Lifetime Gym Membership

ozzw247

Jonboy_1984 said:

Would it be cynical to estimate that 8-10 years is the average lifetime of a private gym round here???

Oddly enough they have just had their 10th anniversary, not much competition locally so they do seem to be doing well.

ozzw247

I have now spoken to the Gym management, they are adamant that the contract was for 10 years stating that in industry and manufacturing 10 years is standard.

I enquired if any special deals were on offer for members who had invested originally - when the Gym was struggling and they need cash flow, the answer was no, the new 10 years £4500 offer is the only one on the table.

They said they could drop it to £4000 if it started immediately and cancelled out the remaining 2 years of my lifetime membership, considering the lifetime membership also included a number of extras - e.g. free trainer session per week etc - which would be lost, hardly an earth shatteringly good deal.

So the situation is this

- I have all the original paperwork - promotional leaflet, invite to join, confirmation of membership and my copy of signed contract

- The term 'Life membership' is used 5 times in the paperwork, 'lifetime membership' twice and no mention of any time limits

- On the contract itself the term 'Lifetime membership' is hand written in to the membership type box.

- The terms and conditions do not mention life or lifetime anywhere, also no mention of the option to change duration.

- I do appreciate the facilities and would like to continue, but feel the new charges are excessive for a 10 year gamble

I believe that the 'lifetime' term would likely be assessed as being between myself and the Gym and the term 'lifetime' referring to one or the other.

So, 

- I could push and hope for a better deal, but need strong arguments to possibly gain ground.

- I could wait until the contract ends and if they withdraw the service, go legal

- I do not intend to sacrifice my current membership and pay £4000 for less facilities!
- I would accept paying perhaps 3k and extending my current membership, I appreciate the place and they have running costs.

My membership runs until Mid 2025, so plenty of time to think.

strawb_shortcake

Is the "lifetime" your brackets or theirs? 

I agree with other posters that lifetime can be ambiguous, and I work with contracts. Is there a break or exit clause? 

I suspect the offer was written by someone with little legal knowledge and worked on the assumption that people that paid for this offer; the majority would not still be attending 5-10 years later, nevermind 20+ years. 

It's not unprecedented for lifetime offers to have been withdrawn. Dr Martens offered lifetime boots several years back, this was withdrawn and replaced with; we'll replace your boots once. However, I'd expect a company such as Dr Martens to have had the correct terms and conditions in place before taking the offer and amendment to market.

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head

ozzw247 said:

My membership runs until Mid 2025, so plenty of time to think.

Do you know why they are bringing this up now if you have 2 years (by their obscure reasoning) left?

If the gym is a limited company you can search for them on Companies House and the filing history will include their accounts which will show profits/loses and assets/liabilities.

I appreciate you say they have little competition but that doesn't necessarily mean they are doing well financially, last thing you want is to pay a lump sum and then the business folds, an understanding of their financial position might give some insight and help you to make a choice down the line. 

user1977

ozzw247 said:

I have now spoken to the Gym management, they are adamant that the contract was for 10 years stating that in industry and manufacturing 10 years is standard.

What sort of industrial or manufacturing contracts are they talking about? I don't see the relevance to a consumer contract with a gym.

I think anybody who believes a private gym operator is still going to be operational by the end of their life is either rather naive or has a disappointingly short life expectancy, and I would have been immensely sceptical about such an offer - but if they haven't qualified it further than I agree you'd be entitled to assume they mean your own lifetime. If they meant 10 years, why wouldn't they have simply said 10 years?

ozzw247

annabanana82 said:

Is the "lifetime" your brackets or theirs? 

The brackets are very much mine, just plain text in the originals

annabanana82 said:
I agree with other posters that lifetime can be ambiguous, and I work with contracts. Is there a break or exit clause? 

I cannot see anything directly, just a standard clause that they can terminate the agreement if there are reasonable grounds to do so, would this be deemed to be a break clause?

the_lunatic_is_in_my_head said:

ozzw247 said:

My membership runs until Mid 2025, so plenty of time to think.

Do you know why they are bringing this up now if you have 2 years (by their obscure reasoning) left?

They sent me a letter offering the new 10 year deal, as a lifetime member I enquired as to why they sent it to me, at that point they said the lifetime was actually only 10 years, not what I expected

In terms of the accounts, I have had a look at companies house and the accounts are up to date and appear fairly healthy.

user1977 said:

ozzw247 said:

I have now spoken to the Gym management, they are adamant that the contract was for 10 years stating that in industry and manufacturing 10 years is standard.

What sort of industrial or manufacturing contracts are they talking about? I don't see the relevance to a consumer contract with a gym.

They also seem to have another part of the business manufacturing Gym equipment, so i assume it comes from this.

user1977 said:

I think anybody who believes a private gym operator is still going to be operational by the end of their life is either rather naive or has a disappointingly short life expectancy, and I would have been immensely sceptical about such an offer - but if they haven't qualified it further than I agree you'd be entitled to assume they mean your own lifetime. If they meant 10 years, why wouldn't they have simply said 10 years?

I would tend to agree, but having missed out on a very good deal in the past, I felt the very low cost for a full feature gym - Pools, Saunas, Jacuzzi etc. - was a gamble worth taking. I will be 60 when the contract ends (by their judgement), so as life expectancy I believe is at 82, I hopefully have another 20 years or so to go.

Aylesbury_Duck

Good news: Your life expectancy will probably be higher than 82 if you're already 50ish.  And as you're someone who uses the gym, I suspect you'll last longer than the average person of your age.

ozzw247

Aylesbury_Duck said:

Good news: Your life expectancy will probably be higher than 82 if you're already 50ish.  And as you're someone who uses the gym, I suspect you'll last longer than the average person of your age.

If I can only get out of the Sauna and Jacuzzi and use the gym equipment!!

Aylesbury_Duck

  

Head over to the pensions board and see if you can cash it all early, then 

Manxman_in_exile

ozzw247 said:

I have read back through all the terms and conditions and there is nothing referring to the contract length and the possibility of them changing it, just some notes on cancelling or terminating the contract if they feel there are reasonable grounds. I see myself as a 'good user' so feel they will have no issue there....

Isn't this the crux of the matter?

I can imagine the gym arguing that they have valid economic or commercial grounds for cancelling lifetime memberships.  Whether that would satisfy a court as being "reasonable" or not I don't know...