Complaint Review: Charter Fitness

    I just have to say that I am disgusted with the way companies are selling off people and contracts. I feel totally violated and feel as though my money was STOLEN from me. I originally signed a contract with Cardinal Fitness a little over a year ago. The agreement was for 12 months and then if I didn't cancel they would continue to charge me on a month to month basis. The original contract that I had stated that if I cancelled my membership before the 12 months was up that I would have to pay $75. Considering I had very little time left on my contract, I decided that it was better just to leave it alone and cancel when the 12 months ended. 
    Driving by the club one day, I had to stop going because a family member fell ill and I was assisting in care, I noticed that the sign was changed to say Charter Fitness and was no longer Cardinal Fitness. I said to myself, "this will save me the trouble of having to cancel my contract because Cardinal Fitness doesn't exist". Boy was I wrong. I saw a charge on my account labeled Cardinal Fitness and contacted my bank. I told them what happened and they said that it may be due to the company just trying to collect on their contracts and it was wrong. I said that I would let it slide but was advised that if it happened again that I should contact my bank and have them proceed to take action against Cardinal Fitness. When I checked the next month I saw that Cardinal Fitness did not charge me again and was happy. Little did I realize that Charter Fitness had. (who would have thought that I would have to look for that??????) 
    The time I definitely noticed, it was because it was for almost $40!!!!! That was the maintenance fee for Cardinal Fitness. This is when I got angry. I never signed a contract with Charter Fitness and I had never received any notification that my contract was being SOLD to Charter Fitness yet I was being charged as if I was a willing member of this gym. When I did call ABC financial, which is the company that does all of the billing for Cardinal and I guess Charter as well, I was told that I was not allowed to have my money back for the months that they charged me. The only thing I would get back for cancelling (a contract with Charter that I never signed or gave permission to charge my account) was the maintenance fee because I had called within 30 days of the withdrawal. Needless to say, that was also a lie.
     Not only do I not get that money back but they tried to charge me another $19.95 fee. So I called back. The woman on the phone was extremely rude, got nasty with me, and had the nerve to talk over me and cut me off!! Now I have worked in customer service for a very long time and know that unhappy customers are not easy to deal with, but you still have to provide exceptional customer service to make them want to come back. This woman obviously did not learn that, EVER, and treated me like I was ignorant. So, I asked to speak with a manager. 
    The manager, thankfully, was much nicer and actually did something positive that her employee could not figure out how to do because she was too busy being rude. She said that she would officially cancel my contract because SHE SAW that I had NOT received any notice of the change in companies and was NOT given a chance to cancel the contract. Imagine that!! But she said that they would not give me my money back for any of the other months that they charged me since Charter Fitness bought out my contract. 
    I am now going to go to my bank and have them file fraud charges against this company so that I can try and get my money back from these thieves. I cannot believe that this happened and they get to keep every penny that they STOLE!! Hopefully my bank can get me my money back, and I hope that someone files fraud suit against Charter Fitness because from what I read, I am not the only victim of their crimes.