8 ms·

These things are insane. I tried to cancel a month-to-month gym membership from a small local gym, and they told me "cancellations become effective on the 1st o

by _yb2s 4y ago

These things are insane. I tried to cancel a month-to-month gym membership from a small local gym, and they told me "cancellations become effective on the 1st of the following month" and "require two months advance notice" thereby effectively charging me for three additional months after I gave notice. Apparently, this was all in the agreement I signed, although it was written so unclear, that nobody would even suspect this is how they interpret it. I told them if you don't cancel it effective right now I am posting this dishonest predatory practice on every social media and review site in town, as well as telling all of my friends I met in here what you are doing, and asking them to please quit in protest. I'll also be doing a credit card chargeback, and a small claims court case to recover the time it takes me to deal with all of this. I will also take action to recover my back membership fees, because they repeatedly failed to maintain equipment in a usable condition, so I didn't get what I paid for. They did concede, and canceled it immediately.

bgun 4y ago
Even though they conceded, you should still follow through on all of the above. You aren't hurting a person, it's a corporation that will only change when forced financially or socially to do so.
- SanderNL 4y ago
  A small local gym is not “a corporation”.
  - chitowneats 4y ago
    The "small local gym" sure was pulling some corporate B.S. on their supposed "neighbor".
  - crazygringo 4y ago
    Legally it usually is, isn't it? It would be unusual for it to be a sole proprietorship. In any case, predatory/scammy practices are bad no matter what the ownership structure is. Being small and local doesn't excuse you from abusive behavior.
  - chrisfosterelli 4y ago
    Technically, many small companies are corporations.
  - PM_me_your_math 4y ago
    Yes, all business entities, with the loose exception of a sole-proprietorship, is a corporation under the law. There are four general types of corporations in the United States: a sole proprietorship, a Limited Liability Company (LLC), an S-Corporation (S-Corp), and a C-Corporation (C-Corp). People who whine about corporations fail to realize that 99% of the businesses they deal with everyday are incorporated entities under the law. Your pizza shop, tanning salon, dentist, ice cream shop, sandwich truck... A business entity can be a good or bad actor. Their legal status as a corporation does not mean they are automatically bad, regardless of the size or public/private status. Their actions and policies define them as either good or bad. Words have meaning and they should be used appropriately.
    - mindslight 4y ago
      My own amateur understanding is that LLCs are distinct from corporations, and that S-corps and C-corps are tax statuses rather than types of legal entities. Corporations generally have more diffuse ownership than LLCs, which is why people ascribe bad things to that specific type of entity. If there is a gym doing these tactics, and it's an LLC with a handful of owners ("members"), those owners are just asshole humans that could theoretically be punched in the face. Whereas if it's a corporation with diffuse ownership, then the policies become "just business" and "nobody's fault". Although corporations certainly can be "closely held" by a few people or a family, just as you can sell shares in an LLC to investors at arms length or have all/part of the LLC owned by a corporation or business trust. And frankly I'm surprised by the number of small businesses I see set up as a sole proprietorship or partnership and doing-business-as rather than spending the money on LLC registration fees. Although as a business gets smaller the protection created by the LLC structure also shrinks, so it's somewhat understandable.
  - plagiarist 4y ago
    Even if it is an individual, the predatory behavior deserves to be financially ruinous. If they cannot run their business without scamming people they should never have had a business.
  - mattgreenrocks 4y ago
    Except legal entities are literally manifest in order to absorb the fallout from situations like these. So don't be shy about using existing processes and tools to issue corrective action.
  - pc86 4y ago
    As someone who used to own a couple small local gyms, they absolutely are.
  - kjs3 4y ago
    If they've incorporated, they're a corporation. Being a small dick isn't per se different than being a big dick.
- _yb2s 4y ago
  Honestly, I was mostly bluffing... I didn't have time to do all of that, which is why I also had to quit the gym. I was planning to temporarily quit/suspend and then rejoin when I was able to, but they lost out on that possibility. I think these kind of predatory cancellation things must be in part a generational thing, and these policies are so old they haven't responded to the times. Older people I know seem to expect it or be okay with it, but millenials and younger will tend to be outraged and refuse to do business with them on principle. America Online, Sirius XM, etc. were able to retain some customers by making it hard to quit, but I think turned away far more without realizing it.
  - jiayo 4y ago
