Complaint Review: LA FItness - Plano Texas

LA FITNESS - Bank theft.


In October I went to LA FItness to check out the gym while deciding what gym to join.  The salesman at the Plano East club in Plano, Tx named Mark told me that in order for me to hold the rate he was offering for a future date I would have to provide him my personal information and my debit card number.  I did not sign put my signature on anything, so I knew they could not draft my account.  The salesman called me several times during October and November, I told him each time I did not want to join.  I may when I move if I sell my house in Dallas. I heard  from him the last time in November and told him NO I did not want to join.  Much to my surprise while preparing my taxes in April, I looked at a bank account that I do not use only to find my account had been debited for over $400.00 by LA Fitness.  I made several phone calls to LA Fitness only to get the brush off.  I finally obtained a copy of the "signed" agreements (knowing I had never put my signature on anything), all of which were forgeries.  They had forged a signature ( not even close to mine) on the "manual agreement" and the "electronic agreement" a month later.   The corporate membership department was not concern about an employee forging signatures and stealing from the public. Instead they took the position it was my fault.  I never worked out in their facility, I never received a thing concerning a membership from them.   The first "manager" at corporate I spoke to gave me an email address that was bogus to send a copy of the signature on my drivers license, so they could verify it.  Then she called back and told me it was not her email address, it was her supervisor and she would not be back until next week.  After finding out the email did not go through, I called again and got a totally different email address  from someone else for the same person. This email address was completely different than the first email address provided.  The "manager" I spoke to said he would follow up with me on Monday and make sure it got handled.  Guess what?  No one called and no one followed up.   I called them and got in touch yet another "manager"  who sounded like a valley girl, popping gum and may the ripe age of 18.  She again put the blame on us, arguing that we signed the document --they were not handwriting experts and could not determine if a signature is correct.  Time after time she was told; I had seen the signatures and it is not my signature! So her response was you had full use of the gym during that time.  I had to explain to her that if the papers are forged and we do not know it, then how would I know of a membership to take advantage of in the first place.  This girl was unreasonable and argumentative.  Finally she asked to put me on hold and speak to her supervisor.  She comes back on the phone and said: OK I will refund $126. of the over $400.  I hung up on her only to have her call back and say she would go ahead and refund all of it in 7-10 days.  All I was ever asking is to give back the money they stole from my account.  It took way too many phone calls met with apathy and a warning them that I am going to expose their scam to the media.   The Corporate Membership Department is obviously a group of unexperienced phone room kids called "managers" that can't make decision without talking to "supervisors" .  Thee kids are apparently trained to not agree to refund money and blame the caller.  Instead they should be paying close attention to the actions of their sales people and how they are lying and stealing from the public  This type of scam should be exposed and warn the public of their antics.