ORLANDO -- Former Melbourne, Fla., travel agent Richard Henri
Vissers will go on trial here early next year on fraud charges.
Vissers, of Cocoa, Fla., is charged with defrauding four travel
agencies out of more than $400,000 in an airline-ticketing scam
between 1995 and 1998. Circuit Court Judge Bob Wattles set Jan. 12
as the date for the trial.
Vissers, 59, was charged in August with an organized scheme to
defraud, a first-degree felony that carries a maximum 30-year
prison sentence. He currently is free on $100,000 bond.
Vissers was the operator of Computer Travel Systems in
Melbourne. He previously had operated Beach Side Travel, also of
Melbourne.
The agencies Vissers allegedly scammed as operator of Computer
Travel Systems included Gateway Travel, Pleasanton, Calif.; Osceola
Travel, Kissimmee, Fla.; St. Cloud (Fla.) Travel; DA Travel &
Tours, Orlando; Global Travel Tours, Melbourne, and HMI Travel,
Herndon, Va.
Vissers reportedly purchased cut-rate airline tickets from the
agencies using bogus wholesale ticketing authorization codes. He is
accused of reselling them at significantly higher prices to his
firm's corporate clients and pocketing the difference.
When airline auditors reviewed the ticket codes on the flight
coupons, they were reported as "undercollected."
The airlines issued debit memos for thousands of dollars to the
agencies, demanding the price difference. Vissers had claimed a
business relationship with a host of airlines.
After receiving the debit memos, the agents learned there was no
relationship between Vissers and the airlines.