I was a joint member of LA Fitness with my husband for 3 years. He then left the gym and I continued my membership on a single persons rate but didn't realize I was entering into a new 12 month contract. So when I gave them a months notice to leave I was surprised when they tried to charge me £50 to exit the contract (I didn't get charged the remainder of the 12 months as my reason for leaving was moving abroad). I mentioned they hadn't sent me a new contract and they pointed out we had a verbal contract which was the phone conversation we had had when I changed to my single membership. I'm sure they didn't mention I was entering a 12 month contract because I knew I was moving abroad so wouldn't have agreed to it! Anyway, I have asked to hear my contract but they are trying to charge me £10 for a copy. Is this legal? My other argument with them is the fact that I joined that particular gym purely because there was a creche facility. But a few months before I left the gym they doubled the creche rates and then closed it so for the last couple of months I hardly went there as I had nowhere to leave my daughter!! Members who joined because of the creche were really angry about this and I heard LA Fitness didn't give members the choice to opt out of the contract. A customer service person mentioned something about them being within their rights unless something wasn't available for 30 consecutive days....so I argue that by closing the creche they were in breach of contract. So I would like to stand my ground as I strongly believe I shouldn't pay the fee. However.....legally I'm not sure where I stand. I wrote to LA Fitness and the last contact they said they'd get back to me in 14 days but they didn't. Their customer service dept is full of human robots who have no authority. It's impossible to speak to anyone higher up the ranks. Suddenly the debt collectors are onto me...my debt is rising as LA Fitness still consider me to be a member and are charging a monthly fee! There is talk of solicitors now.... I suppose my first move would be to pay to hear the contract but is this normal practise? Can they do this? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Fenderbass...please see my experience in quote above. It wasn't the same debt collection agency your debt has been forwarded to though. Hope it helps!

Fenderbass Just report them to Trading Standards/Consumer Direct. Although TS didn't stop the [problem] (saying it was hard to prove?!) at least they stopped them pestering me. Despite the fact CRS's letters are made up they still niggle at you and you are better off without them. Still don't understand why Trading Standards let CRS continue...surely it's their job to stop people like them? You would have thought so eh?

Having received quite a few threatening letters with no evidence of my parking 'crime' I then received a letter from a new debt collection agency saying my debt had been passed on to them and it wouldn't go away! Not being a premium rate number (like CRS) I called them and told them the fine was part of a [problem] and I wouldn't be paying it....they put my case on hold for further investigation and seemed very genuine which it appears they were! They later said that they had received quite a few similar calls. In the meantime I had reported CRS to Trading Standards who looked into it and called me back to say my case was closed as CRS could find no evidence of my illegal parking. I pointed out CRS are criminals but they said it is very hard to prove. So I imagine the [problem] lives on then.

I just received another letter upping my debt, threatening legal action, being blacklisted and possible seizure of any assets. Reported them to Consumer Direct and they advised I send them a letter by recorded delivery asking for proof of the offense.He said this would be better than just ignoring it because I would a least have some written evidence of trying to communicate with them should the matter go any further. Of course they won't be able to prove this parking fine. I plan to ignore them from now on. Has anyone been taken to court yet or had the debt collectors round??

I just had a similar experience to AngryD....a fine for an outstanding debt of £140...well it's the first I heard of it! Instantly realizing they were probably dodgy I called them. The rather pathetic,depressed and confused sounding guy told me the date of the offence was 12/12/06 (same as Angry D above) which is a bizarre coincidence. When I asked why I hadn't heard from them sooner he told me that they have had my debt since January 08 but had a problem locating me (must have had the same problem with you Angry D??!). Well I've had the same car and address for a long time so I can't see what the difficulty was. He also seemed to be making up where he thought my car was parked...just said in a retail park, Halfords or Wicks and muttered quietly to himself 'where's your local area'. He really did sound like he was scanning the internet for a Halfords or Wicks near to my address!!!!! I told him he was conning me and I wasn't going to pay it anyway, he then cut the conversation short by saying he needed to find more information. We shall see. I recently received a parking fine from Parking Eye (a CCTV parking enforcement company) that sneakily appeared in my local Morrisons without me noticing. I regret that I paid this fine. Had I found this site earlier I definitely wouldn't have done. However, I am suspicious that my details may have been fraudulently passed on from Parking Eye to somebody at CRS. It may well not be the case but I was wondering if this has happened to anyone else? Just seems bizarre that I am recently collecting private parking fines having never had any in the past! I will be reporting CRS to trading standards that's for sure. CRS may have some genuine debts to collect but my conclusion is they also make quite a few up. Was really pleased to find this website today....without the internet we'd all be sitting at home wondering if we really did park our car in a certain carpark 2 years ago for an unacceptable amount of time!!!!! I would also be fearful of the consequences of not paying but all the advice on this site has given me the confidence to stand my ground. Thanks very much.