First we must say that the law is the law and we would not disagree with that; however there also is a counter expression as quoted by Charles Dickens character Mr Bumble who stated “The law is an ass” to what are we referring? To answer, the Spanish court system.
Spanish courts
Within these pages there are many stories of the literally thousands of timeshare owners who via legal action have had their timeshare contracts quashed and awarded thousands in compensation, the reason, the contracts contravened Spanish Law 42/98. With the initial challenge taking place in 2015, the court declared that the timeshare contract was illegal, cancelled the contract and awarded compensation. Since then the floodgates opened, so what’s the problem?
Legal appeals
In virtually every case since 2015, where the courts have delivered guilty verdicts, the resorts or developers have used their legal right to appeal, what does this achieve? Answer in reality nothing! At best it may be described as a stay of execution delaying the day when the guilty have to abide by the court rulings thus dragging out the inevitable. At worst it is downright defiance of the statute law in Spain.
Every single claimant, lawyer and judge involved in these cases knows these actions are just delaying tactics, which unfortunately the law allows, however there is a far darker side to these actions.
Money go round
In the case of Silverpoint and Anfi it seems rather strange that for two thriving businesses they both feigned lack of funds to settle claims. Silverpoint went a stage further by declaring bankruptcy thus trying to avoid court ordered settlements. However this has not gone unnoticed by the authorities prompting criminal investigations to ascertain where the money has gone, see our article here.
Anfi have not gone this far yet but are still not paying their legal obligations. Irregular accounting has been drawn to the attention of the Provincial Prosecutors Office of Gran Canaria. This investigation has been running for quite some time now, and much like Silverpoint, it is looking like possible criminal charges involving the suspicious movement of funds will be filed.
CLC World
Another of the largest developers, Club la Costa has also taken extremely devious action to avoid paying the thousands of claimants awarded recompense by the Spanish courts. Late last year CLC announced the closure of a number of its sales companies which on the surface was a simple corporate strategic move indicating that they would no longer be selling new timeshare contracts but when the dust settled it transpired that the companies involved were the companies responsible for the selling of illegal contracts, the very companies the court orders were against.
CLC took steps to place the UK Company into administration and the Spanish company into liquidation; these moves were taken to avoid the settlement of court awarded compensation. Several large Spanish law firms representing claimants are not prepared to accept this and are preparing action. More on this will be announced as and when we are in possession of the facts.
It makes you wonder
Anfi and CLC are both operating as normal, Covid restrictions excepted. OK they may not be selling new timeshare but they are still actively collecting maintenance fees and generating profits so one has to ask why they are trying their hardest to avoid their liabilities? Don’t forget these liabilities are court ordered. The answer is simple; millions are at stake for both organisations which of course is money they don’t want to pay so will try to wriggle out in whatever way they can.
Speaking of wriggling out, Anfi have been writing to owners intimating that there is a legal requirement to sign a new contract, there is no such legal requirement. Signature of this contract will remove any right to challenge the existing contract legally and in return the so called new contract offers no benefits to the owner, the only beneficiary is Anfi, our advice, don’t sign it.
Our Silverpoint report, as mentioned above, is even more complex in as much as the head of the corporate pyramid is the Limora Group. Linked in the corporate tree of Limora are 123 other companies based all over the world, many in known tax havens. Silverpoint funds could be in any, some or all of these other companies. Spanish police will have their work cut out finding the sequested funds, the saving grace is that they are on the case and on this occasion the potential fraud has not gone unnoticed.
Our opinion
They won’t get away with it. Certainly in the case of Silverpoint and CLC their actions are bordering on fraud. As we have reported Silverpoint are already being investigated by the Spanish equivalent of their fraud squad. In the case of CLC, lawyers involved have made forceful representations to the liquidatator in both Spain and the UK declaring that their clients with court orders must be accepted as creditors.
Naturally these actions will take some time to complete but given the physical number of claimants, each with water tight legally upheld claims, we have no reason to believe that the claimants day in court and subsequent rulings will ultimately be settled, the only question is when.
We opened this article by saying the law is the law so why do some timeshare developers believe they are above the law? Honestly we don’t have an answer to that but given the massive numbers of pending awards by the Spanish courts it would appear that even though these developers thought they were above the law, they obviously weren’t.
If you believe you have been the victim of an illegal Spanish timeshare contract we’d love to hear from you.
For more information regarding this article or assistance in any other timeshare related issues please contact the TCA on 01908 881058 or email: info@TimeshareConsumerAssociation.org.uk