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Members of a bankrupt vacation club fight back

Members of a bankrupt vacation club fight back - USATODAY.com

By Kitty Bean Yancey, USA TODAY

Two big names in luxury travel are being sued over vacation-home clubs that
went belly up.

Luxury-safari specialist Abercrombie & Kent, and Andrew Harper, the pen name of a man who keeps his real identity secret and whose Hideaway Report newsletter is read by the well heeled, are among defendants in two cases. They were filed in Los Angeles on behalf of 190 investors who lost supposedly refundable membership fees for Private Retreats by Abercrombie & Kent, Distinctive Retreats by Abercrombie & Kent and Andrew Harper's Distinctive Retreats, a Destination Club by Abercrombie & Kent. The first lawsuit, with 96 plaintiffs, was filed in L.A. Superior Court July 26; a second, with 94 complainants, was filed Wednesday.

The clubs, which enabled members to stay in a network of multimillion-dollar vacation homes in glamorous destinations, cost $100,000 to $1.3 million to join, plus annual dues and daily usage fees.

Abercrombie & Kent and Harper ended their association with the clubs, which they did not operate, two years ago. Re-branded as Tanner & Haley destination clubs, they went bankrupt in 2006.

Abercrombie & Kent spokeswoman Pamela Lassers says membership documents "clearly stated" that A&K was not running the clubs and that "it was just a licensing agreement" that ended in 2005.
FIND MORE STORIES IN: Kent | Harper's | Abercrombie | Destination | Andrew Harper

Lawyer Brian Kabateck, who is representing the former club members, says they thought they were putting their money into operations overseen by A&K. Members got welcoming letters from the A&K CEO, and "even the soap in the rooms" of vacation homes bore the A&K name, Kabateck says. "There were no disclaimers."

He says the retreats were poorly managed and that instead of having membership fees refunded — which was an incentive to sign up for the clubs — his clients "never got their money back."

Harper said via his spokeswoman: "We have no comment because we have not been served a copy of the complaint that USA TODAY received. This is the first we have heard about this lawsuit."

Harper currently is affiliated with another destination club called Solstice. His AndrewHarper.com proclaims that "Today, Andrew Harper's world has expanded to include a destination and lifestyle club, a boutique travel planning service, and an exclusive portfolio of luxury villas and yachts that are regularly inspected."

He says via his spokeswoman: "We do not own Solstice and we are not in partnership with them, but we do advise them on destination sites for Solstice homes and assist them with marketing efforts."

Kabateck, who anticipates filing suit on behalf of more former A&K club members, says his clients include sophisticated business executives who had confidence in the big travel names touting the now-defunct clubs.

"This whole notion of licensing your name to endorse a vacation (you don't oversee) is like Bentley licensing its logo to a guy building cars in his garage," he says.