[Resolved]  Country Vacations — False marketing and cheating by country vacations

Address:	Bangalore, Karnataka, 560001
Website:	www.countryvacationsindia.com

We wish to report our experience with country club vacations and our request immediate cancellation of membership and refund of our money [ref: ref: cvbg1tclub5lb221486 .


On 5th june 2016, at around 08.30 in the morning we received a phone call from one mr. Praveen stating that we have won a prize in a lucky draw at a shopping mall. We were requested to come and collect gifts worth rs. 30, 000 in the evening at an address in kalyan nagar, kammanahalli. At first, we did not express any interest in the call and vaguely told the caller that we will revert to him.

Throughout the day, we received a number of phone calls from this person. Finally, since we were in the city we decided to drop in and collect whatever gifts were promised. We (Me, my husband and my kids) were asked to come to the country vacations office at # 417a, 4th floor above unlimited showroom, hrbr layout 3rd block kammanahalli main road kalyan nagar, bangalore. We reached there at around 5.15 pm in the evening. A young lady greeted us and took us into a small room where there was loud music playing. There were number of tables were sale s representatives were talking in hushed low voices to couples.

The lady told us that there will be a short presentation about country vacations after which we could take our gifts and leave. Then, one mr. Harsha came and started asking us questions about our vacations. He said that the country club was celebrating its 25th anniversary and hence were selecting around 500 winners of lucky draw for gifts and around 116 of those winners would also be eligible for a special offer on their vacation plans. He then introduced us to mr. Santosh reddy as his manager who told us about some vacation plans of country club. He said that this was a special offer and we had to decide within 30 minutes after the presentation. Mr. Harsha then continued to explain the different vacation plans. Mr. Santosh then told us the pricing for the different plans which varied from rs. 1, 55, 000/- to rs. 2, 80, 000 - they told us that it included a country club membership and a vacation plan for 5 years. They also introduced mr. Robert who was supposed to be their senior manager who told us that we said that if we paid in a lumpsum he would negotiate the plan rate from rs. 1, 55, 000/- to rs. 1, 20, 000/-.

Since, by this time it was already 8.00 pm, my kids were very tired and hungry. We tried to explain to them that even though their offer looked interesting on paper, we would need time to think about it since it was a big investment for us and that they should give us atleast 24 hours to come back. We even told them that they style of marketing was not correct since they were not even allowing prospective customers to experience their services before paying for vacation plans. They kept making claims of the "best experience", "great facilities" and went on insisting that we had to decide on the spot or we will lose the benefit. They told us that 93 customers had already signed up and only a few offers were pending. We asked them for some customer phone numbers or references with whom we could check their claims but they evaded this request. They only sent a lady with a phone who offered to show "positive reviews" about their services. Together, the three of them literally forced us to accept their offer at rs. 120, 000/-. They made us sign a lot of blank, one-sided agreements and incomplete forms without giving us the time to read or understand the contents. They did not explain any thing on the cancellation or refund policy during the complete process and kept saying that everything will be given to us in a welcome kit. Because of their constant pushing and marketing gimmicks and trusting their words, we also paid rs. 120, 000 through our credit cards. (Citibank transactions = rs. 115000, rs. 2500 and rs. 2500). Whatever they explained about the different vacation plans were on blank white sheets of paper which was not given to us. When asked, they vaguely mentioned that it will come to us in the welcome kit. By this time it was almost 9pm in the night, my kids and ourselves were very tired after 3 hours of their marketing talk and we did not have the energy to push too much.

On 6th june, we started checking with friends and other customers on this topic. We received a lot of negative feedback from friends, family members and other customers on your services. After discussing with the family, we were not comfortable to go ahead and decided to cancel this transaction immediately. On checking we also found that the initial marketing claim itself that country club was celebrating its 25th anniversary was itself false.

We have immediately approached the kalyan nagar office yesterday evening (June 7th) and requested for cancellation of services and immediate refund. The same marketing guys (Mr. Robert and mr. Santosh) who on june 5th were so polite now changed behaviour and said our money was not refundable.Inspite of our several requests, they did not listen to us. They kept telling us that we should visit their koramangala office and talk to customer care representatives. We tried to tell them when the money was paid at the kalyan nagar branch why should we go to their koramangala office for a refund but they were not willing to listen to any of our requests. Finally, we wrote a complaint letter and give us an acknowledgement to the same which also they did not provide.

We then filed a complaint with their customer service team on june 8th via e-mail but have not received any response. It has been two days since we have raised this complaint. However, we have still received any response from which is very very disappointing. When they wanted our membership and money, there were so many phone calls and follow up from their executives. Now, that we are asking for cancellation and refund, nobody is responding.

We have not used or intend to use in the future any of your services and have requested for cancellation within 48 hours of making payment. We hope we will receive a positive response to this complaint through this forum and an early refund of our hard-earned money.