🔗 Share this article

Authorities have called it as one of the largest scams of its kind in the UK.

Altogether 14 defendants have been found guilty for their involvement in a £28m scheme to defraud more than 3,500 holiday ownership investors.

The targets were eager to get out of long-standing vacation property deals and went looking for help.

Most were from 60 and 80. Over 500 of them parted with more than £10,000, and a single victim transferred over £80,000.

Those affected were exposed to aggressive presentations extending for six hours. They were financially worse off, holding valueless fake "points" and still locked into costly holiday ownership agreements they often use.

The Firm At the Heart of the Fraud

The company at the core of the fraud was Sell My Timeshare (SMT). They collected clients' cash to finance the proprietors' lavish lifestyle of private schools, high-end properties and private jets.

The individual at the helm of the organization, the main defendant, was given a 90-month prison term in January for fraudulent conspiracy.

Recently, his wife Nicola was among the last group to hear their sentences.

She was given a two-year long suspended jail sentence at the London court after confessing to money laundering.

The outcome represents a lengthy process and signifies a significant success for the individuals who testified, the authorities and the Crown.

The Way the Probe Began

The initial awareness of SMT came in the mid-2016. The role involved in the research department of a news organization, creating current affairs programmes.

A friend pointed out that his mum had taken over the rights of a holiday property in the Spanish coast and, after decades of vacations, had started seeking to exit the deal.

It's worth mentioning how widespread holiday ownership had become with British holidaymakers in the last decades of the 20th century.

Timeshares permitted families to access the identical property every year, or exchange their time slots with additional holders who had apartments in other resorts. Roughly 600,000 sun-lovers seized that opportunity.

The initial boom was accompanied by a numerous stories about dishonest operators mis-selling properties. They appeared frequently on investigative broadcasts.

The typical holiday ownership agreement locked buyers for long periods.

In that period, those holders who had enjoyed their regular accommodation in the sunshine for decades were getting older, and many were looking to say farewell to their holiday properties.

Some had health issues and found it difficult to access their units. A few just thought they'd got all they wanted from them. And others had deceased, in frequent situations bequeathing their heirs to inherit the deals - plus their annual payments and service charges.

The Undercover Operation Develops

This was the situation the family member had been placed. She looked online for answers and came across the company, a firm whose digital platform claimed to release her from her contract.

Yet, having paid a fee and scheduled a consultation with them, her family had doubts.

Additional investigation showed many victims reporting they had handed over cash and received no benefit out of it. In fact, they had lost money. Significant sums.

The reporting group commenced probing what was happening. It quickly became clear that there were some shady characters operating in the vacation property industry.

One lawyer had numerous client reports aiming to litigate against SMT.

We spoke to people who had dealt with the organization and they all told the same story. They assumed the business would buy their property off them but when they attended a meeting (for which they made an advance payment) they were informed there was no re-sale value.

Instead, they were encouraged - in fact pressured - to commit further cash acquiring "Monster Rewards", named after the organization's holding firm, the overarching entity.

The nature of these rewards was somewhat vague. They seemed similar to a type of exchange medium, offering cheaper vacations and amenities and shopping deals.

And they were reportedly "tradable" with other owners, at a future date.

Investing money immediately would produce an eventual payoff that would cover SMT's fees and leave the timeshare holder with a gain, freed at last from their pesky agreement.

An unbelievable offer? Indeed, it was.

A 'Deceptive Scam'

Assuming these reports were accurate, this was a massive scam.

This is known as a "deceptive marketing."

A business - specifically SMT - "attracts the customer by advertising a specific service but then to claim it is unavailable, directing the client in the direction of an alternative, lesser option.

That's illegal. Possessing all the accounts we had assembled, we presented the rationale to discreetly video one of the firm's consultations.

This takes dedication, work, and compelling reasons for why this is the only way to collect the evidence required to prove wrongdoing.

Once authorized, our small team organized a appointment with one of the firm's agents in the location.

Posing as a ordinary individual wanting to help his mother released from her timeshare contract|holiday ownership agreement