    Great example. I like broadcast radio. I don't like picking and choosing podcasts, I like to just listen to "what's on". I really like some of the live music content on SiriusXM (celebrity DJs, etc). I'm their ideal customer. And they'd have captured $300-400 of my value over the past 1.5 years, if they only had self-serve subscription and cancellation like Netflix or Disney+. But since they have decided to go the NYTimes route of "everyone pays a different price, and cancelling is next to impossible", they get nothing from me.
    - terinjokes 4y ago
      I cancelled my SiriusXM subscription a fee months ago and it was a painless experience. They even refunded the amount charged a few days prior to my call, without me even asking. Cancelling my at&t account, on the other hand, took several calls to them and my bank, and in the end, I just had my bank stop payment.
dreen 4y ago
Sometimes people you talk to have powers to change the outcome in your favour, sometimes all you need to do is ask. I had an experience like that last year. I was cancelling my broadband in UK with Virgin, and got a £280 disconnection fee. The person who informed me said I will have to pay it in my final bill. Then over a month later I got a call from someone who's task was to see if I need a new connection where I was going. I said no, I was leaving the country. He asked if there was anything else he could do for me. I said, "you could cancel that huge penalty fee I got.." And he was just like "Sure, no problem, done."
- manuelabeledo 4y ago
  A "disconnection fee"? This has to be the most absurd charge I have ever heard of. What does "disconnecting" a customer involve, anyway? I recall having to return equipment or face a penalty to cover costs (high, but still somewhat understandable), but I have never had to pay to get off a broadband contract.
  - ipqk 4y ago
    Often if you sign a yearly contract that includes a discounted monthly rate, if you cancel it before the end of the year, you have to pay the remainder of the contract remaining.
  - dcomp 4y ago
    Most likely an early disconnection fee during the minimum term. Nearly everyone has a minimum term with virgin media as they only apply promotional discounts if you have a 12,18 or 24 month minimum term and the price shoots up as soon as you roll over onto the monthly. [1] https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms-conditions/early-disconnection-fees https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms...
    - dreen 4y ago
      Yep, something like that. I would have had to know if and when Im moving a year in advance, which is ridiculous. I mean it's not like I read the fine print on that, so all the better that they had no problem cancelling the fee.
bob1029 4y ago
This is why I always prepay for my gym membership up-front and do not enter into any agreement. There are a few places that do this. Last one I went to, I prepaid for 90 days. I confirmed they weren't even storing my payment information because I had to provide it again to renew the next quarter. The best part of this is that when you decide you are done, you simply do nothing and its all over. Sure, you will get some marketing text spam for a few weeks but that's about it.
- booi 4y ago
  There's also the added benefit of being able to take advantage of "new memeber" offers
cloverTiger88 4y ago
honestly there will be a delay from the government taking action on smaller local gyms too so I feel like there should be a way to submit the businesses for inspection at least to threaten them to improve their policies
tshaddox 4y ago
I’m guessing you probably won’t win a chargeback unless you can show that you sent them a letter telling them to cancel (and because of this, they actually will cancel if you send them a letter). I think another aspect of this problem is that credit cards don’t just let you mark a transaction as “don’t allow any more of these.” Of course that probably wouldn’t solve the problem. The gyms would probably just continue charging you and eventually send you to debt collection.
- maxsilver 4y ago
  > credit cards don’t just let you mark a transaction as “don’t allow any more of these.” Ironically, they do almost all support this, you can mark any merchant as non-future-billable and prevent all future charges from a given merchant. Unfortunately, you have to call in and ask a phone rep to do it for you, most cards don't let you set this yourself.
- seer 4y ago
  Modern banks like Revolut have this as literary part of their UI. They use some simple ML to figure out which are you recurring payments, place them in a separate folder for you to keep tabs on and allow you to unilaterally stop any “future payments like that”. I mean on top of tech like virtual cards and chargebacks with a few clicks. It seems so simple to implement I have no idea how its not a standard feature for banks these days.
Danjoe4 4y ago
