Court stops Fla. timeshare telemarketer

ORLANDO, Fla., July 19 (UPI) -- A U.S. court temporarily halted a telemarketing operation from allegedly scamming timeshare property owners wanting to sell, the Federal Trade Commission said.

The Florida-based operation, National Solutions LLC, is accused of charging interested sellers thousands of dollars in fees, falsely claiming they had ready buyers for the sales that supposedly would be reviewed and approved by the FTC, the federal watchdog said Tuesday in a release.

The telemarketing operation works under different names in other U.S. cities, the FTC said in papers filed with a federal court in Orlando, Fla.

The FTC's complaint alleged a "sales agreement" presented to the would-be sellers was, in reality, a marketing contract for advertising the property, not a sales contract. Consumers who signed the contract and remitted the fee to the defendants often weren't contacted again, and the properties were never sold. Those who called the defendants were given "the run-around" and demands for refunds were ignored or denied, the complaint said.

Also, contrary to the defendants' alleged assertions, the FTC does not review or approve timeshare sales.

The FTC charged the defendants with violating the Federal Trade Commission Act and the FTC's Telemarketing Sales Rule by misrepresenting that they had buyers willing to pay a specified price for timeshare properties, that they would refund a fee when the property was sold and that the FTC would review and approve proposed sales.

The FTC said it wants to permanently end the defendants' deceptive practices and make them refund consumers' money.