Virgin Active Gym Membership Scam

Jumbelina

.:t:t:t:t:t:t:t:t:t:t:t

Lavendyr

When you developed the financial problems and stopped going, did you give them notice in writing that you wanted to terminate the contract?

RadoJo

What does your contract say? Unless there is a get-out clause about cancelling membership early for any reason, then from what you have posted here, it seems they are quite in the right, and if they accept any offer from you to repay over a period of time will be at their discretion if they are feeling nice. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but you cannot just stop paying for a service if you have signed a contract. It seems that they even stated that you were liable for another year when you initially contacted them about cancelling the DD, so you do owe this money.

The fact that the case has been passed to a debt collection agency means that you need to take action very soon before this becomes an even bigger issue. Depending on the company, they might add 'fees' and extras on to the amount you already owe, but equally, they would rather get their money than take you to court, so it is worth trying to compromise over the repayments. If you are honest and tell them that you haven't got the full sum now, then they will realise that a court judgement won't get them anywhere sooner than the repayment plan you suggest.

It might also be worth finding out from Virgin whether this represents the full sum owed to them, and whether you can officially cancel the membership now by repaying this amount. It may be that they are only pursuing you for the amount which should already have been debited, and you will still need to pay for the remainder of the year until your contract is up, so be sure of what your full commitment is before agreeing to pay any sum in case you will also have to pay further monthly fees to fulfill your contract.

Try not to panic though - you may be in the wrong, but the credit management people don't really care what happened as long as you get your money. The fact that it is a misunderstanding won't change the amount you owe, but if you can demonstrate that you have every intention of rectifying the situation, they will probably make it as easy for you as possible - after all, they want their money, and they'll only get it it if they can keep the lines of communication open.


PS - I know a provocative title gets more attention, but this REALLY isn't a scam (unless there are some mystery details you haven't mentioned) and it is very unfair of you to say it is, particularly when you are the one who has failed to meet your side of the contract. I would be wary of courting bad publicity for Virgin - if you want to come out of this without a credit black mark, you will be relying on their generosity.

pinkshoes

If it said in the contract that you signed that you have to cancel before <date> otherwise it rolls into another year contract, then you'll have to pay.

BUT... if their other letter directly said:

membership would be suspended and I wouldnt be able to use the Gym (like I want to) until I set up another direct debit.

then I would also have presumed that you couldn't use the gym again until you set up another direct debit. You'll still have to pay them the £500 x 2 you owe them, but because you haven't used the gym, maybe you can agree to pay them on the condition you get to use the gym for 12 months (or how ever long the £500 would have covered)!!

ps - don't forget to write to them and cancel before January 2008 unless you wanna pay for another year!

chaddy44

i have the same problem i phoned the national debt line ,i wasnt given a copy of the credit agreement ,so i am fighting this in court on the basis of the consumer credit act section 62 /63 which states a copy must be given at the time of signing .

nexuss

Did you read all the small print before you signed in the first place ?If they have you signature then there is nothing you can do but simply pay up.

rossdo

Virgin Active is a total con, DO NOT JOIN THIS GYM. I joined a few months ago and was told by the Sales Rep that I could leave anytime I wanted as I wasn't signing any sort of contract, I was joing on a pay monthly deal - one month at a time. I cancelled by Direct Debit on the 7th of the month. Nothing happened for almost TWO whole months, then a letter arrived stating- "further to our previous reminder letter and telephone calls..." (there weren't any) - you owe us £46.00 plus (wait for it) £30 in administration fees. This is just a plain con, if you cancel your Direct Debit (and you haven't signed a 12 month contract) why should you need to give written notice that you are leaving their service? It is obviously designed to catch people who haven't read all the fine print, and I truly think it is totally unecessary to have to provide written notice on a monthly pay as you use type of deal. It is enough to cancel your Direct Debit, as long as it is cancelled IN TIME to cover the full month that you have used. Their Salesman certainly didn't elaborate on this when I signed up. WHAT A COMPLETE CON. British Civil Law is a joke if it allows this sort of thing to happen. There are too many companies in the UK trying all sorts of fast ones to extract every last penny from their customers - take a leaf out of Amercian companies. Treat your customers fairly and with honesty and stop the promise-the-world advertising and rubbish customer services. Just do your dam job and stop expecting money for nothing.

I have called Virgin several times now, and they have gave me incorrect email addresses, informed me that I can't cancel my membership until I have paid (!) and repeatedly put the phone down on me. When I have called back, the same thing has happened - sometimes they have pretended to put me through to the correct department only for the phone to go dead after several minutes on hold.

BTW - cancel your membership here [EMAIL="membership.rugby&#64;virginactive.co.uk"]membership.rugby@virginactive.co.uk[/EMAIL] - obviously change the Rugby to your Gym location.

As I write this, I am getting phone calls from a guy calling himself John and from a witheld number. There appears to be much laughing going on in the background. He is pretending to be from The Samaritans! It is obviously a Virgin Active Employee.

Virgin have lied to me and treated me VERY badly, my advice is go nowhere near them. I find it particularly disgusting that they left it so long before sending out the letter. At no stage was I contacted by telephone (which differs from the many many sales calls I got when I showed an interest when trying to join).

It will obviously transpire that they will try to collect three months membership fees, even although I have not been back to the Gym since the 7th of July.

I do not see why I owe these people money - I did not sign any form of Credit Agreement? Can someone put their opinions down? I did not sign a Contract for a specific period of time, only on a monthly basis? Whats wrong with these people? Is it the case that they put you on a totally unecessary Credit Agreement just to get you into this sort of situation?

Why oh why doesn't the Government crack the whip on this sort of garbage, people are sick and tired of this from underhand UK companies.

pimento

I was a member at our local Virgin Active on a month by month basis. When I wanted to cancel (and I hav done it twice now for different reasons), all I had to do was go down, fill in a form saying I was leaving and then cancel my direct debit. It's not rocket science.

I doubt their membership department are psychic, so unless you tell them you want to cancel, how do you expect them to know? Cancelling your direct debit isn't the same thing as cancelling your membership and it does say this in the T&C's.
Virgin Active were perfect and they were very easy to join and leave without a minimum contract. If you can't be bothered to read the germs and conditions, more fool you.

mr-logic_2

I rang to cancel my membership in Nov 2011 but was cajolled into freezing it for for 1 month with the argument that if I came back within that period I would benefit from the lower figure I had been paying over the years. I was told if I tried to return after 1 month my membership would be re-started at a higher rate. As I did not return I took it to mean I had let my membership lapse but they reverted to charging me the old figure per month. Although the small print may well back them up it would be common courtesy to see I had not set foot in there since Nov. In other words, the staff say one thing the small print says another. They are either deliberately misrepresenting things or badly trained. I suspect the former. I have an e-mail reply which is unsigned. I now need a doctor`s note to stop them taking March`s fee as well! Bailiffs next I suppose...