Complaint Review: Lifetime Fitness

LifeTime Fitness can be very friendly when they are trying to lure you into becoming a member, at a pricey $133 a month for their Platinum membership, which is for their NY club in Syosset. However, once you become a member, this is far from the case.

I had a series of incidents that I reported to their gym manager, Susan Mistri, who is what I like to call "surface friendly." Her job, as I see it, is to act as the front person for LifeTime's corporate office in Minnesota. Any complaints that you may have, or resolutions that need be resolved, are all spun back to the general manager of your gym location. And if you make any complaints by email, like I have in a couple of instances to the gym manager, you run the risk of having your membership terminated.

My membership was terminated by Susan Mistri, in part, because I complained of poor yoga. Regina is the head instructor of the Syosset location, and her and Susan Mistri told me that they had to terminate my membership due to my "disrupting yoga." Due to my not following poses exactly as they were called out by the instructor, they used this as a reason to terminate my membership. I had only signed up a few months earlier, and Susan stated that I was not eligible to have the $80 administrative fee refunded due to my violating our contract. However, she will not, neither will a person named Colleen in their legal department at headquarters, provide justification as to what the reasoning is behind how I violated this agreement.

If you speak with legal, or corporate on any issue, they simply will tell you the decision making is all left up to the general manager at your gym location, and if you ask the gym manager they will tell you that you have to speak with legal. Legal has stated repeatedly that they will send me an official termination email which will state how I violated the contract and why membership is terminated. I don't expect to ever receive such an email, or receive any feedback as to why my membership was terminated. In my opinion, this is a real case of business bullying. If you decide you want to be a member, I suggest you don't send in any written complaints about the facility, unless you want to be next on the chopping block.

Please ignore the fact that you have to arrive 10-15 minutes before spin class to ensure you get a bicycle, of which only about 1 out of 3 work properly. This is what Susan Mistri will tell you and what she told me regarding how early to come to class. She says it so casually and nonchalantly. She goes "oh, just arrive 10-15 minutes before class and you should be able to get a bike. At the Chicago location I managed we had the same issue with only 58 bikes." And don't complain about the yoga either, even though my last 2 classes there we went in and out of pigeon pose for the entire class, with virtually no other poses.