TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin El Zafiro payment issues

I have been requested by a board member to post a note about cash or check payments made to El Zafiro. The member wants to know whether or not anyone has received a refund of cash payments made to the company for lodging not received. If not, has anyone explored whether there is any option to try to recover their money.

Thanks for any help.

Carol,

I was talking to someone earlier who ‘thought’ under those circumstances the only recourse they might have would be to bring suit against them.

As you know, so far we’ve been issued temporary credits by both credit card companies we used with the assurance that we should have the situation resolved (in our favor in all likelihood) within 2 to 3 billing cycles. But credit cards are a whole different ballgame than cash or check.

Doesn’t it sound like fraud if monies were knowingly collected with little to no intention of delivery the services paid for?

Good luck to the parties involved.

A refund, Your kidding right? The place obviously had money and lots of other issues and owners are broke or hidden any deposit money so any money guests paid is long gone. If you paid with credit card dispute the charges and hopefully the credit card company will take your loss. You could sue them and waste more money with the lawyers and get a judgment but doubtful you’ll be able to find a asset to collect from. It’s a mess. We lost money on a VRBO’s booking when the owner sold the property and disappeared. Long standing well known well respected hotels are your safest reservation. Really awful when something like this messes up a cherished vacation. Good luck to all. 🍀

Thanks for your input, Pat. The person involved is down about $2300, so it's a fair amount of money. I don't know anything about the business organization of this business, but it could be that they have filed bankruptcy and there is no one to sue? And apparently the owner of the business is now off island?

I'm afraid there's nothing the person can do, but the best thing to do would be at least consult an attorney on island. Anyone have an attorney on island they can recommend?

How long ago did your issue with VRBO happen?
The current policy of VRBO is that the owner is not paid until the guests check in date. They (VRBO) holds all the funds until that time. If anything happens VRBO make an immediate refund. So what you describe could not happen now.
Just want people to know VRBO is a good way to book a rental in SXM.

Good to know. In 2019! Thanks.

I made the unfortunate mistake of making our down payment with a check. We are out $1,300.00. A couple of months ago I was told by the owner that she would use our down payment to book another place we found for our stay. When it came down to making the new down payment to the other place, she never came through. Our booking was towards the end of March 2023. She said that they were still looking to refund/rebook guests for November and December. That she would refund our deposit as soon as she could. I have not heard anything since. This would have been our 4th year staying there. If there's anyone who has received an actual refund from them directly, not through a credit card company, I would like to hear how you were able to do it. If there's a way for people to get together to try and get our money back, I would be interested in hearing about it.

After having tenants become delinquent in their rent payments I have long learned that promises are easy to make but follow through isn't. Good luck on getting it but I wouldn't waste more money in trying to get it back.

Jenni--thanks for your info. Best wishes.

Jenni, if they have or do file bankruptcy, you would be a creditor in the bankruptcy, although probably pretty far down the list. That assumes bankruptcy proceedings are similar here to the US.

While we were on the island (late oct into nov) I read in the D H that an auction company would be there to auction off any and all properties that could be sold off. The next day they were there with buyers !!! Wishing all of you that are in this process of retrieving said funds good luck!!!!

From what I’ve seen, The owner of the property got an court ordered eviction and their was a huge amount of past due rental and other fees well over $100,000.00. The auction was only for the movables, ie furniture, equipment which mostly had very little value. No real property was sold. I understand it the property can be bought for $12,000,000.00 per a local realtor. Any money received from auction on the movables I believe would go to secured contracts like the past due rental to the landlord. Refund of Room deposits would be way down the list and extremely doubtful assets would even be close to the amount owed. If it could be proven the guesthouse owner keep taking deposit money knowing they could not provide a room knowing they would close I suppose fraud could be claimed. Probably hard to prove even in the USA. IMO wishful thinking anybody will get any money back. It’s all long gone.

We're at BSV, and a few days after we got here we followed a huge stakebed truck just pulling out of El Zafiro loaded with furnishings.