Cancelling Gym Membership with 14 days

DVardysShadow

4Chickens wrote: »

Thank you all so much for your thoughts and comments. I am sending the letter today with the ammendments suggested by DVardyShadow.

Don't forget to keep a copy - especially if the offer is rejected. Gym companies are known on these forums for being aggressive in debt collection, and the letter would be useful evidence in defence of your son that an attempt had been made to resolve the issue on his behalf.

You have not said, but sometimes gym contracts are back to back with a finance agreement, which gives the gym their money for the year up front. You may find that you are fighting a finance company. This could be double edged in that the lender may be very aggressive in pursuit, but may also be more concerned to avoid adverse consequences from inappropriate lending to a vulnerable person

gordikin

Again playing Devil's Advocate....driving a scooter?

PZH

gordikin wrote: »

Again playing Devil's Advocate....driving a scooter?

You can drive a scooter in many countries where you do not understand the language or rules - doesn't mean you understand contracts in that country or what you are signing up with exactly.

unholyangel wrote:

In some cases it would be similar to a company giving me a contract in Latin. I may understand a word here and there but the general gist - never mind the semantics - would be completely incomprehensible to me.

I think this sums it up very well :T

gordikin

Again devils advocate...scooter driver on the road making life and death choices. Why can't he make the choice join a gym?

PZH

gordikin wrote: »

Again devils advocate...scooter driver on the road making life and death choices. Why can't he make the choice join a gym?

Choosing to join a gym is an easy choice to make.

Understanding the T&C's are a whole lot more complex - even for someone who does not suffer from Dyslexia.

Not having the mental capacity to enter into a contract is very different to deciding whether to turn left or right or stop for a car or pedestrian when on a scooter.

He clearly did not understand he was actually entering into a contract for 12 months and did not understand the box he ticked on the form did not allow him to even attend the gym because he would be at work or college.

4Chickens

As of today I have not had a reply from Bannatynes so I telephoned their head office. They have received my letter and are waiting for it to be allocated to someone to deal with. They say they usually respond with 7-10 days, however they are experiencing a high volume of correspondence at the moment, I bet they are:mad:

I have also discovered that my son upgraded his membership to full about a week after he took it out, which obviously costs him more.
Also, he never set up a direct debit, it was a card payment, I'm not sure what the technical term for it is but I know that we cannot cancel it, only Bannatynes can. In an attempt to thwart this my son has had his card cancelled and a new one issued but the bank says there is only a 20% chance that this will stop the payments being taken (I don't get this but still worth a try).

Now things just got considerably worse, my son is to be laid off from his part-time job at the end of this week and after next week, will have no money at all going into his bank account.
So the million dollar question is what are the likely consequences of this in terms of payments being taken from his bank account? He does not have an overdraft facility, so will the bank bounce the payments and will my son incur bank charges because of this?

All of this has come to a head today and this is the day that I have a 24 hour blood pressure monitor on to prove that I don't have high blood pressure but 'white coat syndrome'.

Any more help and advice from you will be most welcome:beer:

wealdroam

Is there anything in the contract which may allow the contract to be cancelled if your son lost his job?

Unlikely, but worth a bit of reading I'd've thought.

PZH

4Chickens wrote: »

Also, he never set up a direct debit, it was a card payment, I'm not sure what the technical term for it is but I know that we cannot cancel it, only Bannatynes can. In an attempt to thwart this my son has had his card cancelled and a new one issued but the bank says there is only a 20% chance that this will stop the payments being taken (I don't get this but still worth a try).

Cancelling the card will not change the bank account number - only closing the account will do this.

There are numerous companies who make charges like this (AOL for example) and it really confuses people when they don't see a Direct Debit or Standing Order setup. They are notoriously hard to cancel (In my experience).

You will need to check with the bank over any potential charges.

Do as wealdroam states and check the contract for any break clause in the event of job loss.

babyemily

Op What kind of learning disabilities does your son have? Is he diagnosed with a disability such as autism etc....

nellytheelephant

Has he actually been using the gym?