Just joined TUG and have had similar experiences with the purchase of a Vidanta Grand Luxxe membership. This happened in May 2017 and has not been completely resolved yet. I was contacted by a Global representative about 5 weeks after the purchase to start the transfer process, but had found this thread and the other ones on this forum, so have taken a much closer look at the issues with this. I have subsequently been contacted as second time by Global with an offer to allow me "right of first refusal" to retain my old timeshare for the cost of $3,900, allowing me to avoid the $906 transfer fees (including taxes). A day or two after that, I received a call back from Vidanta customer care in Nuevo Vallarta to discuss my questions with this aspect of the transaction; bottom line from them was that they don't have any concern with whether or not you keep your old timeshare and they offered to allow me to do so without having to pay the fee, although it would be subject to management approval. They'll have the answer for me on whether it's been approved by "management" tomorrow; I'm fairly confident it will be.
The problems that I see with the document that was in our paperwork with the title "Global Vacation Trade Agreement" lead me to conclude that it isn't a binding contract between me and Global. This is particularly the case because of one of the clauses in the contract with Vidanta, number 9.1B, which is an acknowledgement on my part that I have not received or relied on any promise, offer or inducement of any kind, oral or written, not set forth in the contract. It further states that the contract constitutes the entire agreement of the parties and supersedes all prior and contemporaneous agreements, written or oral. That's the first issue I see with the "Global Vacation Trade Agreement."
The second issue with the document that we received is that no one besides us ever signed it. Looking through all of the documents I received in the transaction, all of the other ones include a signature from a representative of Vidanta, which is something that is a part of entering into a contract for most anything in my experience. None of the other documents included any reference to an equity trade in; instead they include recitations that the transaction was a cash only transaction. There are documents that list how much "equity" we have in the Grand Luxxe membership we purchased and that amount doesn't include the amount of the "equity credit" listed on the "Global Vacation Trade Agreement," which is not terribly surprising to me in light of the subsequent communications with Global and Vidanta in which neither indicated that there would be any change in what we owe if we didn't transfer the timeshare.
The final issue I see with the document is that it includes the statement "Subject to change without notice" on the back, below the listings of properties with special conditions in addition to the filing fee and processing fee. In my experiences, a binding contract would bind both parties and this one does not appear to be binding in any way on Global, so I would interpret it to not be binding on me.
I would interpret the "Global Vacation Trade Agreement" as giving you an optional method of disposing of the timeshare rather than as a contract and am treating it as such. I'll update this post after I get the final word from Vidanta, but don't expect there to be anything besides approval of my retaining the timeshare without paying a fee because of the various irregularities with the "Global Vacation Trade Agreement." If there is a different outcome, I'll probably pursue the irregularities with the Florida Attorney General because Global appears to be based in Miami. I've seen postings that list the corresponding Mexican consumer protection department as well.
From reviewing the other postings here, it seems like Vidanta will work with a customer to have Global execute the transfer of a timeshare if you really want them to; some posters have said that it can take quite a while to finish such a transfer. On the other hand, they don't seem to have any concern with whether you transfer it and the fact that Global is apparently willing to negotiate on the final price they allow you to keep the timeshare (while Vidanta volunteered that I could without a fee) lead me to believe that this is just puffing on the part of the sales teams and has questionable legal standing at best.