Revoking ACH authorization is an effective tactic. The CFPB dictates that if you give 3 days notice, companies are obligated to honor this. If they charge you afterwards, your bank will be more than happy to reverse the charge. To be clear, this doesn't void the contract you have with them, you're simply revoking their privilege to charge your payment method. If they want your money they'd have to take you to small claims. Here is a sample email which I've used many times to great effect: May this email serve as your notice to revoke the ACH/Bank Access/Debit Card authorizations of both the below primary bank account and debit card, from [company] effective today, [date] [Bank Name] Checking Account x** Savings Account x** and Debit Card x** Additionally, I am revoking withdrawal authorizations from any other accounts associated with my personal information, listed below name: DOB: phone #: email: I am also revoking your further access to my banking accounts and have already removed your authorization with the Bank directly. THIS REVOCATION APPLIES FOR THE NEXT PAYMENT DUE DATE AND ALL FUTURE DUE DATES. Kindly, I ask that your response to this email shall be confirmation of receipt and you agree it is at least 3 business days prior to any scheduled repayments or membership fee deduction. Note that in accordance with 12 CFR Part 1005.10(c) (Regulation E) you MUST HALT PAYMENT. FAIL TO COMPLY and I will submit a report to the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. Additionally, you will be responsible for any fees, including overdraft fees, incurred as a result of your failure to halt payment
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- preommr 4y ago
  And people actually reply to that? What do you do if they tell you no one got this email?
  - pc86 4y ago
    You mean what do you do if someone knowingly lies in order to continue fraudulently charging you for something? Sounds like a crime to me. But more realistically, at that point you've already filed a claim with the CFPB so who cares what they say? It will get settled one way or the other.
phil21 4y ago
> I'll also be doing a credit card chargeback Maybe you would since it's a local gym, but if it's a national chain credit card companies won't even let you initiate the chargeback whatsoever. I had to go so far as to completely cancel my Amex account to get Lifestyle Fitness to stop billing me. American Express utterly refused to either chargeback, or deny future billings. To the point a new card number issued didn't even fix it. I was quite happy to sign a waiver that I'd take all liability. This was after moving states, calling to cancel, and them saying I needed to fly in to cancel in person. Outright scam that the banks help enable.
- dangwhy 4y ago
  > Outright scam that the banks help enable. I think first logical step is to legislate banks from enabling this. That should cover most of the problem without a wide ranging laws.
- denimnerd42 4y ago
  my amex processed my chargeback for gold's gym just fine. They said it was a no obligation free trial I could cancel at any time and then when I called to cancel before the first bill they said no, you have to come once a week for that to be true..?
  - bombcar 4y ago
    A chargeback is distinct from a "never let this company charge me again" - the latter some places can't do.
- markus_zhang 4y ago
  We should have a github repo for these scamming activities.
- tibbon 4y ago
  I wonder why Amex plays ball with them? They are normally really firm about their chargebacks
  - 4y ago
markus_zhang 4y ago
I'm thinking as an added protection measure we should always use a secondary phone line plus a secondary email and fake address for these types of subscriptions. You don't know what they are going to do.
- bombcar 4y ago
  When you have to utilize dark web techniques to get a gym membership, maybe it's time to do something else.
Waterluvian 4y ago
They prey on people who don't want to rock the boat, don't know that they can try to rock the boat, or are just too busy for this absolute nonsense. The leadership of any company that does anything like this should be very consciously aware that they're mediocre leftovers of the professional world. Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory. It is a screaming confession of incompetence.
- mattgreenrocks 4y ago
  > Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory. It is a screaming confession of incompetence. There's a certain toxic element of business culture that preaches dominance as a virtuous thing, ether overtly, or through dubious terminology/beliefs in ideas like "alpha males." It argues that if you aren't dominating someone, then they necessarily must be dominating you in this interaction. It is an extremely reductionistic view that has trickled down into certain parts of Weird Internet, too.
- ClumsyPilot 4y ago
  > Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory I dont think it works as your described. Amazon is plenty predatory. What happens is a company tries to see what it can get away with. If they don't get in legal trouble, and customers don't abandon them in droves, then other companies start doing the same. It becomes industry standard.
  - Waterluvian 4y ago
    You might be right. Though I think this is a cousin of "I'm just following orders." Too many people don't speak up. Is there nobody who feels embarrassed that this is what they're a part of? "Hey dad, what did you do at work today?" "I worked with some lawyers to make an indecipherable contract so that we can extract extra money for a service someone doesn't want." I guess the answer is some mix of "make the org structure so complex that everyone can feel innocent because no one person is pulling the trigger" (I don't buy it, that just means incompetent managers) plus a heaping scoop of cognitive dissonance.
JohnTHaller 4y ago
Careful, many gyms will send you to collections for failing to pay to the terms of the contract.
- bluGill 4y ago
