PORTLAND, Maine — Maine Attorney General Janet Mills said a former tour bus operator has agreed to pay more than $30,000 in restitution to customers her office alleged were duped into booking vacation trips that never happened.
Mills’ office said in a statement Thursday that 38 customers will share $30,728 in restitution for deposits that were paid on trips around the Northeast and Canada that never happened.
Barry Somes of Cumberland Center faced paying restitution and up to $20,000 in penalties under the AG’s lawsuit, filed in February in Kennebec County Superior Court. Mills took action against Somes individually and companies operating as Seacoast Convention Bureau Inc. and Club Impac Inc., which claimed to raise funds for a charity to benefit children, called the Lids for Kids Project Inc.
The lawsuit alleged Somes advertised that a portion of tour bookings would go to the children’s charity, but that he did not make any such donations.
The lawsuit also alleged two counts of violating the state’s Unfair Trade Practices Act for failing to pay refunds on deposits for canceled tours and for failing to ensure the trips set off as planned.
“He pulled the rug out from under them by not only canceling their plans, but also failing to provide timely refunds so they could make alternate arrangements,” Mills said in a news release.
Somes did not admit to any of the allegations as part of the settlement, according to the attorney general’s office.
The settlement also requires Somes to pay restitution to any future verified claims related to his past tour bus operations and it prohibits him from operating a similar business again.
Somes’ company Seacoast Convention Bureau was registered with the Maine Secretary of State’s Office in 1988 and also operated under the names TourBUSters and O Salon, according to state records.