(Note: The client’s name in this article has been changed at her request to protect her privacy.)

Susan Oliver was looking forward to her vacation. She had paid $3,875 in advance to a travel company for a coast-to-coast “Fall Foliage” tour package. She had even been on a trip previously with the White City, Oregon-based company, Sunrise Tours.

The call came three days before the scheduled Fall Foliage departure.

“The office manager of the tour company said the trip was cancelled. I said, ‘You will be sending me my refund, right?’ The woman said, ‘You’ll have to take it up with John’ (company manager),” Oliver recalled.

In 2008, Oliver and her had husband attended a travel seminar held by the company managers, John and Teri Goodson, in Medford, Oregon. They signed up with the Goodsons for a bus trip to Alaska and ended up having a wonderful time.

Reflecting back, one thing seemed a little odd—the Goodsons had used very strong sales tactics, including offering “substantial discounts,” if people on the Alaskan trip, including Susan and her husband, paid for the 2009 Fall Foliage tour even while they were still on the Alaskan trip.

When her Fall Foliage trip was cancelled and her phone calls to the Goodsons were not returned, Oliver took action.

“I filed a claim with the Oregon Department of Justice later that month. Then I heard from someone who had researched the Goodsons on the internet and had discovered that there had been a 2002 judgment against them and their previous travel company. About that time, I heard about Help Now! from a friend,” said Oliver.

Her friend knew Help Now! senior advocate and retired attorney, Dennis Goldstein.

“The Goodsons had been named in an Assurance of Voluntary Compliance (AVC) order by the Oregon Department of Justice (DOJ) in 2002. Essentially they were barred from running travel companies and agreed to provide refunds to victims from that scam. When I saw that order, I realized we could formulate a more efficient complaint which would get Susan quicker results,” Goldstein explained.

The 2002 scam was essentially the same as the 2008 scam that caught Oliver: market a bus vacation trip to senior citizens, cancel it, and keep the money. Though Oliver and her husband are not senior citizens, just about everyone else scammed on her trip were seniors. DOJ’s involvement in the 2002 scam had resulted in reimbursement to the victims of that scam.

“The Goodsons incorporated their new company under the name of an 80-something woman claiming they were employees, not owners, and therefore not violating the 2002 judgment against them. The elderly woman was just a subterfuge, and DOJ saw right through that,” said Goldstein.

Because Help Now!’s work with DOJ last year in the water filtration scam had involved some of the DOJ personnel working on the travel scam, Goldstein was able to get their immediate attention and expedite the matter’s handling.

As a result, DOJ has recently obtained a new AVC from the Goodsons which gives them 90 days to provide full reimbursement to the victims, like Susan, of their Fall Foliage tour package scam. The clock is ticking. If they don’t pay, they face much stiffer sanctions including fines by the state.

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