Payment Details
Upon receiving any check, Special Journeys will automatically send out a receipt. If the Traveler has not yet submitted a Traveler Details document, the receipt will be sent to the address information listed on your check. You can submit payment or partial payment for a trip in any amount at any time.
Checks sent to our Omaha PO Box are guaranteed to be deposited the same day that they are received. Checks and other mail sent to our Boys Town PO Box may not be processed or received immediately. When checks are sent to the Boys Town PO Box, they are always forwarded to the Omaha PO Box for processing, which causes an additional 2-3 day delay.
If the exact date the funds are withdrawn from your account is critical, consider sending a Cashier’s Check from your bank. Your bank will withdraw the funds immediately from your account. If you mail a check from Omaha, Nebraska to our Omaha PO Box, it can take 2-3 days for the envelope to be received on our end. Mail sent from rural areas may take 5-7 days to be received. Special Journeys has no control over the United States Postal System and their delivery times.
Payment Details
Methods of Payment
You can make a payment via a check (either personal or corporate from a payee / guardian / conservator / agency), cashier’s check, or money order.
We do not accept credit or debit cards. We do not have the ability to do automated checking withdrawals.
Processing Your Payment
All payments received by Special Journeys shall be applied to the purchase of one or more Special Journeys Vacation Vouchers. Each Special Journeys Vacation Voucher costs $100. Each Vacation Voucher can be applied to a single vacation that you select at any time prior to the 5th anniversary of said voucher’s purchase.
Each Vacation Voucher is solely redeemable for a fractional share of a vacation that you attend. The quantity of Vacation Vouchers required for each trip is listed separately for each trip. Vacation Vouchers are non-refundable, non-transferable to another person and they expire after 5 years. For additional information about the Vacation Vouchers, refer to the next section – Purchasing Vacation Vouchers.
Once a selected trip’s deadline date passes, all designated or tendered Vacation Vouchers become subject to our Cancellation and No-Show/Late Traveler Policy. During any time period when the Governor of the State of Nebraska declares that a State of Emergency exists due to a pandemic, the expiration date of all Vacation Vouchers shall be tolled, that is, we will stop the running of the time period.
Purchasing Vacation Vouchers
Everyone deserves (and often really needs) a vacation! It is something to look forward to – a goal and a break from everyday life and routines!
Most of our Travelers need to save funds in advance for a vacation. If our Travelers were unable to save funds for a trip (like any other individual who goes on vacation), their only option would be to take a no-money-down vacation and pay the entire balance off upon return. Unfortunately, this type of program does not exist, so our Travelers would never be able to take a vacation.
Vacation vouchers are not countable assets from the perspective of governmental benefit programs because they meet the legal requirements.
Can Vacation Voucher Purchases be Refunded?
No. Because they must not be countable assets, Vacation Vouchers are non-refundable, non-transferable, and they expire after 5 years.
How are Vacation Vouchers Applied?
All Vacation Vouchers are processed in accordance with First In First Out (FIFO) accounting rules.
As an example, let’s say you purchased Vacation Vouchers on two occasions – one year ago and yesterday. When you attend a trip, the first Vacation Voucher(s) you purchased (a year ago in the example) would be applied towards your trip.
Expired Vacation Vouchers
In our many years of operations, we have found that only a very small number of Vacation Vouchers expire unused after 5 years. In the event a Vacation Voucher would expire unused after 5 years, Special Journeys will take one of two actions regarding these funds, in its sole discretion:
1. First, we may transfer the funds to a specific Nebraska Non-Profit, namely – Special Journeys Travel Companion Association. This non-profit provides the volunteer Travel Companions who assist Travelers on trips. The Association has no paid employees, and uses donations to recruit and screen Travel Companions.
