Alma Resort developer confuses customer with valueless “ownership certificate”
Alma Resort developer confuses customer with valueless “ownership certificate”
Besides anomaly in representative offices and unreasonable clauses in the contract, the certificate that Paradise Bay Resort Co., Ltd., the developer of Alma Resort in the central province of Khanh Hoa, gives to customers also contains confusing information that raises the suspicion that the company is cheating the customers.
In a letter to VIR, a customer named S said that after signing the contract to own a vacation with Paradise Bay Resort Co., Ltd. and pay the deposit, he received a certificate of ownership issued by a company named Hutchinson Trustees based in the UK.
S said that Alma told him this certificate ensured that he could join in an international club that allow him to exchange vacation weeks at Alma Resort for week at another hotel in another country.
However, on the certificate there are a lot of opaque details. Specifically, the company certifying the ownership is “Hutchinson Trustees”, with address at “5 - 6 Priory Court, Tuscam Way, Camberley, Surrey, GU15 3YX, United Kingdom”, and phone number: “(+44) 1276 482000”.
Searching “Hutchinson Trustees” on the company registry website of the UK government at https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/ returned three results of three companies, all at the same address, namely Hutchinson Trustees Limited; Hutchinson Trustees Secret Bay Residences Properties Limited and Hutchinson Trustees (Lithuania) Limited.
These companies have one director in common named “RICKARD, Anna Kathryn”. Of the three companies, according to the link, https://beta.companieshouse.gov.uk/company/08206611/filing-history, Hutchinson Trustees Secret Bay Residences Properties Limited was dissolved in 2014. For the remaining two there is no information about their operation status.
But whether they are still operating or not, on the certificate that S received, there is no information about whether Rickard represents which of these two companies. Judging by the stamp on the letter that is attached with the certificate, it may be Hutchinson Trustees Limited.
However, the address “5 - 6 Priory Court” and phone number “(+44) 1276 482000” belong to yet another company with the website http://www.hutchtrust.co.uk and name “Hutchinson & Co Trust Company Ltd”, with email address at enquiries@hutchtrust.co.uk, instead of enquiries@hutchtrust.com as written on the certificate. This company also has many directors, one of whom is RICKARD, Anna Kathryn.
Lawyer Tran Duc Phuong from the Ho Chi Minh City Lawyers’ Association said that this certificate does not have any legal value in Vietnam.
According to Decree 111/2011/ND-CP issued by the government dated December 5, 2011, on certification and legalisation by the embassy, the certificate by UK company Hutchinson Trustee has to be legalised by the Embassy of UK in Vietnam before being used in Vietnam.
As per Vietnamese laws, the certificate has no value because a certificate of a third party has no value to certify a contract of renting a room or a villa, no matter whether the third party is a Vietnamese or foreign company.
In fact this certificate can be understood as a notice about setting up an account at a company that facilitates people exchanging and selling vacations.
