Global Connections, Inc
Reviews and Complaints

Appears the complainant doesn't understand what he was offered. The $1999 was for one star and the $6000 was for more stars so comparing the two shows you weren't listening or understanding. I haven't bought and am looking at the options and deals before I do, if I do. But when you complain, make sure you understand what you are being told. Reading your comments show me you really have little knowledge of the details nor did you grasp anything but the lower price for lower stars. Since my wife and I took the presentation and know what they are talking about, your complaint to me appears useless and misleading.

Just went to a presentation in Pune and realized in time that it is a fraud.

My husband and I got tricked into this stupid Scan. We want out but there's no way! If anyone knows how to get out please help. A struggling couple that want to have great memories with their two young kids.

Indeed it is.

It’s actually a scam, this company took all my money, I was told I’m making good profits, I invested and all was almost gone then I met James Rodriguez at cyber-wizard dt com after seeing a review here testifying of he’s good work to recover scammed money then I contacted him, and everything tuned to be true, so true

Absolutely HORRIBLE! I have had so many issues with this company. First I referred some friends, these friends did not receive any information from Global Connections, I called to see why and the representative was extremely rude and had gave no assistance, her response "I have no idea, they must be running behind" She made me feel like an inconvenience just for asking a question. In their defense, another lady, Cat, called back the following day and went out of her way to help me. With her help I referred a few people, some of which bought that same day.

Next, I was told by Samuel (in the Denver office) when I signed up that the stars would transfer over to the following year if unused, so my husband and I decided that we would purchase 3 stars and save them to use every other year. This was Samuel's selling point because we were on the fence about buying. After purchasing, I decided to call and check on if the stars were only able to be carried over 1 year, or if more were possible. I was then informed that the stars do not carry over at all! I could not believe that their representative, Samuel, would give false information just to get a sale. The response that I received from my follow up phone call "I'M SORRY THAT YOU DIDN'T READ THROUGH THE ENTIRE BOOK THAT WAS GIVEN TO YOU AFTER YOU SIGNED THE PAPERWORK"

DO NOT PURCHASE FROM THIS COMPANY, THEY WILL GIVE FALSE INFORMATION TO GET THE SALE AND GIVE THE TRUE TERMS/CONDITIONS IN A 20 PAGE BOOK!
If you have already purchased, you have 3 days to back out. I recommend backing out.

I got a letter in the mail about Global Connections and their 90 minute presentation. Folks, as a licensed travel agent for over 30 years, THIS IS A SCAM! Nothing is free in this world and the only thing these people care about is getting your money and then throwing you to the wind! I have seen all the negative reports, lawsuits, and complaints and I am really surprised they are still in business. I even told them this during one of their presentations that it was a scam and that it has everything to do with a timeshare and NOTHING about travel. Make sure you report them to the authorities! In addition, they will not let you go to the presentation unless you are COUPLE? that is stupid in itself! You have to have two people and not one? Another SCAM tactic...

Liars, Liars, Liars! This is a scam, save your money and don't buy into what Global Connections is trying to sell! The sales representatives are misleading and don't tell you about all the red tape. Unfortunately I purchased a "plan" and are regretting I ever attended their sales presentation. The fact is, they do NOT tell you everything about the club. When you see their website, you will notice they only have a small selection of places to go. Even booking a year in advanced won't guarantee you'll get a week at your preferred destination.They will stick your name on a waitlist with twenty other people and hope something becomes available. They say if you don't see a place where you want to go, then simply submit a request form and (per sales presentation) are able to secure your vacation 85% of the time. Such a lie! Every vacation I tried to book has been during their value or peak season. Look to pay additional fees up to 500 dollars. What a joke! The travel agents and member services are rude and unaccommodating. They don't care! They boast about their A+ BBB rating. They have several complaints filed against them, don't believe the hype. They are not member centered!

