Thousand Trails Scam

[bdpreece]

Attended one of the Thousand Trails "We need to tell you about all the new opportunities your membership can provide"meetings This was in August of 2015.

For attending they gave me with a certificate for a 3 day 2 night vacation package good for one year from date of issue. Called the number on the certificate Monday to try and redeem it. They have no record of the cert number and were going to research it and get back to me in about an hour. Never heard back.

Tuesday I called back and was told they are not supposed to ever tell anyone they will call back. I asked to speak to a supervisor but was refused. They said they would escalate my problem to management though.

Yesterday I contacted the Thousand Trails Facebook page and got a message back that someone would "reach out to me shortly" Nothing yet!

Beginning to wonder if the whole thing was a scam.

Has anyone ever attended one of these and actually gotten the free vacation?

[ol_Bombero-JC]

JEBar wrote:


........its worthless

IMO - like your bottom line..:W

~

[JEBar]

back in '02 we received a 4 free days/3 free nights offer from Thousand Trails .... went to our nearest park, listened to the sales pitch, had a good time, but couldn't see the price .... the last night there a work camper suggested we take a look at Campground Membership Outlet in Florida .... they handle selling memberships for people no longer or able to camp .... a few months later we did and instead of paying the $4K+ price we were quoted for a new national membership we paid $1,500 which included the transfer paperwork and first year's dues .... we've been members every since and for us it has proven to be an exceptional value ..... our $600 a year dues covers 50 nights in their parks which breaks down to $12 a day .... when we go over 50 nights they charge us $5 a day .... our goal is to go over 50 .... so far as I know one can still purchase a used membership like ours .... if their parks are where you want to go and if you have the time to use your membership, it can't be beat .... if not, its worthless

[2gypsies1]

About 20 years ago before we began full-timing, we attended a presentation and 3 free nights at a crummy park on the Oregon coast. The salesperson kept repeating over and over that if you don't buy in now you'll never find a place for your RV. What a crock! I wish I had kept a list for him of where we stayed during our 16 years of full-timing. It certainly wasn't with his organization!

[jake2250]

Yeah, we fell for it!!, I bought something at CW and filled out a chance to win a free membership.. I get called a couple of days later that I won the grand prize, had a meeting at the store,,with the TT rep, Tried to sell us the lifetime membership,ridiculous price, we said no and this guys gives me a slip for three nights free camping!!
I asked if that was the grand prize and what about the free membership? Turns out it was three free nights membership! What a crock!

So I take the free pass and we stayed at one of the two close to us, It was near a river in a field, not allot of shade but a club house, pool and store.
While there the host stopped by and asked if I would like to attend a free vacation planner meeting, told him we were just guests.. He tells us we should attend anyway..
free snacks and some wine, It was a long drawn out TT membership meeting. Trying to get people to upgrade..
I show interest and told him that I wasn't sure I would use it as often enough to make it worth the amount they wanted..
This guy writes me a certificate for 12 free nights membership to TT, Tells me to try it..

We have been to the two close to us a few times, but still nothing i would spend that amount of money on!!
The camping was FREE but everything else cost twice as much as any other convenience store,, Plus the campground with the fishing lake has more charges and fees than any other place I have ever fished!!
The price of a bundle of fire wood was ridicules..
We only used eight of the 12 free nights.. that was enough for us!!

[beemerphile1]

bdpreece wrote:

beemerphile1 wrote:
Your complaint does not meet the definition of a scam. How were you scammed?

If you are promised something and you don't receive it; is that not scammed?

I would call that a broken promise.

Bernie Madoff scammed people.

[NYCgrrl]

monkey44 wrote:
The question always that occurs to me when I read these "memberships" - how much did it cost to begin with, and divide that by the number of nights you use it, and add the nightly costs.

See if you arrive at a positive number in your favor.

Hullo.

Don't like anyone trying to razzle dazzle me in ANY aspect of life.

[bdpreece]

beemerphile1 wrote:
Your complaint does not meet the definition of a scam. How were you scammed?

If you are promised something and you don't receive it; is that not scammed?

[nineoaks2004]

Remember the old saying "there are no free lunches" and it sounds true to form here too.

[monkey44]

The question always that occurs to me when I read these "memberships" - how much did it cost to begin with, and divide that by the number of nights you use it, and add the nightly costs.

See if you arrive at a positive number in your favor.

[SolidAxleDurang]

It's beyond me how people fall for this.

[wa8yxm]

When I got my TT membership.. They offered me a free weekend Just for attending the sales pitch.. I went, prepared to say NO.. but the woman said to my wife and I "What would it take to get you to say YES?" Wife answered. and guess what.. They had it... Oh well. Since then i'm glad I did because during our lean years we spent half the summer and 2/3 the winter in TT parks.. for 45/month.

Only 30 amp (50 amp is more per night) but still beats paing the nightly/monthly fee at other parks in the area.

And of all the places I park,, The staff at the TT parks.. I've yet to find better.

[beemerphile1]

Your complaint does not meet the definition of a scam. How were you scammed?

[myredracer]

Not a scam. Does sound like a communication error.

Don't get put off. These "free" camping passes are not unique to TT and are out there with others. High pressure used-car type presentations happen at other membership networks too. You won't find an easy to read glossy brochure with all the different types of memberships and full details on it. The TT website only has info. about one year zone memberships and says nothing about permanent memberships. You have to phone them to get that info. TT booths are common at RV shows.

The free passes or memberships are simply a come-on to get you to a presentation. They hand them out like candy at RV shows. We got a free year's membership at one once and the fine print limited it to something like 6 days max., not on holiday weekends and not in the summer. Not worth much. We did buy a membership in that network (Wa. state only). DW is an accountant and used the "free" membership to negotiate a big discount off a new membership and then just before signing, squeezed them for some extras. We did the get up to start walking away routine and the salesman said "wait a minute"... 🙂

If looking for a TT membership, don't buy a new one. By a pre-owned one and save thousands of $$. That's what we just did and got a top-of-the-line one with excellent features. There's a LOT of things and different features to know about before buying a used or new membership and you MUST do your due diligence (internet). Memberships in a particular network are not all alike either and it depends on what the original buyer negotiated into the contract. If a used TT membership you are looking at, get the membership # and phone head office to get details of the contract. We had one seller refuse to give it to us and got p*ssed that we even asked. Had another that had big money owing on it that the seller (daughter of an elderly parent) didn't know about. You can buy a TT membership from anywhere in the US. We got ours from a seller in Arizona. Lots of steps and hoops to go through but definitely worth it.

[wa8yxm]

Likely there was a break down in communications.

As I recall TT does not actually run the presentations, or the "reward for attending" that is a different company (A Contractor) and likely either you called the wrong number (TT instead of the number on the certificate) NOTE,, I think you said you called the number on the cert but not sure)

Or they simply have yet to get their black tank contents together.

(One of the things I like about RV forums is you can say "Black Tank Contents" we all know what goes there, and you do not have to use any "Bad Words" like S***)