On Dec. 15, Koster filed court documents in Taney County Associate Circuit Court against JD&T Enterprises, Inc. of San Diego, California, and against Forever Grand Vacations, of Branson. Forever Grand Vacations sells travel club memberships in Branson for its partner, JD&T Enterprises, which is doing business as Travel to Go, according to the suit.
In this most recent suit, Koster is seeking a permanent injunction that would prevent the defendants from doing business in Missouri and would prevent the defendants’ representatives and employees from selling vacation benefits. Koster is also asking the court to require the defendants to provide full restitution to customers, and to pay refunds to all Missouri customers who provided notice to have their memberships rescinded. He is also asking the court for the defendants to pay the state an unspecified civil penalty, to pay the state 10 percent of the total restitution paid, and to pay all court costs.
According to the suit, Forever Grand Vacations and and Travel to Go were selling travel club memberships to customers in Branson.
The companies told the customers that the membership would give them access to large discounts. However, according to the suit, customers found that they were not able to get the discounts advertised and customers had difficulty getting out of their memberships.
According to Koster, the defendants have accepted at least $100,000 from at least 37 consumers for goods or services that were not provided.
Examples
The suit gives two examples:
On Jan. 26, 2013, a customer from Waynesville attended a presentation and purchased a membership for $3,288. He was told he would have six months to cancel and receive a full refund. After making payments for four months, the man decided to cancel; however, he was told it would cost him an additional $500 to cancel and he still had to pay the $3,000 balance on his membership fee.
He was also offered, for $500, an opportunity to sell his membership. The customer paid the balance on his membership, as well as the $500 listing fee. His membership was listed on a site with hundreds of others and he never received a refund. He is also still being contacted by the defendants with other offers.
Another customer, from Virginia Beach, Virginia, attended a travel club presentation in Branson in March and was told by his presenter that the presenter had gone to Hawaii on a 50-70 percent discount and that airfare can generally be purchased for 50 percent less than the normal rate.
The customer paid the membership fee of $5,544 up front. The customer then tried to book a cruise but found this his membership could not get him a lower price. He eventually got a $2,500 refund after attempting to cancel his membership, but he is still owed $2,044.
Counts
The suit accuses Forever Grand Vacations and Travel to Go of three counts of misrepresentation and one count of deception. It also accuses Travel to Go, specifically, of operating as a travel club in Missouri without being registered as a travel club in the state.
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