Global connections promo gifts are not the best, due to the fact that they are FREE hello anyone who thinks something FREE is going to work out exactly how you want it has no common sense. This travel club works though, I am a happy owner and have been for the past 3 years. Can I go everywhere? NO but am I given other opportunities in case somewhere I ask is unavailable? YES ! They work with me and I pay $22 a night! HELLO!?! I don'T know anyone else who can do that and have a travel agent plan everything for me! This has been a blessing for my family and I. Thank you Global !

Yes, this is exactly how they operate. And I'm glad you didn't purchase like I stupidly did. I am very disappointed with Global Connections. I signed up for $5, 000 w/no annual fee the 1st yr. This is one of the ploys to reel you in, so you don't realize how ridiculous this annual fee is until the next year when you have to pay it or have to access to trips on the $5, 000 you just paid last year (which is exactly what happened to me. Part of their ploy - their game - is no annual fee the 1st year. Just give them your mega thousands of dollars that first year. Though I contacted them months in advance to schedule my 1st trip, w/the selection of dates they sent me, the best selection for our vacation was not during the summer, but instead the first week of school for my grandchildren. So you have to choose crappy accommodation with somewhat better dates, or schedule an undesirable date to get the best choice offered. Though when you sit in that purchase-meeting, they tell you all the fine places you'll have to choose from as long as you contact them in advance. Well we did that, and we still didn't get the dates requested. They don't tell you their choice of dates may not even come close to your request. The next year that I had to pay the annual fee, of course it was $395. Yes with all that smooth talking, this fact is set up for you not to really get what you'll pay. Oh yes they tell you this, but they're like confidence men, convincing you with two people on both sides of you talking fast. Back to my vacation point: I go on vacation once a year, so to pay them $395 to activate my annual membership, plus whatever I must pay for the trip, I might as well book my trip with anybody else. Given this $395 fee, I call them and asked if they could reduce the annual fee to half, given I am a senior citizen and they quickly said absolutely not. Now here I am reading all these discounts and negotiations people made with this company (in the write ups of this Complaint Board Website), yet they won't negotiate with me, so they could get something every year and I would use my package. They told me everyone pays this same fee. Well that's not what I have read in these complaints. Other people did in fact negotiate and are still aren't satisfied with this company. Well I didn't get any of those negotiated discounts, and now that I've made an attempt, they've refused. So in other words, I just gave them $5000 of my hard earned money for them to be legally correct with their smooth talking swindling, but legally correct company. You know how these corporations do. They find all the loop holes in the law and then scam as many people as possible. Any reasonable company would lower that activation fee to half that price, which I could afford to pay. But no negotiation for a senior citizen. Nope. They don't care because I already gave up the $5000 and if they know more suckers like me will come their way everyday of the week, so they don't have to think about me anymore, even though they have negotiated with others. They talked to me over the phone like every one pays the same. No, not the case. Each customer gets their percentage of a scammed price and then they are through with you. Please don't waste your hard earned and saved-up money with this company. I just made them a donation of $5, 000 - not a purchase, but a scammed donation.

definitely a scam and definitely a time share hard sell. We agreed to a contract with a Roland Fiedler in the Lombard office. Mr. Fiedler said that he would call a certain party in Virginia the next day and have this individual contact my husband about selling three time shares he has. I told Mr. Fiedler that if we didn't hear from this individual I would cancel our membership the next day. We didn't hear from the Virginian and I called Chase and told them to put the charge into dispute.

Under Illinois LAW, we had 72 hours to decide whether or not we wanted to keep the contract or to rescind it. I had not number to contact the company, thus had Chase to dispute the charge against my account. This is the only way I know of to rescind a contract with an unreachable corporation.

If there is any further hassle from Global Connections on this matter, I will immediately contact the IL Attorney General, "The Haggler" with the New York Times, and the consumer columnist at the Chicago Tribune, along with the Chicago affiliates of ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox.

