I sat down with the NTOA's President to find out more about this helpline.
Can you
tell us a little bit about the genesis of the NTOA helpline?
The "ASK NTOA" program was developed out of the
many requests of timeshare owners who felt they needed to have their voice
heard. These were not our members but still needed some level of assistance and
access to our association.
What
makes it different from any other means that timeshare owners have at their
disposal to provide feedback on an issue or company?
The owners who are contacting us have used other means
and not found the assistance they were looking for. As an consumer centric
organization, we make time for owners and their needs. Sometimes it's a matter
of us getting the right person or company contact involved with an owner that
can resolve an issue perhaps at a higher level.
I see
that consumers do not have to be NTOA members in order to avail themselves of
the helpline. Do NTOA members receive priority or special assistance?
NTOA members receive many benefits including a more
advanced but informal resolution process in which the association performs
follow up with the member to assure their needs are met.
What
type of assistance is the NTOA going to be able to offer and when will that
assistance be offered?
ASK
NTOA is a new open resource for owners. With this program, we listen, we refer
and we record the issues we receive but further action is limited
once the referral is made unless the owner has special
circumstances.
Can
foreign residents with a timeshare issue in the US and/or US residents with a
timeshare issue outside the US use the helpline?
NTOA works with strategic partners around the world like
TATOC. This network gives the ability to form a safety net for most any owner
and in most any situation.
Consumers
in general and timeshare owners in particular are extremely worried about
privacy issues. What assurances can the NTOA offer that they will not
provide personal information to another party?
ASK NTOA is a voluntary program. While owners can remain
anonymous when reporting an issue to us. We do ask these owners to allow us to
share basic information with only the parties involved so that the problem can
be fixed. Aside from this no information will ever be shared with a third
party.
I would be remiss if I didn't mention two other resources for timeshare owners. The first is TATOC (http://www.tatoc.co.uk/) and the second is Mindshare (http://mindtimeshare.me/)
Of course, this blog and Timeshare Insights in general are great places to turn for help. In the past week, I've been able to assist three owners with issues.
Where do you turn to for timeshare help?
8 comments:
I'm in the same boat, any advice would be greatly appreciated carlos_jackson26@hotmail.com
Hello Lisa, We to got sucked into the sales pitch offering a free trip to Las Vegas for going to a 90 minute seminar that lasted much longer, I had been in the hospital 21 days from nearly dying prior to this then thanking how great it would be to actually take a vacation so this sounded great, it didn't help that the Salesperson was hot and kept bending over with her thong sticking out, I was off base but sold on the idea, we purchased what was called half a plan with like 4000 pts but good anywhere with at least a 24 hour notice, this is not a normal Timeshare where you go to the same place year after year, it's good for most 5 star hotels costing a small fee for time stayed so in my case all I see is us paying maintenance fee's on a piece of paper, we may had been asked where we would like to go and used that as a source to charge fee's, my wife had never been out of MI so she was clueless, are that all professional sales people or just trained as great con artists getting paid very well to make the sale, once you sign the papers, they give you like 3 days if we change our minds but when you call it's like caller ID and they won't answer until the 3 days have passed, I was told by my surgeon that he would make me a whole man again but that didn't happen, you can replace an arm or leg but a Colon not 100%, after the 2nd surgery and the Bag was gone, I didn't feel safe leaving my home for fear of accident now 10+ years later I feel 99% safe but we never used the Timeshare, my wife used it for a hotel out of town once or twice with family, with my issues I needed work were I was free to use the restroom as often as needed so what work I had was just ok then MI started a No Smoking Ban which cut my hours from 7 days unlimited to weekends only or 15 hours then I took on another job putting me On Call 24/7 with no time off unless it was an emergency then replaced after taking 3 days off after my wife had a heart attack at age 45 at which time I went into business for myself doing the same work but I'm on my own with numerous breaks between calls, with my system the way it is, I still spend most of my time on the toilet until the next call comes in, sounds bad but I have a TV & puzzle books in front of me, a little insecure? Yes, I can Go hours without using a restroom but still no fun going anywhere when I can't enjoy my time with my wife, if our government can allow the sale of Pot/Weed on every corner then they can do something to keep us from being scammed, it's not all about the money, our payments are $118 but maintenance fee's have gone up to over $500 or near $100 more since we joined, it's just a piece of paper, we can go worldwide with just a 24 hour notice so how can they justify paying any fee's when not used, if we said in the beginning where we would like to visit like say Florida, then they are using that as a source only to charge those maintenance fee's which is a SCAM, it would only take one great law firm to correct this issue resulting in a lot of refunds then maybe putting them out of business, reading the others just got me more upset, sorry. Any comments are good. ronaldv73@hotmail.com I also fell victim to others claiming they could rid me of this but once they were paid the calls ended losing thousands.
HELP! TIMESHARE NIGHTMARE! NO WAY OUT ! HELP!
Have you called the HelpLine? Were we able to assist?
Have you called the HelpLine? What was the outcome?
The HelpLine number is 1-844-ASK-NTOA
Can you email me any helpful ways to get out of this timeshare please?
Please email me at lisaschreier617@gmail.com
Post a Comment