Sick And Tired

They're gone. The scratch-cardists. The office in Puerto Alcúdia has closed. No-one will be lamenting the loss. All that remains for the moment is the sign - To Holiday and Real Liberty, sometimes known as right liberty.

There has been a fair old turnover of the street sellers this season. More seem to have been taken on in an attempt to generate ever more business. Maybe it hasn't worked. Maybe tourists are more resistant. Maybe those taken on did not like what they were doing. Maybe there were too many and they were not making their commissions. If there is any sympathy, it is for those who took up this employment in the hope of making some summer dosh. They may have antagonised a lot of people, but they were only the frontline operators for the backroom selling. I am told that there has been a fair amount of dashing around by people looking for transfers and flights out.

It was quite an impressive set-up. The offices were large. A kiddies area, the sales area, the separate offices, the plaques displaying some major names, such as hotel chains, the staff with ties. One looked familiar. There is a youtube knocking around of an exposé by the BBC in the Canaries. The salesman shown by the hidden camera looked similar to one from the Alcúdia office.

The website, for those who succumb to the sales pitch, is still up. It says that To Holiday is operated by Elite Holidays Royal Travel in the Canaries. The site is visually the same to that of Travelsafe, a company that the forums have been less than complimentary about. The revealing thread on the Holiday Watchdog site that has embraced To Holiday also has the names of Real Liberty and Elite in its title; its content also embraces an outfit known as Carpe Diem, which appears to be the company higher up the "organisation" above Elite.

The local police have, apparently, been issuing fines. Maybe they - the fines - have mounted up. Maybe business has just dried up. Maybe the pressure had been growing. Whatever. The office is closed. The police, who had grown "sick and tired" of the whole issue (as said to me,) may, from 2010, have more clout if the issue arises again. There is due to be a change in European law to deal with holiday clubs as from next year. Timeshare selling had been outlawed, but the holiday club was not. This appears to be set to change. The problem of the scratch-cardists in Alcúdia may now be over. We'll see.


Town hall troubles
Two town hall things lurking in "The Diario". Pollensa town hall, which may or may not have yet set its budgets for this year, is one of a group of town hall administrations seeking credit - to the tune of slightly less than one million euros. The deficit that the town hall is running is partially due to an historic shortfall dating back to 2005. According to the head of finance, there is now also an issue in respect of unpaid taxes from bars and restaurants with terraces. And in Sa Pobla, the town hall, which had said that it would be pursuing a strategy of low- or no-cost acts in order to keep its fiesta programme intact, has more or less "exhausted" its budget of just under 350,000 euros, claims the opposition Partido Popular.


QUIZ
Today's title - charming song by a charming (Swedish) group; well, Nina was/is charming.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)

Blue Orchid

Once and for all, but probably not, we seem to be heading towards something like a definitive ruling on the most sensitive aspect of the planned golf course on the Son Bosc finca near Playa de Muro. The environment ministry has made it clear that the rare orchid on the finca should be protected by an area of 150 metres around where it grows. By coming up with this restriction, the ministry has, in effect, given its blessing to the project, though it has also stated that the eighth hole of the course cannot be sited where it was originally intended as it would interfere with the orchid's natural habitat. The ruling, if one can call it that, is now being presented to the various interested parties, one of which - the environmental pressure group GOB - will doubtless have a finca-full of objections. Others, like the hoteliers' association in Playa de Muro, which has backed the project from the off, will probably be only too happy to spin the whole thing as their being environmentally conscientious - a golf course that preserves the natural rarity of a species. One can almost read the literature now. Presumably, the eighth hole will go somewhere else, unless the course is to have a unique selling point in being the only one on Mallorca with seventeen holes.


Clear blue water (or maybe not) - Puerto Pollensa
Pollensa's mayor may not have been flavour of the past several months in Puerto Pollensa, but the other day he was able to appear in more favourable light and to announce that the long-lasting problems with water - of different types - have pretty much been solved, up to 60 million euros having been spent over the last eight years to arrive at the solution: four pumping stations have cost 40 million alone. This upgrading of "sanitation" is, according to the mayor, more important than the general beautifying of the port, though there is some suggestion that the frontline and the church square will be given a facelift - at some point. However, projects for doing so will have to await financing, which suggests that there may be a bit of a wait. Having spent 60 million on getting the water right, there may not be a lot of spare cash sloshing around, albeit "The Bulletin" is indicating that the flower beds in the square might be for the chop. Strange, I should have thought that flower beds, kept tidily, would make the place quite appealing. And unlike drainage systems, they wouldn't cost a shedload.


Scratch cards
The scratch-cardists are back. There we were thinking that that "for rent" sign on the office in Puerto Alcúdia's Calle Maristany opposite the small parking area meant that they might be no more. But no.

I don't really wish to go into all of this, well not yet anyway. The point to make, though, apart from the hassle and sometimes verbal abuse that those in the street subject tourists to, is that anyone approached should be very, very wary. It's best to just say no and walk away. Don't be taken in by what is usually a nice manner. The company involved is called To Holiday, which appears to also be Real Liberty; both names are on the office.

For the time being, here are a couple of links, one from Holiday Watchdog, the other from "The Independent":

http://forum.holidaywatchdog.com/Timeshare-&-Holiday-Clubs-To-HolidayElite-Holiday-Roya-Travel-Real-Liberty-1-Holiday-Clubs-Thread-12203.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/house-and-home/property/if-the-holiday-club-rep-drops-by-your-sunkissed-resort-be-on-your-guard-883613.html


QUIZ
Today's title - husband-and-wife but claimed to be brother-and-sister duo.

(PLEASE REPLY TO andrew@thealcudiaguide.com AND NOT VIA THE COMMENTS THINGY HERE.)