How Covert Filming Uncovered a Multi-Million Pound Timeshare Fraud

It has been described as one of the largest frauds of its kind in the United Kingdom.

In all 14 defendants have been convicted for their part in a £28m plot to defraud over 3,500 timeshare holders.

The victims were eager to get out of age-old holiday ownership agreements and tried to find support.

Most were in the age range of 60 and 80. Over 500 of them lost in excess of £10,000, and one individual paid over £80,000.

Those affected were subjected to aggressive sales meetings continuing for six hours. They were left out of pocket, possessing useless fake "points" and still bound by high-priced vacation property deals they could no longer use.

The Company Behind the Scam

The firm at the heart of the scheme was the organization in question. They accepted clients' cash to fund the directors' luxurious standard of living of prestigious schooling, high-end properties and exclusive air travel.

The individual at the head of the company, the company director, was given a seven and a half year jail time in January for fraudulent conspiracy.

Recently, his spouse Nicola was one of the final three to hear their sentences.

She was given a two-year suspended jail sentence at the London court after admitting financial crime.

This has been a long time coming and marks a significant success for the victims who came forward, the police and legal representatives.

The Way the Probe Was Initiated

The initial awareness of the firm came in the summer of 2016. I was working in the investigations unit of a news organization, creating current affairs shows.

A colleague pointed out that his parent had taken over the use of a holiday property in a European resort and, after long-term use, had begun looking to exit the deal.

It's worth mentioning how widespread holiday ownership had evolved with UK travelers in the last decades of the 20th century.

Timeshares allowed families to use the same accommodation each season, or swap their time slots with other owners who had properties in different locations. Roughly 600,000 vacation seekers accepted that option.

The first timeshare rush was linked to a lot of reports about dishonest operators deceptively promoting investments. They appeared frequently on public interest broadcasts.

The typical timeshare contract tied investors in for decades.

At that time, those owners who had enjoyed their guaranteed place in the resort for decades were advancing in years, and a significant number were attempting to end their association to their vacation investments.

A number had declining mobility and couldn't get to their apartments. A few just believed they'd enjoyed sufficient use from them. And others had died, in many cases leaving their heirs to take over the contracts - plus their regular contributions and upkeep costs.

The Covert Probe Unfolds

This was the situation the friend's mum had ended up. She looked online for solutions and found the company, a enterprise whose website claimed to get her out of her agreement.

Yet, having submitted funds and scheduled a consultation with them, her loved ones smelled a rat.

Subsequent checking uncovered many victims claiming they had handed over cash and got nothing out of it. Actually, they had suffered financially. Substantial amounts.

The reporting group started looking into what was occurring. It quickly became clear that there were some shady characters operating in the vacation property industry.

A legal professional had hundreds of individual complaints preparing to take action against SMT.

We spoke to people who had used the firm and they all told the same story. They assumed the business would purchase their timeshare away from them but when they went to a consultation (for which they submitted funds initially) they were told there was no market for their property.

In place of that, they were persuaded - actually compelled - to invest additional funds acquiring "the firm's incentive scheme", named after the business's umbrella group, Monster Travel.

What exactly these were was rather ambiguous. They appeared to be a type of exchange medium, providing discount travel and amenities and shopping deals.

And they were apparently "transferable with fellow investors, at a future date.

Committing funds immediately would lead to an future return that would cover SMT's fees and leave the timeshare holder in profit, liberated eventually from their pesky deal.

An unrealistic promise? Certainly, that proved correct.

A 'Misleading Tactic'

Assuming these reports were true, this was a major deception.

The technique is termed a "bait-and-switch."

A business - here the company - "attracts the consumer by advertising a specific service and then say that's not available, pushing the individual in the direction of an alternative, lesser offering.

Such practices are unlawful. Equipped with all the accounts we had gathered, we argued to discreetly video one of the company's meetings.

This takes dedication, work, and strong justifications for why this is the exclusive approach to obtain the evidence needed to prove wrongdoing.

Once authorized, our small team set up a appointment with one of the organization's staff in the English town.

Pretending to be a potential client aiming to help his mother free from her timeshare contract|holiday ownership agreement