Fitlife Ltd - Associated Members Club

toby42

Hi Just been reading some of the comments glad I'm not the only one just wish i had read this before though! I received a letter chasing the payment by standing order. I cancelled the standing order weeks ago as i decided i did not want to join. I have wrote a letter back saying that i aint paying and that a copy of the letter has been sent to the Financial Service Authority and told them that i have also included copy of their so called agreement. These w*$£ers are ripping us off. I'll keep you posted as i have requested a reply to my comments.

Jo

:mad:

Millerspike

Good Luck Toby42, i wouldnt hold your breath waiting for a reply, i wrote to them a month an a half ago and im still waiting

MissLML

Hello All

I have been in touch with my local Trading Standards and given them my full story and copied all paperwork, letters sent, letters received and kept them updated about phonecalls (I have just received my first one from Lyle Hill). The chap at Trading Standards is brilliant and is taking this further, don't want to reveal too much because you never know who else is reading here.

I cannot stress enough though, if you haven't already contacted Trading Standards please do so as soon as possible. There is a lot of information gathering going on.

Good luck everyone and DO NOT give up.

heidi13

Sarah_Ross wrote: »

I am yet another victim of this awful company called Associated Members Club/Fitlife Ltd. I live in Newcastle Upon Tyne. I did have two credit agreements with them, one of which was for me and the other was for my partner. My agreement has now been sucessfully transferred into somebody elses name. My partners agreement is still active, this being the one in which I was totally mislead into signing. I was told by the employee of Associated Members Club who signed us up that it would not be a problem for my partners payments to come out of my bank account as he salary is paid into my account so just for ease we asked that his payments could just come out of my account. I believed that I was only signing a form to authorise collection of my partners payments from my bank account but little did i know she actually had me sign the credit agreement which should have been in my partners name bearing in mind she told me my signature was only required for the purpose of collection of payment and not that I was taking over responsibility of his agreement.

Below is set out a copy of a letter that I wrote to Associated Members Club on 20th April 2008.
__________________________________________________ :mad:
PO Box 781
Cheltenham
GL518WR

Also by email – [EMAIL="admin@associatedmembersclub.com"]admin@associatedmembersclub.com[/EMAIL]

20th April 2008

URGENT ATTENTION

Dear Sir/Madam

[my name]
Membership No: ....
Gym Name.......

[my partners name]
Membership No: ........
Gym Name.....

I am writing with reference to the two gym memberships above which were signed up on 06th March 2008.

The reason myself and Mr Denholm decided to signed up to these gym memberships was due to the fact that I had received a letter posted through my door from Survey UK Ltd stating that I had won a free gym membership worth £750.00 which would cover the cost of a two year membership with the above gym club, for myself and, also, exactly the same deal for another person of my choice, that person being Mr Denholm. The letter stated that I had to contact Survey UK Ltd immediately to find out further details. I did this and spoke to a member of staff from their office who gave me the same details, as aforesaid, being that I had won a free gym membership worth £750.00 which would pay for gym membership fees for myself for two years together with the same deal for a person of my choice. I was given the name of an employee who works at Kicks gym on behalf of your firm. I telephoned the gym club and arranged to go down with Mr Denholm and see your employee.

Upon arriving at the club for the first time, we spoke with your employee who told us that we would each have to pay a service charge of £13.18 per month, over the two years of the membership for the upkeep, cleaning and maintenance of the gym. This monthly payment taken over the two year period totals to the sum of £331.44 each. This was not mentioned at all when I spoke with the member of staff at Survey UK Ltd who led me to believe that I had won these two memberships and that they were a gift free of charge.

Having the sum of £331.44 payable to yourselves not only by me, but also by Mr Denholm, is not, in my opinion, what I would class as having won a free gym membership for myself together with a gym membership for Mr Denholm on exactly the same terms.

Setting this aside, we decided to join Kicks as £13.18 per month was a lot cheaper than the gym membership fees that we were paying to our previous gym club.

Your employee sat us down and told us to sign the membership application forms along with the credit agreement forms which gave a blank section to fill in the details of a bank account from which the monthly service charge would be collected from by standing order.

Mr Denholm is my partner. His working salary is paid into my personal bank account and so I told your employee, with the agreement of my partner that the service charge payable to you by him would therefore need to come out of my bank account. We were told that this would not be a problem, and, all that was needed was for my bank account details to be inserted on his credit agreement and for me to sign to authorise that payment could come out of my bank account. Your employee, therefore, copied the bank account details which I had filled in on my own credit agreement onto the credit agreement belonging to my partner. She then marked my partner’s agreement with two crosses and told me I needed to sign in both places just to authorise payment of the service charge coming out of my bank account. Your employee told me, that my signature on the credit agreement belonging to my partner, was only needed for the purposes of authorising the collection of his service charge payment, which is what I was lead to believe.

Besides the fact that the gym is in no way suitable for me, in the sense that I find the cleanliness of premises appalling, the machinery looks like it has been bought in the early ages and the changing rooms are not very welcoming, I have successfully transferred my membership into the name of Mr Kenneth Rodgers (I hold written confirmation from you of this transfer).

Whilst in the process of this transfer, it has come to my attention on looking through the documentation which we were given to take home, your employee has failed to inform us that this was a non cancellable agreement. Moreover, I was lead into believing that the purpose of my signature being on the credit agreement belonging to my partner was only for the purpose of collection of his payment of service charge. This is not the case as, in fact, she told me to sign in the position where my partner should have signed, at the time of signing my partners agreement I was signing it on the understanding given by your employee that it was for the purposes of collection of payment only and not, in any way, in terms that I was taking responsibility for my partners agreement in any way whatsoever. I would never sign a credit agreement for or on behalf of anyone other than myself as I would not want to be left in a difficult position finding myself responsible should the terms of the agreement be breached in any way.