  Depending on the law though, you may be able to ignore collections, and you can dispute it if they put anything on your credit report. Just because something is in a contract that doesn't mean it is legal an enforceable. See a lawyer for details as this is different in every state and country.
- bob1029 4y ago
  Collections is mostly meaningless if you are otherwise financially responsible. The entire system is quite abusive. You may try experimenting with "I don't give a shit", assuming your other ducks are in order. I have found it to be therapeutic.
- kjs3 4y ago
  You can contest being sent to collection tho (in the US: Fair Debt Collection Practices Act). It takes time and research to understand what you have to do, but being sent to collections isn't always a credit death sentence.
temporallobe 4y ago
I had a similar situation. During covid, a gym I was attending shut down some of their locations because of covid, forcing all those members to crowd into fewer locations. Those gyms became unusable to me because of equipment hogging and overcrowding (I typically counted on one hour to complete a full workout and was extremely pressed for time, now it would take me at least twice that). I tried to cancel, citing my reasons, but I got a similar runaround to you. I also had to submit my cancellation in writing and mail it into their corporate office. I refused to do any of this, so I called my credit card company and complained that they were fraudulently charging me and requested that they block further charges. Sure enough, a few months later I got letters and emails threatening to cancel my membership because there was an issue with my payment method. Since the membership was month-to-month, they couldn’t hold me responsible for anything beyond the month for which I had already paid. I joined a small private gym that works on a monthly prepaid membership. Just pay for the month in advance, and you have access. Don’t pay? No access, no pressure, no worries. Leave for months at a time and come come back with no hassle.
A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago
I personally had to get cc dispute started, because, $my_local_gym_that_is_not_a_chain also uses the same scummy tactics including, but limited to starting to add more charges. They also said, I need to fax my hand written cancellation to their HQ. I did, but as you can guess there is a reason I opened a dispute with CC.
kemitche 4y ago
I had a gym membership that I wanted to cancel because I had moved, and their closest location was no longer convenient. First, they tried to tell me I had to go back to the location I had originally signed up at in order to cancel. No phone cancellation options or anything. I guess if I had moved more than a few miles away, I'd be out of luck. After some fighting, the closer location let me fill out a paper cancellation form. The cancellation form had a very clear section that showed "paid in full" and "$0 remaining due." Despite this, I got a bill a month later for my "final month." I refused to pay it, obviously. They harassed me, calling me daily. Only once I posted a poor review online did someone finally decide the $50 (or whatever it was) wasn't worth it. They gym itself was a fine gym, but these billing practices are scummy scummy scummy. I refuse to sign up for any other gym (except maybe a local rec center) until there's more legislation to protect my consumer rights. The cancellation nonsense isn't worth my time.
louison11 4y ago
The opposite happened to my partner here in Portugal. She signed up to a gym ($100/month), and they literally forgot to start charging the account until 5 months later. Everything tends to be so inefficient here. I guess at least in this case the inefficiency worked in our favor. Now let's hope they won't take 5 months to stop charging when we cancel ;-)
grammers 4y ago
My daughter had dancing lessons in the past (never again!), we quit because she did not want to go anymore. They told us we can only quit by the end of the quarter with a month's notice - it was beginning of March, so too late to quit for end of June. Then Covid hit, classes got cancelled; we still had to pay until end of September. This fine print is totally insane.
- josephcsible 4y ago
  > classes got cancelled; we still had to pay until end of September. This fine print is totally insane. Isn't charging people for things you don't give them supposed to be one of those things that are illegal no matter what any contracts say?
knodi123 4y ago
such a depressingly common trope. them: "Sorry, there's nothing I can do, I simply can't help you!" customer: "I'll be really annoying." them: "I figured out how to help you!"
- themitigating 4y ago
  This is exactly how most people operate. Reactive instead of proactive.
OJFord 4y ago
Just cancel the payment, I wouldn't even bother to talk to them if it's clear it'll be difficult. They'll send you a letter or something saying if you don't update the payment method your access will be cancelled. Ok?
EastSmith 4y ago
I think you should do what you told them you would do anyway - posting on each and every social network.
treeman79 4y ago
Similar. I got badly injured. Gym said I could only cancel in person. Was not possible. Played me off between gym and corporate for several days. Went ballistic on all social media, review sites etc. wrote some emails shaming them. Charged back from bank. They finally agreed to cancel remotely.

