Anyminute Travel / Pacific Palm Destinations Travel Scam Artists Woburn, Massachusetts

Working with a MAJOR airline to stop this scam, could use any help, please reply, you can verify my creditials.   

We signed up for the program in March of 2012 in the Woburn office.  Since then our contact person no longer works there and I have been trying to contact them for weeks with no answer at all.  I have sent an email also and no response.

Today I drove to the woburn office and discovered the furniture and audio equiptment gone, never a good sign.

Dear Consumer,

Pacific Palm Destinations has been nothing but cooperative with your requests over the last week.  It is unfortunate that you decided to go this route.  

YES, you were invited to a presentation and asked to stay for 90 minutes.  We make it very clear that, YES, it is a sales presentation and YES we are going to ask you for a large amount of money.  However, NO ONE is required to buy anything.  

First, let me address the Login situation.  During our presentation, as well as our paperwork process with buyers, we make it very clear that you will NOT receive your login information for 7 business days.  However, you do have immediate access to our reservations department.  We also explain that it does take some time to set up individual web accounts for every member but that does not impede your ability to book travel.  Not only is this information given to you verbally but it in 2 documents that you have signed and initialed while you were here in our office with our staff.  We also go as far as to say, if you are more comfortable we will be the 'go between' so to speak for you with reservations until you are more comfortable with the process.

Having said that, a member of my staff has taken the time to do just that for the last week.  I have 9 documented emails between him and your wife discussing travel plans. We also have multiple phone calls between my staff, reservations and you.  SO to say we have not responded is completely inaccurate information.  My office manager, also spoke with you last night regarding your complaints about the quotes.  She repeatedly requested the details of our quotes versus what you had found elsewhere and you either refused or could not give her any information aside from 'lower' or 'the same'.  The reason my staff has been asking you for these details is in fact to help you.  We would have been happy to beat your comparison quotes or find another solution.  We can not be expected to do that if we do not have any specific details.

Lastly, writing this report, threatening our business, and our attorneys demanding a refund is a bit excessive. Claiming to have filed a police report is excessive.  We have also been in touch with the attorney generals office and are in the process of providing their offices with documentation backing our case in this matter.  You are out of rescission. We are under no obligation to refund your money.

My staff has been diligently working with you for the last week. In fact, even after you filed this report and made your threats, my staff was in touch with you again TODAY trying to find a solution to your dissatisfaction.  We are not scammers, we are not breaking any laws, nor have we been negligent with you or any other customer.  We understand you are frustrated and are still willing to work with you.

Sincerely,
Pacific Palm Destinations

Consumers who attend the sales presentations are promised that if they buy a membership to Pacific Palm Destinations AKA Anyminute Travel, they will be able to travel for "pennies on the dollar." Moreover, consumers are promised the "lowest prices for travel."

Consumers pay anywhere up to $7,995 for a membership to Pacific Palm Destinations. When consumers attempt to make travel reservations using their Pacific Palm Destinations membership, they are unable to schedule the trips they desire and/or the prices offered by Pacific Palm Destinations are similar to those that consumers can obtain for themselves using the internet.

Consumers have to wait up to a week for thier anyminutetravel.com website password, well past the three day cooling off period to cancel a signed contract. This webiste provides no contact information (at the time of this post), but promises:

"Any Minute Travel is the first online booking engine, designed to provide our customers with exceptional insider prices on over 16,000 hotels, 2000 cruise itineraries, flights, car rentals, vacation   packages, and attractions worldwide. The Any Minute Travel website is for Members Only. Our small   membership fee offsets the customary mark-ups on travel making it possible to give great savings to our customers. Our proprietary technology enables us to offer this outstanding array of travel services   conveniently online.  We have designed our site to be extremely user friendly, and you always have the option to call and speak to one of our experienced travel professionals.  In addition to our travel services, we recently introduced Condos, a unique service offering accommodations at over 4500 luxury  vacation condos worldwide by the week.  With Condos, travelers will enjoy rates that are actually lower than staying in a hotel room."

Consumers are told NOT to book using the websites, but to use the website to browse for avaliable inventory and then call Pacific Palm travel agents to book travel. You are told your request goes on a "queue while the agents work to find the best deal, and that you'll be contacted once we are satisfied that we have found the best options for you." When consumers do call to attempt to make travel reservations using their Pacific Palm Destinations membership, they are unable to schedule the trips they desire, and are told someone will back to them. Phone logs will show that calls were made, but do not reveal that no services are actually provided.

