cancelling virgin rolling contracts - this may help

[Pedders78]

Latest update - It seems my case has been passed to the head of Member Support (ha!) Services. I have received yet another letter from them saying that my statement of them being in breach of clause 8.2 of the contract was not true as in the contract they refer to the gross cost of the diamond membership being frozen for life not the net cost. Basically telling me exactly what the last person did - just from a higher source and with a little more elaboration - but still not anything even close to proof.

 

I have responded with the follwowing letter which i'm thinking will quite possibly be my last (to Virgin that is!)

 

Dear Carrie,

 

Re: Virgin Active Ltd – Account **************

 

Thanks you for your letter dated 2nd December 2009 in which you have again (for a third time) attempted to justify an increase in your membership dues and direct breach of your own terms and conditions as outlined in my previous letters.

I stated in my previous letter that until you prove beyond any doubt that you were not in fact in breach of your own contract as opposed to just saying that you were not, I will continue to dispute your claim that I owe you any monies citing the VAT decrease in December 2008 as my reason for early termination, and that statement still remains true and relevant today.

In response to some of the points you have made in your letter - It mentions nothing in your contract with regards to the Diamond Membership’s fixed price for life relating to it’s gross cost as you have stated. Again I would remind you that VAT is a tax imposed by the government which Virgin Active has absolutely no say in whatsoever, therefore it can only be referring to the net cost! Simply put, even if you do believe it relates to the gross cost - as a corporate body citing the terms and conditions of a contract in order to harass and bleed money from a consumer you cannot ethically, nor legally, base your argument on assumptions!

You also mention in your letter that I committed to a price of £59.95 for the life of my membership – which is not a true statement. If you check the contract you will see I initially committed to £56.95 per month!

I believe that you have acted atrociously with regards to this issue because at no point have you attempted to mitigate your claim. I also believe you have breached your own contract and that your statement that I owe Virgin Active any monies is not a true one! I am simply very tired of repeating myself over and over again to you people. So accordingly I have decided that this will be the last correspondence you receive from me. I dispute your claims – therefore you can’t [by law] pass this out to any third parties. If you still believe that I owe you money then I suggest the next move you make is to issue court proceedings.

 

 

Regards

 

 

*YAWN*........till the next one!

[PGH7447]

keep at em:)

[Badbunny]

I don't think the issue is whether you are right, I think the biggest issue for them is that if Virgin admit a breach of clause 8.2 then they are afraid the flood gates will be opened.

[PGH7447]

how sad for them then, the interesting thing is will they be tempted to add the vat increase on jan 1 to this unlawful rolling contract

[Pedders78]

The actual issue for me personally was never regarding the VAT increase it was to do with what is in my opinion an unfair and unexplained rolling contract that i cancelled for legitimate reasons initially i.e a shoulder injury and the fact i could no longer afford to keep paying the money!

 

Virgin are basically trying to screw me (and it would seem a vast number of other people also), on a technicality in the contract and thankfully due to the VAT issues mentioned i have seen an opportunity to do exactly the same! If it weren't for that then admittedly i probably wouldn't have taken it this far. It's more a matter of principal now - i'm fed up with watching the consumer get s**t on!

[Mariko123]

Hi Pedders,

 

I thought that if you had a injury and couldn't go to the gym they had to let you out of the contract? however, I have heard very many similar stories where they aren't letting people out of the contract if they have severe back problems, pregnancy and also doctors notes etc.

 

They're taking the p*ss.

[Pedders78]

You'd think so wouldn't you? But no, when i originally cited my shoulder injury as my reason for cancellation i was told (quite rudely incedentally) that it didn't matter - and it was only after a bit of investigation that they reluctantly told me that all they could do was "freeze" the account and there are a number of restrictions on doing that too. It was at that point that i told them to bite me and six months later here we are.

 

How is it going with you Mariko, did you pay them off in the end?

[Mariko123]

This freezing business is pointless as you are then still tied in for the remainder of the contract again.

 

Fight them if you can, however, I have reluctantly taken up their offer of paying half. I'm not happy with myself for doing it. I've told them I'll pay them each month for four months on a specific date on the phone. They weren't too happy with that but tough really.

 

I had a friend look at the contract who has a Contract Law degree. She said the contract was definitely unfair but it was legally binding, I'd initialled after every paragraph and signed so there was no way I could get out of it but to try. I mentioned the VAT issues and she said that was a non entity but to give it a go. It does seem that Virgin are frightened about the vat being picked up, or they wouldn't have, reluctantly, offered me a buy out. They aren't ever going to admit it though.

 

I really don't know how they can try to make you pay when you have an injury. Do you have a doctors letter?

