Help Needed - £400 of unpaid direct debits, my fault or the Gyms?

nisbf1

Hi,

Looking for a bit of advice here and didnt know where else i could find any!!

About a year ago me and my girlfriend joined a gym just along the road, i gave my bank details to set up a direct debit for the membership, after about 2 months the manager came up to me and asked me to give my bank account details again because the details hadnt been taken down correctly.

I gave the man my details again, but still no payments came off my account. I then stopped going to this gym and started using another, thinking that it would be the end of it, I wasent using their facilities and they werent charging me for using them. This was about 8 months ago

Until when i came home yesterday(i work away from home for a few weeks at a time), when i opened the door to find a letter from ARC Credit management saying i owed them £368!! And will issue court proceedings if i dont pay within the next 10 days, which would mean paying it all today (17th of June)

Where do i stand on this? And why has it taken so long for them to get in touch regarding the money if they wanted it?

What should i do? as i dont want any court proceedings against me as i am starting to look at buying my own house and dont want to affect my credit rating, any help would be greatly appreciated

Thanks

stebiz

nisbf1 wrote: »

Hi,

Looking for a bit of advice here and didnt know where else i could find any!!

About a year ago me and my girlfriend joined a gym just along the road, i gave my bank details to set up a direct debit for the membership, after about 2 months the manager came up to me and asked me to give my bank account details again because the details hadnt been taken down correctly.

I gave the man my details again, but still no payments came off my account. I then stopped going to this gym and started using another, thinking that it would be the end of it, I wasent using their facilities and they werent charging me for using them. This was about 8 months ago

Until when i came home yesterday(i work away from home for a few weeks at a time), when i opened the door to find a letter from ARC Credit management saying i owed them £368!! And will issue court proceedings if i dont pay within the next 10 days, which would mean paying it all today (17th of June)

Where do i stand on this? And why has it taken so long for them to get in touch regarding the money if they wanted it?

What should i do? as i dont want any court proceedings against me as i am starting to look at buying my own house and dont want to affect my credit rating, any help would be greatly appreciated

Thanks

I'll say it as it is, rather than what you want to hear.

When you joined, did you sign a contract with them? Did it say you needed to give written notice? Did you give written notice?

If you did sign a contract and did not given written notice, to bring this contract to an end, they are quite within their rights to ask for the money.

Check it out. Ask for a copy of any agreement!

pinkshoes

Even though they didn't take the money, you still had a contract with them, and you've already admitted to using their facilities.

When you stopped using it, you should have cancelled the contract in writing, as per the contract instructions. Normally it's a minimum of 12 months...

I'm quite sure you're responsible for paying this bill, but you shouldn't have to pay any extra costs if they've added something to it; you should just pay for the minimum contract term.

Can you prove that you gave your bank details to them twice?

Mankysteve

There is no defensive of ignorance.

m0jo

Mankysteve wrote: »

There is no defensive of ignorance.

To be fair, lots of people have been stung by gyms and rolling contracts etc.

To the OP there's loads of advice on the forums regarding gym membership. however if you've used the gym and not been paying surely you expected this day to come sooner ot later

Sandoval

You signed up agreeing to pay a certain amount of money per month of gym usage. You used the gym for x amount of months, now you're trying to weasel out of paying because they made a mistake.

Cough up the dough and stop being silly now will you.

dmg24

m0jo wrote: »

To be fair, lots of people have been stung by gyms and rolling contracts etc.

And this is not one of them!

BargainGalore

Sorry but you used there services they made the mistake of not getting the money but you legally still owe it so why not do the decent thing and pay up