We have hit some hard times and I called to cancel. The gentleman on the phone said he is sorry but there is no way to cancel. We wouldn't have to pay the yearly fee, because if we don't use it we won't be charged. Well great, but I will never use it, I am hoping they make it easy for me to get out of this. They can keep all the money I put down and have paid in so far. I just want out.

We went to their fercucktah presentation this past weekend. Laughable, but not in a funny way. Where to begin?

They started off asking everyone where they would go on a "dream vacation". Responses ranged from Hawaii to Europe to the Caribbean. They don't tell you these places are not on their list of venues.

They mention the BBB and say they'll show us their BBB ratings, but all they do is tell you they have an A+ rating with them, with no documentation offered.

They play on your emotions. They show an unsubtle Pixar-like 4 minute commercial that screamed "life is short, you need to take more vacations". No kidding. I plan to, but I can handle the itinerary on my own.

They have employees planted throughout the presentation room who act as prospective customers, who interact with the presenter every time the presenter asks the group for a response. They're so obviously shills for the company that it was insulting. If these shills didn't respond, no one would have.

The shills agreed with everything the presenter said, offered opinions every time the presenter asked for one. It was creepy.

Over the phone, they tell you that the presentation is 1 hour. When you get there, they tell you it's going to be 90 minutes, and ask who told you it would be one hour, with the implication that the person who did would be spoken to.

Inside the presentation room, the presenter says he can get through the presentation in 49 minutes if people cooperative and interact with him during his pitch.. Even with the shills interacting, we were in there for about 2 hours.

They tell you they don't need you to buy, they get paid for their efforts regardless. They act shocked when you tell them you have no interest in their product. They act shocked when you leave immediately after their presentation.

The free gift we were offered was a scratch ticket, with the prizes being a 2014 Ford Explorer, a 47 inch Samsung TV, or 2 RT plane tickets to anywhere in the US except Hawaii or Puerto Rico. That's what we went for, but after their insulting tactics, we said we just wanted our gift and wanted to leave. We were told we couldn't get the gift right away, that we'd have to wait an indeterminant amount of time for it. We didn't bother to ask why, we were so disgusted with them. They had no trouble letting us go, in that we were angry and we likely would have expressed as much in front of all their prospective suckers who were staying to listen to more of their nonsense.

My guess is that every comment on this site defending the company comes from an employee of the company.

I'm going to check with the BBB about them next.

My wife and I have been members for 8 yrs and we LOVE our program. If you've recently become a member and are questioning your decision, DON'T! To help put your mind at ease, I'd like to address a few of the complaints addressed on this board:
1) Most of the complaints are about the "free" gifts. I'm not sure what people were expecting in exchange for sitting through a 90 min. presentation, but it simply isn't reasonable to believe the travel gift will be unrestricted. We joined because the program will allow us to travel in style for the rest of our lives (and our kids' lives, and our grandkids' lives, and ...) ; not for the stupid gift. If you use these complaints as the reason to cancel your membership, you were LOOKING for an excuse to cancel and probably shouldn't have joined in the first place.
2) Our representative explained they CAN'T show us all of the resorts because they access many of the resorts through exchange companies. They never know what is/will be available the week we want &/or the size we want until we make our request. Tell them where, when and a "description" of the type of property you want (big/small, adult only/kid friendly, near a landmark, etc.) and they'll show you your options. In my opinion, the resorts range from 3.5 Stars to 4.5 Stars. The great thing is, you don't pay unless they offer you a property you're happy with!
3) When was the last time you saw a "resort" in a major metropolitan area like Chicago or New York? If that's the ONLY way you travel, this probably isn't the right program for you. But if you want to go to resort locations SOMETIMES, you can stay in a condo for a fraction of the cost of an average hotel room.

For those of you who complain, what is your hotel going to cost you next year? 5 yrs from now? 10, 20, 30 yrs from now? You don't know do you? That's too bad. I do!