 

My situation was slightly different. Money difficulties and the membership had to go. I had no idea about this rolling contract business or that I was signed on for another year so that was my arguement. It wasn't explained to me and I wasn't given a contract at the beginning after I'd signed. Unfortunately it's my word against theirs.

 

You know, the main thing that's annoyed me about this, and it seems you've had this problem. Is their rudness. You'd think they could at least be polite.

 

Their letters are laughable, the grammar and spelling is shocking. My law friend couldn't believe they'd sent letters out to so called clients like that.

 

Yes we are clients, I would never treat a client they way that they are treating us. It's shocking.

 

Who are you speaking to at Virgin? I really don't think they can hold you to ransom if you have an injury surely?

[PGH7447]

final step write to richard branson and send copies to the newspapers, see how he likes his well loved brand dragged through the press

[Pedders78]

I did write to Richard Branson but didn't send the copys to the press - pehaps i should!

 

I can probably get a doctors note if necessary but that costs money too, allbeit only £20 and like i say with a doctors note they will only freeze the membership which isn't enough as far as i'm concerned.

 

Basically i am credit blacklisted already and have been for years because i got stuck in a perpetual cycle since the age of 18 with credit cards and bank loans and (beleive it or not) a number of civil offenses including parking tickets and a train fare fine (yes really)! I am now nearly 32 and i have recently started to take stock of my finances and subsequently my life, and one of the ways in which i have done this is to fight back against the system where as before i might've buried my head in the sand and just ignored it all. Don't get me wrong, sometimes i think it may be better for someone to settle up and come to some sort of agreement as i have with one (and only one) of my other creditors, but my personal situation and feelings on the matter dictate otherwise and when you actually win against one of these large corporations of government organisations the feeling is pretty darn good!

 

All of my creditors are now dealt with to my satisfaction and i can begin to rebuild my credit score. Virgin is the only outstanding "blip" and as i'm sure you can understand i'm not about to give in to them when i have come this far.

 

Sorry to go off on one guys - got a bit carried away there!

[PGH7447]

thats ok we all have a rant now and then:D - and good for you for getting your self sorted

[Mariko123]

yes we all do... more than now and then even...

Well done for getting your finances sorted, it's such a shame that virgin are the only one's now outstanding.

[Pedders78]

Just a brief update - I still haven't heard back from Virgin since my last letter (in which I told them to stop with all the talk and just go ahead and issue court proceedings), so i'm thinking they have just let it go.

 

I could be wrong and get home tonight only to find a nasty letter on my doormat - but my gut tells me that i have beat the f***ers!

 

Is it too early to celebrate?

[PGH7447]

fingers crossed

[aSW18]

Hi there,

I'm new to this forum or any internet forum actually but I find this issue really terrible - I'm so disappointed with VirginActive.

 

I've come up against the same problem as you guys only I have some exceptional circumstances which make it feel even worse.

 

I was put on one of these rolling contracts and I specifically remember talking to the rep at the time and reading the terms and conditions. This definitely was not made clear to me and I never knew such a contract existed. I joined in Dec 2009 and wanted to cancel last month - Jan 2010.

 

They then explained about this 'window' when I should have canceled.

 

In my case - I spent this time - Nov 2009 at my Dad's bedside in a hospice - he died from prostate cancer on 10th Dec 2009. I pretty much put my life on hold from last October and even if I had been aware of this clause, there's no way I would have cancelled my gym membership - I was barely sleeping and eating and I assumed people would understand the situation from a human point of view.

My work was incredibly harsh my only giving me 2 days paid compassionate leave which slashed my salary by £1,000 in december. I am now therefore short of cash and cancelling the gym membership was the obvious thing to do as I pay £60 a month.

 

I've just spoken to the Membership girl at VirginActive an hour ago and she didn't care at all. She said she had lost someone in her family as well but she still paid her bills! And that if I didn't pay, they would transfer to a debt collection agency.

I think it's the lack of compassion in my case that astounds me the most.

 

I've sent the story to Watchdog - still need to check my contract for the small print (don't even know where it is at the moment).

 

I cancelled my direct debit last week.

 

What should I do next?

I have enough to deal with with trying to help mu msort out all Dad's finances. I have about 30 organisations to write to at the moment.

 

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

[Pedders78]

Welcome to the forums aSW18,

 

Firstly, i'm very sorry to hear of your loss - you have my condolences, i too have lost family members to that horrible disease so i have some understanding of what this must be like for you.

 

As far as your dealings with Virgin go - just scan back over this thread and you will see that there are options available to you. Most are based on technicalities however and a fair amount of headaches go hand in hand with them.