by _yb2s 4y ago

bgun 4y ago

Even though they conceded, you should still follow through on all of the above. You aren't hurting a person, it's a corporation that will only change when forced financially or socially to do so.

SanderNL 4y ago
A small local gym is not “a corporation”.
- chitowneats 4y ago
  The "small local gym" sure was pulling some corporate B.S. on their supposed "neighbor".
- crazygringo 4y ago
  Legally it usually is, isn't it? It would be unusual for it to be a sole proprietorship. In any case, predatory/scammy practices are bad no matter what the ownership structure is. Being small and local doesn't excuse you from abusive behavior.
- chrisfosterelli 4y ago
  Technically, many small companies are corporations.
- PM_me_your_math 4y ago
  Yes, all business entities, with the loose exception of a sole-proprietorship, is a corporation under the law. There are four general types of corporations in the United States: a sole proprietorship, a Limited Liability Company (LLC), an S-Corporation (S-Corp), and a C-Corporation (C-Corp). People who whine about corporations fail to realize that 99% of the businesses they deal with everyday are incorporated entities under the law. Your pizza shop, tanning salon, dentist, ice cream shop, sandwich truck... A business entity can be a good or bad actor. Their legal status as a corporation does not mean they are automatically bad, regardless of the size or public/private status. Their actions and policies define them as either good or bad. Words have meaning and they should be used appropriately.
  - mindslight 4y ago
    My own amateur understanding is that LLCs are distinct from corporations, and that S-corps and C-corps are tax statuses rather than types of legal entities. Corporations generally have more diffuse ownership than LLCs, which is why people ascribe bad things to that specific type of entity. If there is a gym doing these tactics, and it's an LLC with a handful of owners ("members"), those owners are just asshole humans that could theoretically be punched in the face. Whereas if it's a corporation with diffuse ownership, then the policies become "just business" and "nobody's fault". Although corporations certainly can be "closely held" by a few people or a family, just as you can sell shares in an LLC to investors at arms length or have all/part of the LLC owned by a corporation or business trust. And frankly I'm surprised by the number of small businesses I see set up as a sole proprietorship or partnership and doing-business-as rather than spending the money on LLC registration fees. Although as a business gets smaller the protection created by the LLC structure also shrinks, so it's somewhat understandable.
- plagiarist 4y ago
  Even if it is an individual, the predatory behavior deserves to be financially ruinous. If they cannot run their business without scamming people they should never have had a business.
- mattgreenrocks 4y ago
  Except legal entities are literally manifest in order to absorb the fallout from situations like these. So don't be shy about using existing processes and tools to issue corrective action.
- pc86 4y ago
  As someone who used to own a couple small local gyms, they absolutely are.
- kjs3 4y ago
  If they've incorporated, they're a corporation. Being a small dick isn't per se different than being a big dick.
_yb2s 4y ago
Honestly, I was mostly bluffing... I didn't have time to do all of that, which is why I also had to quit the gym. I was planning to temporarily quit/suspend and then rejoin when I was able to, but they lost out on that possibility. I think these kind of predatory cancellation things must be in part a generational thing, and these policies are so old they haven't responded to the times. Older people I know seem to expect it or be okay with it, but millenials and younger will tend to be outraged and refuse to do business with them on principle. America Online, Sirius XM, etc. were able to retain some customers by making it hard to quit, but I think turned away far more without realizing it.
- jiayo 4y ago
  Great example. I like broadcast radio. I don't like picking and choosing podcasts, I like to just listen to "what's on". I really like some of the live music content on SiriusXM (celebrity DJs, etc). I'm their ideal customer. And they'd have captured $300-400 of my value over the past 1.5 years, if they only had self-serve subscription and cancellation like Netflix or Disney+. But since they have decided to go the NYTimes route of "everyone pays a different price, and cancelling is next to impossible", they get nothing from me.
  - terinjokes 4y ago
    I cancelled my SiriusXM subscription a fee months ago and it was a painless experience. They even refunded the amount charged a few days prior to my call, without me even asking. Cancelling my at&t account, on the other hand, took several calls to them and my bank, and in the end, I just had my bank stop payment.

