On 9/16/09 my wife Mary and I paid Paradise Today $5995 to start using their vacation services and discount prices for travel and hotels. We later discovered that they lied to us in their presentation of the package that they were selling. They said that they had an A+ rating from the Better Business Bureau, when in actuality it was an F. They also said that they’d been in business for over 20 years, but they had only just started this company in 2009.
In November we booked our first hotel stay to start using their services. My wife and son stayed at the Courtyard by Marriott in Los Angeles (Century City) on the nights of January 8-11, 2010. Paradise Today guaranteed our room rate at $99 per night, even though the hotel charges were $199 for 3 nights and $189 for the final night. We didn’t even know that they operated on a rebate basis until we saw the confirmation price they sent us after they quoted us $99 and charged our credit card. Paradise Today was to have sent us a check to make up the difference. Dae Byun, the Fulfillment Director of Paradise Today, emailed us on December 17, 2009, confirming our reservation and letting us know that our rebate would be $380, though we later realized that this rebate should have been $390. This email states that Sun Travel Systems of Tucson, AZ (phone (520) 722-3524) set up our reservation and gave us the confirmation number of 83332289. The literature from Paradise Today states that our refund should have been mailed to us within 14 days after we returned from our trip. However, we've called them dozens of times in the last 6 months and there have always been excuses given as to why they are not mailing our check. We have been told several times that a check would go in the mail to us within a week or two of these conversations that we had with them. We’ve talked with the owner of the company -- Anthony, a manager -- John, and the accounts director -- Christina, and we’re always given different excuses as to why we haven’t received our money yet. They’ve said that their company was being audited, their accounts department was being overhauled, the people we need to talk to are at doctor’s appointments, weddings, or out of the country. We have never received any money from them that they promised to send us. Now we can't get through to them at all by phone -- all of their numbers have been disconnected. We realize now that we have been cheated out of nearly $6000, and we want all of our money back. Apparently they never intended to follow through with any of their promises to pay us back and guarantee their special rates, or they would have done so in the last 6 months.
Since I am currently unemployed and my wife has a part time j