On Dec. 27 we were in Mazatlan, Mexico and really having a great time with our family. The shuttle picked us up at the airport and provided transportation back to our hotel at the El Cid Beach and Marina Yacht Club. They offered us some gifts and a ride back to the airport if we would listen to a timeshare presentation. We were there on a timeshare stay with Wyndham and have been very pleased with the resorts we have stayed in though them. We at first said that we weren´t interested and the just kept making it sound better and better so we finally decided that we would go and listen. We got there with our son and his family and Arturo Guevara (our salesperson) started right away with being so friendly and telling us that he had something really great for us and that it would just make our Wyndham timeshare even better and would put it to better use than what we were using it for now. What was supposed to take only 90 min. took well over 5 hours because we just kept saying no that we weren´t interested and then Arturo would add some more things to it telling us we justs couldn´t pass this up and that everything he said was true.


To start with when we sat down Arturo asked us if we had received a letter in the mail from Wyndham saying they were going to charge us a 700.00 dollar fee just because and when we said we hadn´t received that letter he said "Well it will be waiting for you when you get back home, because they have sent it out to everyone. He said at one time he had worked for Wyndham and the were very bad for doing that kind of thing. He then went into telling us about the El Cid Club and that it was very different from our Wyndham because it was a club catered just to us as members. That El Cid had taken millions of dollars and purchased hotels and spaces on airlines and cruises, so that when we wanted to use these vacations that we would have priority and we would always be able to get where we wanted to go because of the club vs. timeshare theory. He brought up any place we named on his fictitious computer that we now know and showed us that we could virtually stay anywhere when we wanted to take our vacation. He told us that we could stay at the Ritz Carlton for 50.00 a night and brought that up with a date that we just threw out and of course there was availability. He took us on the cruise lines and showed us that for around 2500.00 we could take about 7 of on a cruise for two weeks.

He told us we could fly on any airline for 198.00 anywhere we wanted to fly and never pay a penny more. He told us that he could sell our timeshare for 70, 000 and by the time we paid off our El Cid and Bank of America card we would have 6, 000 to the good. When we asked how he could be so sure of that he said "because I deal with his everyday and this is a risk we are taking with you because we need to have your promise us that when you get this money you will send it to us"He told us that they couldn´t make this deal unless they felt for sure we would be honest enough to send them their money. When I keep asking where we would send the money he keep saying saying that we would get a letter detailing all the information when our property get sold and they would get the same letter so they would know right away to expect their payment. Thought out the whole presentation I kept saying if we would be able to have access to all the properties of Wyndham that we do now and he assured us that we would plus more. I keep saying that I wasn´t interested in dealing with RCI and that I wanted to know where I could see what we would have available to us and he keep putting us off with "There are so many that we can´t name them all. you have to go though our VIP El Cid reservations and they will give you all that information but only if you go through them. If you don´t no one else will be able to help you and since your are VIP you will have your own special agent to help you make these accommodations."


Well, now to go back on the things he said and the truth of the matter. We haven´t sold our timeshare and the only thing it did was open us up to many other scam artists out there wanting to sell it for us. We have tried several time to use the airlines for 198.00 and it has always been more to use than just going directly through the airlines themselves. The VIP customer service is rude and not helpful at all. We have tried to stay in hotels for 50.00 a night only to find that they don´t have vacancies and they can´t help us. When making reservations to return to El Cid this year we couldn´t get any reservations except at El Cid Mazatlan and we then didn´t have enough points for what we needed because we didn´t qualify for the 35% points discounts. On the other hand we are still waiting for the letter from Wyndham saying they were charging us another 700.00 this year for extra maintenance costs.


Everything we have been told is a lie. Then come to find out we only get a small percent of Wyndham properties that we can stay out which was something I asked over and over because there was no way I wanted to give them up and go with a smaller group of vacation spots and I did not want to be connected with RCI as our main timeshare.


This has been my experience with El Cid Vacations Club, I´m just another scammed client, even that I tried several times to rectify the information and the offers we received. They will do anything to get you to sign that contract, what supposed to be a free transportation and some gifts for 90 minutes resulted on a exhausting presentation. I will regret this experience all my life, right now I´m contacting the timeshare developer to request the cancellation of my timeshare and the reimbursement of my monies.

I hope we can get a positive response, please feel free to leave your comments about my experience and what you would recommend me to do against this company.