivalent to $4000.00. After returning from Orlando, on 12-18-2002, we discovered that the 120,000 Marriott points is actually worth $500.00. Therefore, we felt that Mr. Jason C Myers has grossly misrepresented the promotion to us and got us to sign the contract by making false statements and deception. We requested MVCI to refund the deposit nullify the contract but MVCI and its agent (Clarke Poos, Sales Manager, MVCI-Horizon, Orlando, FL) refused to do so. In summary, Timeshare is simply not a good business to get into for normal folks who have other important things to take care of in their professional and personal life. This complaint is being posted only to make everyone aware of Timeshare frauds even with a corporation like Marriott. Hope it will save someone from making the same mistake. Sam B.