 

A couple of things we have spoken about over this thread which would probably come in handy for you are as follows:

 

A) If you dispute Virgin's claim that you owe them money then they are not allowed by law to pass your account to a third party for collection. Send them a letter stating this fact and the fact that you indeed do dispute their claim - and then at least you will only be dealing with Virgin staff as opposed to debt collection agencies or solicitors.

 

B) If your a Diamond member then they are comitted to giving you a fixed price for life. As far as i am concerned this can only legally refer to the net cost of your membership - so look at the recent VAT increase and see if it has affected the Net cost of your membership, if it has then you have a case (even if the cost has decreased!) I myself have used this tactic with my case due to the VAT decrease in 2009 and it's now looking almost promising (touch wood)!

 

C) You also have The Office of Fair trading on your side who "frown upon" these sort of contracts - it would be worth speaking to them also.

 

D) You could always go to your GP and explain your case to him/her who may write you a letter stating that your recent loss and subsequent grief constitutes a medical complaint (i.e depression).

 

Decide on your standpoint and then write an all encompasing letter to them citing one or all of the above points as your reason for "early termination" whilst at the same time being very clear in stating the fact that you 100% dispute their claims and they cant...third party - blah blah blah!

 

Be prepared though, Virgin won't go down easily - but stick to your guns stand your ground and you should be alright!

 

Keep us updated on your progress - hope all goes well!

[aSW18]

Thanks very much that's really helpful. I could really do without the stress of this but the principle is just wrong.

I will let you know what happens.

[luciftian]

Having been a member of Virgin Active on a monthly contract since August 2004 with a £50 fee, as my membership fee had increased in January 2005 to £55 and then to £56 in January 2006, in December 2005, after a lot of consideration, perusal of the contract and several conversation with Virgin Active's Sales representatives, I signed a new contract to transfer to the newly launched Diamond Membership which cost £51.95 per month, with an effective starting date of February 2006. [i can demonstrate the above using my bank statements.]

 

In December 2005, before signing the new contract, I had clearly explained to the sales representative that I did not want to be tied into a 12 month contract, which is why I was reluctant to become a Diamond Member, which required an initial 12 month commitment; but the sales representative explained time and again that IT WOULD only be for an initial 12 months to show commitment, then it would go back to be a monthly contract with a one month notice as my previous contract. So "commit to 12 months then back to where you are now but with the advantage of paying a few pounds less a month and the guarantee that the price would not increase for life."

 

I took a contract home with me prior to signing it (double sided A4 sheet), read it carefully and did not find anything to dispute what the sales representative had told me. So I signed up. As I was doing this they pulled out another single sided A4 sheet, a Transfer form, to process the £10 fee to transfer from my current membership to the Diamond one.

 

I read this form carefully (which oddly had only 8 sentences on it, each of which required that I initialled it as acknowledgment), I clearly remember finding one sentence in particular unclear and going against what I had been told "Diamond Membership will automatically renew for a further twelve months at the end of the commitment period". I queried this and the sales representative explained that referred to the type of membership, i.e. Diamond, which had a fixed price for the life (i.e. the length of the membership) and unless I were to cancel my contract, I would continue being on a Diamond membership at the same monthly price. She laughed and again reassured me that it was definitely an initial 12 month commitment, after which it would return to a 30 days notice contract, like my old one, and that the contract was definitely NOT on a permanent 12 month basis. I was reassured and I signed (I would like to point out that two of us were actually signing up).

 

In April 2007 we cancelled our membership and cancelled the Direct Debit mandate.

 

We subsequently received an undated account overdue letter; as advised in it we contacted them: at that point it was explained to us that we had not completed our 12 month commitment . We understood from that that we must not have completed the initial 12 months we had committed to (no details of when the 12 months they were referring to started and finished were given to us, verbally or in writing). We therefore re-instated the direct debit.

 

A few weeks later we received and undated letter stating "it has been a while now since you decided to cancel your membership with us here at Virgin Active [...] until 20th July all ex members can take advantage of our fantastic half price joining offers!"

 

From a letter from Virgin Active dated 26th July 2007 it is clear that:

1) we must have contacted them to query why we had received that letter, since, although we had not used the facilities for months (certainly not between April and July or we would have noticed that our membership had in fact been cancelled) to the best of our knowledge we were still paying them as we had been previously told we had to since our contract had not terminated;

 

2) arrears for April to July and a continuation to our contract were demanded of us even though Virgin Active was clearly under the impression that we had cancelled our membership and up to the point when we contacted them they were not after any further payments from us or held us under any further contractual obligations;

 

3) we wrote to them explaining point 2 above and asking that the contract remain terminated and that no arrears were due as per point 2 above.