dreen 4y ago

Sometimes people you talk to have powers to change the outcome in your favour, sometimes all you need to do is ask. I had an experience like that last year. I was cancelling my broadband in UK with Virgin, and got a £280 disconnection fee. The person who informed me said I will have to pay it in my final bill. Then over a month later I got a call from someone who's task was to see if I need a new connection where I was going. I said no, I was leaving the country. He asked if there was anything else he could do for me. I said, "you could cancel that huge penalty fee I got.." And he was just like "Sure, no problem, done."

manuelabeledo 4y ago
A "disconnection fee"? This has to be the most absurd charge I have ever heard of. What does "disconnecting" a customer involve, anyway? I recall having to return equipment or face a penalty to cover costs (high, but still somewhat understandable), but I have never had to pay to get off a broadband contract.
- ipqk 4y ago
  Often if you sign a yearly contract that includes a discounted monthly rate, if you cancel it before the end of the year, you have to pay the remainder of the contract remaining.
- dcomp 4y ago
  Most likely an early disconnection fee during the minimum term. Nearly everyone has a minimum term with virgin media as they only apply promotional discounts if you have a 12,18 or 24 month minimum term and the price shoots up as soon as you roll over onto the monthly. [1] https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms-conditions/early-disconnection-fees https://www.virginmedia.com/legal/fibre-optic-services-terms...
  - dreen 4y ago
    Yep, something like that. I would have had to know if and when Im moving a year in advance, which is ridiculous. I mean it's not like I read the fine print on that, so all the better that they had no problem cancelling the fee.

bob1029 4y ago

This is why I always prepay for my gym membership up-front and do not enter into any agreement. There are a few places that do this. Last one I went to, I prepaid for 90 days. I confirmed they weren't even storing my payment information because I had to provide it again to renew the next quarter. The best part of this is that when you decide you are done, you simply do nothing and its all over. Sure, you will get some marketing text spam for a few weeks but that's about it.

booi 4y ago
There's also the added benefit of being able to take advantage of "new memeber" offers

cloverTiger88 4y ago

honestly there will be a delay from the government taking action on smaller local gyms too so I feel like there should be a way to submit the businesses for inspection at least to threaten them to improve their policies

tshaddox 4y ago

I’m guessing you probably won’t win a chargeback unless you can show that you sent them a letter telling them to cancel (and because of this, they actually will cancel if you send them a letter). I think another aspect of this problem is that credit cards don’t just let you mark a transaction as “don’t allow any more of these.” Of course that probably wouldn’t solve the problem. The gyms would probably just continue charging you and eventually send you to debt collection.

maxsilver 4y ago
> credit cards don’t just let you mark a transaction as “don’t allow any more of these.” Ironically, they do almost all support this, you can mark any merchant as non-future-billable and prevent all future charges from a given merchant. Unfortunately, you have to call in and ask a phone rep to do it for you, most cards don't let you set this yourself.
seer 4y ago
Modern banks like Revolut have this as literary part of their UI. They use some simple ML to figure out which are you recurring payments, place them in a separate folder for you to keep tabs on and allow you to unilaterally stop any “future payments like that”. I mean on top of tech like virtual cards and chargebacks with a few clicks. It seems so simple to implement I have no idea how its not a standard feature for banks these days.

Danjoe4 4y ago

Revoking ACH authorization is an effective tactic. The CFPB dictates that if you give 3 days notice, companies are obligated to honor this. If they charge you afterwards, your bank will be more than happy to reverse the charge. To be clear, this doesn't void the contract you have with them, you're simply revoking their privilege to charge your payment method. If they want your money they'd have to take you to small claims. Here is a sample email which I've used many times to great effect: May this email serve as your notice to revoke the ACH/Bank Access/Debit Card authorizations of both the below primary bank account and debit card, from [company] effective today, [date] [Bank Name] Checking Account x** Savings Account x** and Debit Card x** Additionally, I am revoking withdrawal authorizations from any other accounts associated with my personal information, listed below name: DOB: phone #: email: I am also revoking your further access to my banking accounts and have already removed your authorization with the Bank directly. THIS REVOCATION APPLIES FOR THE NEXT PAYMENT DUE DATE AND ALL FUTURE DUE DATES. Kindly, I ask that your response to this email shall be confirmation of receipt and you agree it is at least 3 business days prior to any scheduled repayments or membership fee deduction. Note that in accordance with 12 CFR Part 1005.10(c) (Regulation E) you MUST HALT PAYMENT. FAIL TO COMPLY and I will submit a report to the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection. Additionally, you will be responsible for any fees, including overdraft fees, incurred as a result of your failure to halt payment

