The man whom I have promised to take to Tahiti with me — if I ever get there — asked me the other day if I had blogged about Mario Haubert “not sending” my refund to me again.
Yeah, like anyone would believe that OnlyTahiti.com was going to make good on its promises for a Tahiti vacation.
So, no. Mario Haubert of OnlyTahiti.com promised (again) that I would have my money refunded on Thursday, March 27. But alas, …. OnlyTahiti has my money and won’t give it back.
Friends Joe and Carol are just returning from Tahiti — after booking their vacation with a respectable travel agent (who was NOT OnlyTahiti.com). I hope they will share their photos and their tales about their trip.
Me, I’m just going to spread the word about how you can’t trust Mario Haubert at OnlyTahiti.com. He gave me his word, but his word, unfortunately, is no good.
Also, unfortunately, he is spreading his scam all over the Internet using search engine optimization techniques and keyword spam. Here is one OnlyTahiti press release that uses Oprah in the headline, even though Oprah has nothing to do with OnlyTahiti.com.
Have you been scammed by OnlyTahiti.com? Write to me and we’ll join forces to shut him down.
I got involved in a real comedy of a scam involving a too-good-to-be-true offer of a vacation to Tahiti. First the deal was $400 for two people and included roundtrip airfare for 2 people from Los Angeles to Tahiti, hotel, inter-island flights and one meal a day. Just wire the money to this guy in Las Vegas. Ridiculous, huh? But someone I trusted said Mario Haubert from OnlyTahiti.com was good for it. And Chuck figured that the worst that could happen was that we paid off someone’s gambling debt in Las Vegas.
Well, I sent OnlyTahiti.com $400 on Aug. 3, 2007, and then was foolish to send him another $400 a few weeks later. He promised to send me airline confirmation codes, but he kept putting me off and putting me off.
Months later, after he disconnected his phone and claimed to have had his e-mail disrupted by a virus, I got an intermediary to get him to call me. And he finally agreed to refund my money in January.
Yet, here it is almost March, and I still am no closer to seeing Mario Haubert return my money.
On Monday, after I first blogged about this, he called me from a “caller ID blocked” number, all indignant that I could think that he was pulling a scam. “I would never screw you,” he insisted, telling me I would have my money on Thursday.
Thursday came and went.
He called me twice today (Friday, Feb. 22) to say that he got an e-mail from his bank saying that a check to cover my refund had been received. His banker said the money wouldn’t clear his account until next Friday, Feb. 29.
“I give you my word, Kathy,” Haubert said. “The latest it will be is Friday.”
Yada yada yada.
I’ve excerpted some of the e-mails and phone conversations from this guy below.
It’s a bit embarassing for me to admit I sent this guy money, but I hope no one else gets taken in by this nonsense — or sees it for what it is: a pathetic comedy.
Date: August 3, 2007 2:35:50 PM PDT (CA)
From: “Mario Haubert” <m.haubert@hotmail.com>
8 DAY / 2 TAHITI / 2 MOOREA / 2 HUAHINE / 2 BORA BORAALL INCLUDE / LAX -TAHITI / INTERISLANDS FLIGHTS ……$400WESTERN UNION TOWILLIAM GULP / LAS VEGAS
| Taxes and Service Fees: |
Air Reservations.Prices quoted are subject to additional charges, including but not limited to: (i) Airport Passenger Facility Charges that range from $2-$18 USD, depending on itinerary; (ii) Federal Segment Fees of $3.20 USD per segment (defined as a takeoff and a landing); (iii) the September 11th Security Fee of $2.50 USD per flight segment (maximum charge per trip of $5.00 USD one-way, $10.00 USD round-trip; (iv) a Travel Facilities Tax of up to $13.40 USD per round-trip for domestic flights beginning or ending in Alaska; and (v) for international itineraries, foreign and U.S. government-imposed charges of up to $200.00 USD per round trip, depending on routing and destination. Air fares may be subject to additional restrictions, may not be available on all flights, and may change without notice. Specific fare rules are provided prior to purchase.
Date: Mon, 22 Oct 2007 21:04:42 -0700
Subject: Reservations for Tahiti
To: m.haubert@hotmail.com
Hi, Mario, I haven’t heard from you regarding our reservations for March.Can you confirm that you received my e-mail from last week, please? And that you are sending our confirmations so we don’t have to cancel this trip and request a refund?Thanks,hello Kathy ,confirmation coming tomorrow . thank you
Let Tahiti Steal Your Heart, Your Home Away From Home
That’s the headline on a press release last August from Only Tahiti.com. But that’s not the only thing that onlyTahiti might steal.
I’m supposed to be in Tahiti this month, and instead, I’m still at home and out $800.
What gives?
Only Tahiti, only Tahiti. If only Tahiti would give me my money back!
The Walrus is about to “uncover” its first CD! Riding the tide of a rock and roll renaissance, this Pacific Northwest classic rock band has 11 new rock music classics for music lovers of all ages. The CD release party will be at The Wild Buffalo House of Music on Saturday, Nov. 18.
Listen to a PRWebPodcast about the Walrus’ upcoming CD, to be released in Bellingham on Saturday.
Or check out this classic rock band’s MySpace page and MySpace blog.
The Walrus rocks! The PRWeb Podcast crew rocks!
Capt. Kathy is extremely proud of Chuck, Jamie, Walt, Joe and Michael for sticking to this project for two years!
A cool new search engine has launched, www.Like.com, that has intriguing possibilities for the consumer-generated media space that I live in.
Riya, a world leader in visual computing, says that its visual search engine will allows consumers for the first time ever to search for items by appearance instead of just text. “This “Likeness SearchTM” dramatically improves the ease of finding aesthetic or hard-to-describe items on the Web,” according to a press release distributed Nov. 8.
According to Riya, image search accounts for 8 percent of all Web searches on sites like Google and Yahoo! but these searches look for the words attached to photos, not the photos themselves.
It looks like Like.com doesn’t have a whole lot of images to select from just yet, but it allows people to shop for items that are similar to what celebrities are wearing. Pretty interesting.
