Gym Memberships

Gyms make a significant proportion of their money from members who join but who rarely use the facilities. Long termination or ‘notice’ periods keep membership levels high because it makes it more difficult to cancel. Most clubs require a minimum 12 month initial contract and follow with a 3 month notice period required to cancel. It’s obvious why clubs want these clauses in the contracts, but increasingly the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) are finding against them and the question remains – are the contracts enforceable in court?

If you give notice to quit and cancel your direct debit, expect considerable harassment, initially from the club and then from aggressive letters and phone calls from debt collection companies and so called legal firms. If you deny or dispute the debt these actions could be classed as harassment so make sure you lay down your case clearly and understand your rights.

The consumer has certain rights as detailed under the OFT Debt Collection guidelines, in particular 2.6h and 2.8k. You may also wish to look at 2.2 c, according to how the firm chasing the alleged debt contacted you.

Another useful reference is the Credit Services Association (CSA) Debt Collection Guidelines

You can also see their member list here, Credit Services Associations (CSA) List of Members

If you’ve hit financial difficulties, let’s say you’ve used the gym but not met your payments, your rights are limited because they are collecting payment for a service already rendered.

Breach of Contract

Your membership agreement will probably state that there is a notice period. If you give notice and do not honour the notice period they will probably chase you for the months specified in the notice period.

The problem is they can’t do this. If they say you’ve breached your contract, they can only claim for their losses and they need to prove these losses; they must also try to minimise these losses.

If you stopped paying they’d probably stop you from using the club, in which case they’re definitely not entitled to try and make you pay for it.

Quality of Service and Standards

The OFT recently found that many gym agreements were unenforceable under the Unfair Terms in Consumer Contracts Regulations. This doesn’t make the whole agreement unenforceable, just the sections that are unfair. See our article on OFT V Total Fitness.

If however you could argue that the standards fell below an acceptable level that either didn’t justify the fees charged or meant you were unable to use the club then you stand on even stronger ground.

Examples could include a change in opening times meaning you couldn’t use the club at a time you used to, a reduction in facilities or staff levels. These would all be good reasons to terminate the contract without providing further notice.

Penalty Charges and Debt Collection Agents

Whatever happens if it gets to a debt collection agency, write to them and tell them that any fees they try to apply are not legally enforceable. The only costs they would be able to add to the ‘debt’ are county court fees – they cannot add legal fees in the small claims court.

Enforceability

As good a game as these people talk it is very rare for these cases to actually end up in court. They’ll do their damndest to scare you and cause you so much stress that you give in and pay up. If more of these get to court the gyms are all too well aware that the obvious flaws in their contracts will make case law and they’ll not even be able to try and scare ex-members with their bullying tactics.

What should you do?

It’s really not our place to give legal advice, although this article should give you some grounding – do your own research and stand your ground. If more people stood up for their rights it won’t take long for the clubs to amend their contracts and the cowboys will go out of business.

Bearing in mind that you’re likely to get hassle by phone it might be an idea to make sure the telephone numbers they have on file for you are changed to ones they won’t be able to harass you on … not that we’d suggest giving false phone numbers…

Write to the club and broadly tell them why you are leaving (generally because standards have consistently fallen) and that you give notice with immediate effect. This should be sent by recorded delivery or similar to guarantee postage, then you can trace the letter on the Royal Mail website. 

1. There’s no reason why you can’t email in either – as long as they acknowledge it.
   
   It is your decision whether or not to cancel a direct debit, if you don’t you’ll have to start proceedings against the club to get your money back. Do not acknowledge a notice period or refer to your membership agreement in your correspondence.
   
   
2. Assuming the club doesn’t accept your immediate termination they’ll write and tell you how much money they think you owe them. Refuse to talk to them on the phone and insist everything is put in writing.
   
   Write back and say that you don’t recognise their agreement and ask for proof of the agreement and any specific terms they feel you are in breach of. There is no need to say any more.   

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