deleted 4y ago
[deleted]
preommr 4y ago
And people actually reply to that? What do you do if they tell you no one got this email?
- pc86 4y ago
  You mean what do you do if someone knowingly lies in order to continue fraudulently charging you for something? Sounds like a crime to me. But more realistically, at that point you've already filed a claim with the CFPB so who cares what they say? It will get settled one way or the other.

phil21 4y ago

> I'll also be doing a credit card chargeback Maybe you would since it's a local gym, but if it's a national chain credit card companies won't even let you initiate the chargeback whatsoever. I had to go so far as to completely cancel my Amex account to get Lifestyle Fitness to stop billing me. American Express utterly refused to either chargeback, or deny future billings. To the point a new card number issued didn't even fix it. I was quite happy to sign a waiver that I'd take all liability. This was after moving states, calling to cancel, and them saying I needed to fly in to cancel in person. Outright scam that the banks help enable.

dangwhy 4y ago
> Outright scam that the banks help enable. I think first logical step is to legislate banks from enabling this. That should cover most of the problem without a wide ranging laws.
denimnerd42 4y ago
my amex processed my chargeback for gold's gym just fine. They said it was a no obligation free trial I could cancel at any time and then when I called to cancel before the first bill they said no, you have to come once a week for that to be true..?
- bombcar 4y ago
  A chargeback is distinct from a "never let this company charge me again" - the latter some places can't do.
markus_zhang 4y ago
We should have a github repo for these scamming activities.
tibbon 4y ago
I wonder why Amex plays ball with them? They are normally really firm about their chargebacks
- 4y ago

markus_zhang 4y ago

I'm thinking as an added protection measure we should always use a secondary phone line plus a secondary email and fake address for these types of subscriptions. You don't know what they are going to do.

bombcar 4y ago
When you have to utilize dark web techniques to get a gym membership, maybe it's time to do something else.

Waterluvian 4y ago

They prey on people who don't want to rock the boat, don't know that they can try to rock the boat, or are just too busy for this absolute nonsense. The leadership of any company that does anything like this should be very consciously aware that they're mediocre leftovers of the professional world. Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory. It is a screaming confession of incompetence.

mattgreenrocks 4y ago
> Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory. It is a screaming confession of incompetence. There's a certain toxic element of business culture that preaches dominance as a virtuous thing, ether overtly, or through dubious terminology/beliefs in ideas like "alpha males." It argues that if you aren't dominating someone, then they necessarily must be dominating you in this interaction. It is an extremely reductionistic view that has trickled down into certain parts of Weird Internet, too.
ClumsyPilot 4y ago
> Real leaders of real companies don't have to be predatory I dont think it works as your described. Amazon is plenty predatory. What happens is a company tries to see what it can get away with. If they don't get in legal trouble, and customers don't abandon them in droves, then other companies start doing the same. It becomes industry standard.
- Waterluvian 4y ago
  You might be right. Though I think this is a cousin of "I'm just following orders." Too many people don't speak up. Is there nobody who feels embarrassed that this is what they're a part of? "Hey dad, what did you do at work today?" "I worked with some lawyers to make an indecipherable contract so that we can extract extra money for a service someone doesn't want." I guess the answer is some mix of "make the org structure so complex that everyone can feel innocent because no one person is pulling the trigger" (I don't buy it, that just means incompetent managers) plus a heaping scoop of cognitive dissonance.