I am currently working in a firm of solicitors and have sought legal advice on the issues outlined in this letter. After looking at all copy documentation received from your employee and also your office my colleague has advised me as follows:

· In the copy signed documents which we were given when signing up to these memberships we were not given a copy of any document outlining the most important terms of the credit agreement which, by law, under the Consumer Credit Regulations, should be given to anyone entering into a credit agreement before signature. All that was explained to us was the fact that there was a service charge payable monthly and that we were able to transfer the membership over in the case of serious illness or departure to a location out of the area. This being the case the agreement is unenforceable in any event, unless you obtain an Order of the Court.

· If my partner’s membership is not cancelled forthwith my colleague will be prepared and willing to take this matter further.

I await hearing from you and I would be grateful if you could give this matter you most urgent attention.

Yours sincerely
S Ross
__________________________________________________ ______________

I got a response from them a whole week later (even though my letter stated in bold URGENT) saying that they could not do anything about it as it was out of their hands now and that I should contact Fitlife Ltd. So I copied this letter to Fitlife Ltd on 28th April 2008. I received a response from Fitlife dated 29th April 2008 although it was posted second class so i did not receive it until 01st May 2008. The letter said that they were sorry but there is nothing they can do about it and that they could not alter my repayment schedule or rescind the one agreement left. They told me that my credit agreement did include a pre contract info sheet which is lies as neither myself or my partner hold any such sheet. They did not mention at all my points raised with regard to me only authorising payments to come out of my bank account, not agreeing to take on the actual credit agreement on behalf of my partner.

I will be writting back to them today asking why they have not commented on this point which is the main reason i wrote to them.

Any help from anyone would be very much appreciated!!!!!!!

Sarah from Newcastle Upon Tyne

PS I am absolutely disgusted with this company and I am not under any circumstances going to drop this case.

I'm so glad its not just me who's having trouble with these people!! I have to cancel due to the fact that my fiance left me 2 months before my wedding after clearing out my account and the guy at Assoc Members Club have been no use at all. Interesting to read others have been totally conned by these b*****ds who change their name more often than the weather and have got Trading Standards envolved. I physically don't have the money to pay my subs and want to cancel but they are very hard to contact and aren't interested in my explanation. :mad:

CashmerePencil

Hi everyone, not been on for a while but have still been battling!! But I'VE WON!!! I HAVE BEATEN ALL OF THEM! And have it in black and white in writing!!

So everyone please take heart, stay strong, dont give up and dont pay them a penny cos if you stay strong and hold out, you will come out triumphant!! Its taken almost 10 months of going back and forth but i have beaten the lot of them!!!!

Keep up the fight!!!

coxpip

That is such good news - the best yet!! How did you win though? I've been battling for ages and have still got nowhere, I've just given up replying to them now - Trading Standards took all my correspondence away (copies) but I've heard nothing from them either.

Millerspike

Same here, i wrote to them about 2 months ago, still with no reply from Fitlife / AMC or Trading Standards

KIMTURNER

i am so glad i found this website!!! i am just about to hand yet more of my cash over to this vile company who are now sending letters demanding payment from me. The AMC conned me into joining them in september 08. just one week after i had joined my local gym through the club i was found to have breast cancer, i wrote to AMC informing them of the situation and that i was cancelling my standing order as i would be unable to take part in exercise for a good year due to having chemotherapy and surgery and on the advice on my oncologist. They replied by saying i could transfer the membership to a family member or friend. My son initially said he would take this over but has since changed his mind. i have this week received a letter demanding payment from a company called Lyle Hill Membership Management. i was going to pay them my £16.53 tomorrow, but having read the letters on this forum have decided not to as i feel i am paying for something i am not getting any benefit from, and that the company is one big scam!! Can anyone give me advise of what to do next?? Thankyou!!

pete1210

CashmerePencil wrote: »

Hi everyone, not been on for a while but have still been battling!! But I'VE WON!!! I HAVE BEATEN ALL OF THEM! And have it in black and white in writing!!

So everyone please take heart, stay strong, dont give up and dont pay them a penny cos if you stay strong and hold out, you will come out triumphant!! Its taken almost 10 months of going back and forth but i have beaten the lot of them!!!!

Keep up the fight!!!

Well done mate! But does this then mean that notification in black & white is the only conformation that you are clear from this scam?

KIMTURNER

opsmithswife wrote: »

AAAARRRRGGGGHHHHH! :mad:
11th Sep - we received a FINAL WARNING from Lyle Hill.
I'm just about getting fed up to the back teeth of these companies.
I feel like begging them all to take me to court so I can sue their a$$es for all their worth!

How many times do we have to tell these people that we haven't actually signed a contract. All we've signed is a Credit Act!

I'm about to contact my lawyers again and forward them the new letters!

Plus, does anyone else realise that it was made illegal in April (i think) for Survey UK to send out any slips of paper containing, "Congratulations, you've won", meaning that by the time we received this slip of paper in June, they were breaking the law. Tut tut!

My husband and I will be looking into going public. Once we have had some joy in involving newspapers etc, we will post a contact number for everyone who wishes to join in.

Best Regards

having demanding letters from this vile company, can you let me know how you and your husband got on going public please??