MM I Bought - Their Screwups were Continuous
Westgate Timeshare Resort Issues
Date of Incident: 1/6/2004
I purchased a timeshare from Westgate Resorts in Orlando on 9/14/2000 for $8300.00. I put $3,000.00 down and financed $5300.00 over 30 months with no interest. The amount of my payments were to equal $176.67 a month starting 10/27/00. At the time of the purchase I signed a credit card authorization slip to have my payments automatically debit my credit card so that I would not have to worry about the making the payments each month.
On 11/06/2000 I was assessed with a finance charge of $17.67. Westgate failed to charge my credit card. I offered to mail a check to get the payments up to date and I informed Westgate that I would be making my payments by mail from then on. I decided to mail the payments each month and keep receipts in order to have proof that each payment was made on time. Westgate refused to credit the finance charge and I refused to pay it since it was their error. Westgate would not cooperate with me even after making many phone calls to Westgate and holding for 15 minutes each time due to "heavy call volume". I wrote letters to the Department of Business and Professional Regulation (Bureau of Timeshare), CFI, and Westgate to try to resolve this matter.
Then on 11/28/2001 Westgate made another error. They posted my payment as $176.61 instead of $176.67. Then they assessed me again with another finance charge of $11.95. This practice continued several more times throughout the life of the loan. I had finally decided to quit trying to get the matter resolved and just keep making the payments until the loan was paid off.
Then on 10/24/2003 I get a letter from Westgate informing me that the loan was paid in full on 3/27/2003. I don't know why it took 7 months for Westgate to let me know this but when I received the letter I had realized that I had made 7 payments over the amount due. This total came to $1236.69 in over payments that Westgate should return to me. I called about this issue and spoke with Brian Mason. He asked to fax him proof of the payments which I did. Brian said he would call me back and would make sure that I received my refund. I never heard back from Brian. I called many times and got the "run around". The representatives would not even give me their last names. They gave me every excuse in the book as to why Brian would not take my calls.
Today (1/6/03) I received a check for $1,145.74 which is short by $90.95. I called again to ask why the check was short the amount and no one at Westgate can explain why nor will they offer to send me the monies due. I need help on getting my FULL refund. If anyone has any information on what I should do next please contact me.
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