 

The above mentioned letter dated 26th July, explains that we had in fact set up a direct debit mandate in May (as they had demanded of us in May) but that no moneys had actually been paid because of a problem with the type of account used. The letter which is long and confusing, and which never mentions any actual contractual start or end dates, states:

"Unfortunately as you are diamond members you have a 12 month rolling commitment period to which you have only made 5 payments to your current commitment period including the arrears in question. This amount was owing to us and therefore there will be no refund".

 

All we understood from that was that Virgin Active was refusing to waive the fees between May 2007 and July 2007 (explained in point 2 above) and that we were still obliged to make payments as somehow we had still not fulfilled our contractual requirements.

As the whole situation seemed grossly unfair, and as the conversations we had had with the sales representatives prior to and whilst joining were so impressed in our minds, we completely missed and not understood the significance of the words "12-month rolling contract", which had never been used before, in paperwork or verbally, and we still remained of the understanding that our contract stipulated that after an initial 12 months period we would be on a monthly rolling contract. The whole situation was utterly confusing.

 

We ended up remaining members even though we hardly ever used the service.

 

[i would however like to point out that I now understand in retrospect that, given that Virgin Active had acknowledged that we wished to cancel our Diamond membership in April 2007, but told us we had only made five payments, Virgin Active should have stopped taking payments after a further seven payments, as we had terminated our contract according to the terms and conditions they stipulated, well within the 17th day of the last month – they’d had in fact had a full 10 months notice!!!!!!.

The fact of the matter is that Virgin Active did not stop taking payments at the end of the contractual 12 month rolling period in early 2008, but just ignored our request to cancel our membership and once again renewed the contract by a further twelve months, once again without giving us any notice!]

 

In May 2009 I once again cancelled my membership and stopped the Direct Payment Mandate with effect from June 2009 (I had been working about 90 hours a week for months and had not used the gym at least since November 2008 ) and this is when, as they demanded that I keep paying them moneys and I explained to them the terms of the contract I had agreed to back in December 2005, they started insisting that I had actually agreed to a 12 month contract which automatically renewed itself for another 12 months without any warning required from them.

 

I explained several times (verbally and in writing) that those were most definitely not the terms of the contract that were described to me by Virgin Active’s Sales Representative nor the terms that I had agreed to when I had joined; I explained that if they had actually got me on a 12 month rolling contract they had mis-sold me said contract. I therefore requested they send me a copy of my contract (twice) as I remembered going through it meticulously prior to signing it, as well as having the various in depth discussions with their sales representative.

All Virgin Active sent to me was a copy of the Transfer Form (twice).

 

The form itself is confusing as it was signed on 27/12/05, but an effective date for the transfer is not stated; however the date 1/2/06 is hand-written at the top of the form.

 

As I read this document for the first time in three years, in the light of what they were telling me now I could see that that paragraph (point 4) I had originally questioned before joining was what they were referring to (even though it does not actually use the words 12-month rolling contract, that is effectively what it is describing, whilst using the word “membership” instead of contract). I was utterly shocked and appalled and so very angry as I had been simply conned.

 

It is indicative that Virgin Active will not send me a copy of the double sided A4 contract that I had originally perused and signed. Although it is clear that this contract must exist (as this is the bit of paper which actually contains all of the terms and conditions about behaviours, right to cancellation, right to freeze the membership and so on - none of these things are indicated in the Transfer Form-), in spite of having been asked for it twice (once in writing once verbally) Virgin Active insist in only providing me with the Transfer Form.

 

It is also clear from the correspondence I received from Virgin Active that they themselves both in 2007 and more recently in 2009 are not clear about the terms of my contract and the effective dates of my contract:

 

- a letter from Virgin Active dated 18th June 2009 states "So far you have completed 38 months membership and so you have a further 10 months to complete before your membership is cancelled." This would have been a liability of £519.50 and would place the start of the 12 month rolling period in April (the last payment made was in May 09; if 10 further payments are due to the end of the 12 months rolling period, this must mean that only two had been made).

 

- However in a subsequent letter from Virgin Active dated 26th June 2009 they state "There are 7 months of your membership to complete before we cancel your contract"…This would have been a liability of £363.65 and would place the start of the 12 month rolling period in January.

 

- further still a letter from ARC dated 14th August 2009 puts the total liability to end of contract to £445.60. Even accounting for a £30 collection administration fee (which is not mentioned in this letter, but is mentioned in yet a different letter sent from Virgin Active on 22nd June 2009) that would imply liability for 8 months at £51.95, thus placing the start of the 12 month rolling period in February.