Police Reports have been filed, the Attorney General's Office for three states have been contacted.

The person that wrote this report is an angry moron that didnt want to pay his bill, and thought he'd be cute and make this report. I have delt with company personally and they are the most helpful and friendly group I have ever delt with. Slandering a company because you didnt get your own way is both unprofessional and childish.

Dear Readers of Ripoff Report,

I am the author of the scathing review above.  After reading Pacific Palms response, my conscience dictates that I should retract several pieces of information and clarify a few others.  Firstly, upon re-reading the lawsuit from 2009 I referenced in my review, I can see that there were no claims of not receiving passwords or anything having to do with passwords at all.  I was confusing the story the woman I met on craigslist told me with the lawsuit.  In addition, I do not know the outcome of that case.  

Next, I see that my wording indicates that the woman I met on craigslist used her password to find nothingwhat I meant was that she claimed she found no deals like the ones she was promised.  It is true that I jumped to conclusions upon reading the internet and speaking to a person who said she had paid for the service; I want to clarify that I never actually tried out their product and cancelled before I had a chance to do so.  I allowed others negative experiences to sway me and influence my decision in this respect. Their product may very well be what they claim it to be.  

As well, I understood from the woman I spoke to that the company was in RI a week ago; it appears I misunderstood and (judging by Pacific Palms response) it was longer than that.  Furthermore, although we did discover our salesperson had a mug shot online, I do not know any details about whatever crime he was arrested for and his dealings with me were always polite and professional.  At the time I wrote this review, I had not yet been provided with a cancellation of my purchase.   This company has since complied with my request to cancel my purchase and I am satisfied with the outcome. 

I regret any hardship my review may have caused this company and its employees.  I honestly should have just let the woman I talked to tell her own story if she preferred; the information I had was hearsay.  Pacific Palm Destinations settled this issue satisfactorily and in good faith I felt the need to do the same.   

Hello Pacific Palm Destinations,

It is helpful to all consumers who come to view your presentations, that you allow the consumer to view the website and how it works by actually typing in your license #. Maybe you can have a "training licensee #" for the consumer to use during presentations. If the consumer can see first hand before buying as to how it works themselves, then that may diminish some confusion.

Also, with the internet being the world's primary source of information, it is helpful to be upfront with your customers. There should be no "surprises" when a customer goes home and researches you and your company. People want to know who they are giving their money to, both personally and professionally. In my opinion, a consumer will feel they are being scammed, if there is negative information written about both the company and it's owner. People will not want to give their money to someone who has a mug shot or who's previous work history has records for scamming people. This is a major red flag to a consumer. If there are negative complaints against the owner or a company on the internet, you have no control over that. However, it is under your control as the company's owner to be upfront with your customers, and addressing these allegations up front assuring them that there are no surprises, because these issues were addressed directly. Show the people that you are registered with the Better Business Bureau (which you are not by the way).

It is also helpful that you include email addresses on business cards and a web address. Again, in an internet world, these simple suggestions may be helpful.

This is just a suggestion. Thank you and Good Luck.

After reading the report on this website we at Pacific Palm Destinations would like to clear up the false accusations about our company.  You did sign a contract that we have already voided because you had concerns and you contacted our office and expressed that you did not have the enough money to cover the check that you wrote to our company. As for the false information about our program, you never became a licensee and have never used it or tried to talk to one of our agents that book travel.  We inform you during the presentation, and also as clearly stated in your paper-work that there is a process in receiving your log in information for our website.  We have done nothing as a company that is unethical or against what we represent.  Also, the information about ones personal life has nothing to do with how our program works.  We have sold our liscense to use our program for the last 3 years and have MANY very satisfied clients.   I apologize that we were unable to answer your questions to clear all this up when we sat with you in our office for 2 additional hours after the presentation to get every question you had answered.  Another complaint that you refer to is even more inaccurate than the post above, We relocated to MA well over a month ago.  As you stated above we did remove benefits to tailor the program to your needs and most importantly your budget. The unfortunate thing is that people such as yourselves join our program go home and try to find a reason as to why they shouldn't have and believe anything they read online instead of contacting us and even attempting to book travel and seeing the type of savings we can provide. Pacific Palm Destinations strives to please all of our clients, but when a company deals with the public and as many people as our company does on a daily basis we realize it is near impossible to please everyone. If you have any more concerns please contact us.

Thank you

Pacific Palm Destinations
781-281-0942