JohnTHaller 4y ago

Careful, many gyms will send you to collections for failing to pay to the terms of the contract.

bluGill 4y ago
Depending on the law though, you may be able to ignore collections, and you can dispute it if they put anything on your credit report. Just because something is in a contract that doesn't mean it is legal an enforceable. See a lawyer for details as this is different in every state and country.
bob1029 4y ago
Collections is mostly meaningless if you are otherwise financially responsible. The entire system is quite abusive. You may try experimenting with "I don't give a shit", assuming your other ducks are in order. I have found it to be therapeutic.
kjs3 4y ago
You can contest being sent to collection tho (in the US: Fair Debt Collection Practices Act). It takes time and research to understand what you have to do, but being sent to collections isn't always a credit death sentence.

temporallobe 4y ago

I had a similar situation. During covid, a gym I was attending shut down some of their locations because of covid, forcing all those members to crowd into fewer locations. Those gyms became unusable to me because of equipment hogging and overcrowding (I typically counted on one hour to complete a full workout and was extremely pressed for time, now it would take me at least twice that). I tried to cancel, citing my reasons, but I got a similar runaround to you. I also had to submit my cancellation in writing and mail it into their corporate office. I refused to do any of this, so I called my credit card company and complained that they were fraudulently charging me and requested that they block further charges. Sure enough, a few months later I got letters and emails threatening to cancel my membership because there was an issue with my payment method. Since the membership was month-to-month, they couldn’t hold me responsible for anything beyond the month for which I had already paid. I joined a small private gym that works on a monthly prepaid membership. Just pay for the month in advance, and you have access. Don’t pay? No access, no pressure, no worries. Leave for months at a time and come come back with no hassle.

A4ET8a8uTh0 4y ago

I personally had to get cc dispute started, because, $my_local_gym_that_is_not_a_chain also uses the same scummy tactics including, but limited to starting to add more charges. They also said, I need to fax my hand written cancellation to their HQ. I did, but as you can guess there is a reason I opened a dispute with CC.

kemitche 4y ago

I had a gym membership that I wanted to cancel because I had moved, and their closest location was no longer convenient. First, they tried to tell me I had to go back to the location I had originally signed up at in order to cancel. No phone cancellation options or anything. I guess if I had moved more than a few miles away, I'd be out of luck. After some fighting, the closer location let me fill out a paper cancellation form. The cancellation form had a very clear section that showed "paid in full" and "$0 remaining due." Despite this, I got a bill a month later for my "final month." I refused to pay it, obviously. They harassed me, calling me daily. Only once I posted a poor review online did someone finally decide the $50 (or whatever it was) wasn't worth it. They gym itself was a fine gym, but these billing practices are scummy scummy scummy. I refuse to sign up for any other gym (except maybe a local rec center) until there's more legislation to protect my consumer rights. The cancellation nonsense isn't worth my time.

louison11 4y ago

The opposite happened to my partner here in Portugal. She signed up to a gym ($100/month), and they literally forgot to start charging the account until 5 months later. Everything tends to be so inefficient here. I guess at least in this case the inefficiency worked in our favor. Now let's hope they won't take 5 months to stop charging when we cancel ;-)

grammers 4y ago

My daughter had dancing lessons in the past (never again!), we quit because she did not want to go anymore. They told us we can only quit by the end of the quarter with a month's notice - it was beginning of March, so too late to quit for end of June. Then Covid hit, classes got cancelled; we still had to pay until end of September. This fine print is totally insane.

josephcsible 4y ago
> classes got cancelled; we still had to pay until end of September. This fine print is totally insane. Isn't charging people for things you don't give them supposed to be one of those things that are illegal no matter what any contracts say?

knodi123 4y ago

such a depressingly common trope. them: "Sorry, there's nothing I can do, I simply can't help you!" customer: "I'll be really annoying." them: "I figured out how to help you!"

themitigating 4y ago
This is exactly how most people operate. Reactive instead of proactive.

OJFord 4y ago

Just cancel the payment, I wouldn't even bother to talk to them if it's clear it'll be difficult. They'll send you a letter or something saying if you don't update the payment method your access will be cancelled. Ok?

EastSmith 4y ago

I think you should do what you told them you would do anyway - posting on each and every social network.

treeman79 4y ago

Similar. I got badly injured. Gym said I could only cancel in person. Was not possible. Played me off between gym and corporate for several days. Went ballistic on all social media, review sites etc. wrote some emails shaming them. Charged back from bank. They finally agreed to cancel remotely.