 

I am currently waiting for them to take me to a small claims court, but they haven't yet done so.

 

It is worth pointing out that Virgin Active NEVER sent me any notification that the membership was due for renewal, or that it had been renewed; not even in January 2008 which was actually the legal end of the contract I had signed as I had given notice in April 2007 that I wished to cancel my contract, and had been obliged to fulfil payments in full for the entire contractual 12 month period.

 

How could I be expected to remember when my contract was supposedly due for automatic renewal given that:

 

• I had signed this new contract several years before (a contract which I had been mis-sold in the first instance by Virgin Active’s Sales Representatives, and which ,I was therefore certain all along, had been a monthly one after an initial 12 month period, and was therefore not aware of an automatic renewal of the initial 12 month commitment [in fact what is the relevance of using the word initial at all?];
  
• Virgin Active never sent out reminder notices of the contract being up for automatic renewal or any notifications whatsoever that they had in fact automatically renewed said contract for a further 12 months.
  
• Virgin Active generated confusion throughout my dealings with them;
  
• It is evident from their correspondence that they themselves are not clear on the term dates of my contract;
  
• The only shred of paperwork I have from Virgin Active does not state a clear effective start date of the Diamond Membership contract.
  
• In all of my years of membership with Virgin Active they never sent to me ANY correspondence which stated the date terms of my contract, their correspondence would simply quote how many months were still outstanding on the commitment, and in practically all instances current analysis reveals that these were incorrect.
  

Investigations on the Web have revealed that I am not the only one to have had problems with Virgin Active and their Diamond Membership; complaints are varied and include several reported instances of mis-sold contracts just like mine was. Complaints are not limited to the UK, just today I came across an Italian group (#http://www.facebook.com/home.php#!/group.php?v=wall&ref=ts&gid=63246205928# ) incredibly similar experiences; the group is trying to guide individuals in dealing with Virgin Active and their techniques of persecution through various agencies, and advising they lodge formal complaints with [email protected] (consumer protection)

 

Quite frankly I am stunned that it is legal in this country for a company to have a silent yearly renewal policy which does not require any notification or reminder of any kind.

 

Are there any groups of ex-customers who have united to complain about Virgin Active and their actions?

 

I would be very grateful if anyone could forward me a copy of an original contract as Va are not providing me with a copy, anything would be a start ... however mine did date back to December 2005...

Edited February 5, 2010 by luciftian

[PGH7447]

Hi Luciftian

 

sorry to hear your woes with this awful company, I would suggest that you send virgin a cca request for the original agreement.

 

also these types of contracts are a real pain but stand firm, these fools eventually back down.

[luciftian]

Hi PGH7447

 

I have already requested a copy of the contract twice. Virgin only return the Transfer form.

 

I have given up wasting my time on them. If they want my money they can take me to court. I don't even get angry about it anymore - I have already wasted too much of my energy on them.

 

However, given that so many of us have such similar stories, they would have weight if we were to organise ourselves and submit them all to the relevant authorities: consumer protection, OFT, watchdog. It's too easy for the above to dismiss a singular complaint; if we were to all complain together they would need to take note, as surely we cannot all be stupid and liars.

[aSW18]

I've had a bit of an interesting development.

As the obnoxious girl on the phone yesterday told me that it was very clearly stated in my contract that I was on a rolling contract and how it worked, I thought I would try and find the paperwork. I couldn't find these supposed terms and conditions but I did find the carbon copy of my original application and direct debit mandate which included my membership number, the date, schedule for payments and the amount of my monthly direct debit (which coincides with how much has been deducted each month since Jan 2009). It also states that I will be going on the Diamond plan written as DIA on the form.

The things is, my signatures are missing! I don't know what happened that day but on both sections where I'm supposed to have signed to say I agree by the Ts & Cs and where I authorise the DD there is no signature and date from me! So I think they've actually been direct debiting from my account these past 13 months illegally and we don't actually have a contract in place. I never wanted to cancel the policy before so I've just never dug out the paperwork to check. I don't know how that happened but it's clearly my contract and there is clearly no signature!

So I think I can now actually turn the tables and threaten them with legal action instead. Going to ring the OFT and see what they say - especially as VA have told me on the phone I can't cancel and that I need to keep paying them.

I'm also going to ask VA to send me a supposed signed copy of my contract because as far as I'm concerned it doesn't exist!

 

Will let you know what happens.

[PGH7447]

see this thread, I got them on trying to say I hand made an extra 3 day payment so my contract date was the previous month, pity they could not prove the extra payment

 

http://www.consumeractiongroup.co.uk/forum/gyms-health-clubs/226934-virgin-active-[problem].html