After entering my daughter in a drawing for a free martial arts lesson, and receiving a call back on it, she loved it so much that we decided to let her try it. We signed up for a monthly contract and VMA uses Member Solutions for their payment collection. We absolutely love VMA but it became clear that my daughter was not going to be able to continue going. I hung on to the membership for far longer than I should have in hopes of her being able to go back and I accept that - it was my fault. The dues were paid every month automatically, no problems.
In May, when I finally went to cancel the membership, I was told by Member Solutions that they had no record of my daughter in their system anywhere, no matter what piece of information I gave them - Name, address, phone, SSN, credit card number.....nothing brought her up in their system (I had misplaced my original agreement, though I did recall their terms). So I called and cancelled my credit card so I could stop the debits. In August, I got a bill for $280 so I called and explained the situation to them but, since I had no proof of my having ever called, I was stuck with the bill.
Ok, fine, sucks, but alright. I told the guy that I didn't just have $280 lying around, could I make it in payments? He placed me on hold, came back and said yes, that was fine, how much could I pay then (this was August 15th). I made a $100 pymt and set it up that I would make a 2nd $100 pymt on 09/15/14 and the last $80 on 10/15/14. I clarified with the guy that $280 is all I would have to pay. Ok, fast frwd to 09/15/14. I got online and made my 2nd $100 pymt like I said I would.
Two days later, I get a call saying I have a $205 past due balance and can they get my pymt over the phone? I said, oh hell no and explained it all to the lady and got sent to "customer service" where, low and behold, I got the same guy I talked to last month. Seemingly nice guy, by the way, but a total idiot apparently. He puts me on hold about 10 minutes, comes back and makes some vague comment about my accout not making sense and places me back on hold another 20 minutes. He then comes back and proceeds to tell me that I owe them $205 because August's dues were due on the day I talked to him and were added on to the $280 that I called about! I re-explained the deal to him, that I had intentionally clarified that $280 would be all I owed and he apologized to me, basically for screwing up but I still owed them $205.
I got a manager on the phone who proceeded to explain to me why I owed this extra money. I usually don't get hateful with people on the phone, but before I hung up with these people, I was not being very pleasant. I told him that all I was going to pay them was the $80 that we'd agreed on and I wanted them off my back. He told me that that was fine but if I only paid them $80, my account would remain open and subject to fees and negative effects to my credit. I told him I'd get an attorney, that they are harassing a disabled woman on a very fixed income and that what happened was not my fault, it was his employee's fault and he told me that what happened was just a small mistake on the part of his employee and that I owed it. I told him that that what he defined as a "small mistake" was taking money out of my pocket that I couldn't afford and was wrong.
Oh well, you owe it, sorry for your trouble. Then he tells me that I owe $195, he's taken the last $10 fee off for me.....Gee thanks, a**hole! I hung up on him and after thinking about it, called back and paid the bill, even though I didn't owe it and didn't really have the money to spare, just to keep them from ruining my credit; I worked too hard to get a good name and these people were just going to ruin it for me? No thank you.
Total lesson learned. I will NEVER work with any company who uses Member Solutions again. Never. It's sad because VMA is awesome but some people aren't going to be working with them anymore because of MS. Buyer beware, after all.