2. The second option is to utilize those funds to makes trips safer for both Travelers and Travel Companions. Examples of past safety investments include travel-friendly, anti-slip shower matting; collapsible (bus-friendly) luggage carts which allow us to offer VIP luggage delivery/reloading service at each hotel; custom food software that tracks detailed food components and allergens for each menu item at over 20 restaurants so that Travelers with allergies or food restrictions have an additional, automated safety check.
Funds from Vacation Voucher Purchases
The funds from the sale of Vacation Vouchers are supervised and audited by Thomas Mann, a licensed Nebraska attorney with 25 years of legal experience.
Tom and his wife, Lexi Mann, have served as tour leaders for Special Journeys, LLC since 2004.
Take a Memory Home Voucher (Memory Voucher)
Throughout recorded history, people have traveled to distant lands and brought home objects linked to their journey. These travel mementos are far more than mere merchandise. To the traveler, they take on a personal, cultural and even spiritual meaning that goes well beyond the physical object itself. Souvenir mementos are not just objects, they are personalized forms of storytelling that enable people to make sense of the world and their own journey through life and distant places.
A Memory Voucher is individually priced, based on the total cost of the Traveler’s vacation. Only one Memory Voucher can be purchased per individual vacation. Memory Voucher values range from $5 to $100. You can determine the applicable Memory Voucher cost by subtracting the last two digits of the total trip cost from 100. (For example, a total trip price that ends in ’60’ would have a matching Memory Voucher value of $40. If your trip price is an even $100, you have the option of converting another Vacation Voucher to a Memory Voucher to allow you some extra spending money for the trip.)
Memory Vouchers can only be paid for by application of a Vacation Voucher. On trips, our custom money-tracking software will spend/apply Memory Voucher funds before any other funds (spending money) that you may have brought on your trip. A Memory Voucher must be used in full before the end of the trip as it is non-refundable once the trip begins. It cannot be transferred to another individual, and it expires at the end of the vacation. A Memory Vouchers is a non-countable asset from the perspective of governmental benefit programs.
Payment Errors and Bounced Check
We recognize that many of our Travelers have their funds managed by a payee and/or guardian. Obviously processing errors and human mistakes occasionally occur. In the event this occurs, the individual who has made the error needs to contact Special Journeys, LLC within forty-five (45) days and certify that an error was made.
In this event, the transaction will be cancelled, and the funds will be returned to the same account name of record that the check was issued from. If payment is made via a check that cannot be cleared (bounces), the entire transaction shall be declared null and void. In the event of a bounced check, the party sending the check will be responsible for any bank fees or costs incurred by Special Journeys, LLC.
Interest-Free Payment Plans
We recognize that many of our Travelers may not be able to manage the cost of a vacation before the start date of the trip they wish to attend. Subject to approval by Special Journeys, you can attend a trip and pay off the remaining balance of your vacation upon return. In order to qualify for a payment plan, a Traveler must complete 2 steps:
1. First, they must have their signed and returned Payment Plan Agreement approved by Special Journeys before the final payment date Payment Plan Agreements can be obtained by contacting our office or replying to one of our pre-trip emails.
2. Second, the Traveler must have paid at least the minimum amount required before the final payment date. Travelers who utilize a third-party professional payee service – or have an agency act as payee – must have at least 60% of the total trip cost paid before departure. Travelers who do not utilize a professional or agency payee service must have at least 70% of the total trip cost paid before departure.
As long as payment is received in full within 1 year after the trip’s departure date, there will be no interest due. If the full payment has not been received 1 year after the trip’s departure date then interest will be retroactively applied from the date of the trip’s departure at the rate of 14% compounded monthly.
Further, any traveler with delinquent payments agrees to pay for all cost of collection including court filing and reasonable attorney fees. Special Journeys, LLC reserves the right to, at its sole discretion, refuse extension of this or any payment plan to Travelers who have previously failed to pay in full for a previous vacation within 1 year of their return, as well as the right to require full pre-payment in advance for Travelers who have cancelled multiple vacations, or are otherwise deemed to be a credit risk.