Who is Vacation Protection Services?

Is there more to Trip Assured than meets the eye?

That’s the intriguing question raised by two readers who are involved in a dispute with Vacation Protection Services, a company that offers “affordable protection against trip cancellation” that is suspiciously similar to Trip Assured’s.

Trip Assured, you’ll recall, is the beleaguered Crossville, Tenn., company that is in hot water with authorities for selling travel protection that isn’t licensed insurance. Six states have issued cease-and-desist orders against it.

“We have a dispute that has gone on since April with Vacation Protection Services,” Rudy and Mary Jensen wrote to me in an e-mail. “We believe this is a fraudulent company.”

The Jensens suggested that Vacation Protection Services and Trip Assured were one and the same — and they asked me to find out if it was.

On first blush, the two companies seem different. Trip Assured is based in Tennessee. Vacation Protection Services appears to operate out of Altanta.

But look closer.

It’s clear that the two companies have a lot in common. The Web sites look as if they were designed by the same person. They use similar color schemes, fonts and navigational features.

Certain phone numbers the companies are almost identical. Trip Assured’s phone is (931) 707-5655. Vacation Protection Services’ fax number is (931) 707-0215.

Vacation Protection Services’ Internet domain name is registered to a Crossville, Tenn., address — 236 Miller Avenue. Trip Assured’s address in Crossville is 80 Miller Avenue.

Distance between the two businesses, according to my mapping program? Six feet.

So if these two companies are one and the same, as these readers believe they are, you have to wonder: Do the cease-and-desist orders issued by the six states against Trip Assured also apply to Vacation Protection Services?

Apparently not.

Vacation Protection Services, which is technically “based” in Georgia, allows you to pay for its services with a credit card. Trip Assured, as I reported a few days ago, had its ability to process credit card transactions suspended by Metavante Corp.

So is Trip Assured trying to get away with something here? I don’t know.

But I do think there are too many unanswered questions about Vacation Protection Services — questions that need to be answered for the sake of the travel agents and customers who will buy its travel protection services.

For example, will the cease-and-desist orders also apply to this company? Is Metavante Corp. still working with it? And is Vacation Protection Services licensed to sell insurance, which travelers like the Jensens apparently thought they were buying?

Update: I just received the following note from the Jensens, saying they received a check for their full claim from Vacation Protection Services. “In our last contact with them, after reading your material on Trip Assured, we asked for their license number to sell in California,” he added. “They said they were underwritten by Stonebridge Insurance and thus
needed no other license.” The Jensens indicated that the case has been settled, as far as they’re concerned. I love happy endings.

Christopher Elliott is the author of Scammed: How to Save Your Money and Find Better Service in a World of Schemes, Swindles, and Shady Deals. Critics have called it “eye-opening” and “inspiring” — it’ll “grab your attention and won’t let go.” Order your copy now on Amazon, Barnes & Noble or iTunes.

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