Want to cancel your memebership?? ... well, please drive to the nearest LA Fitness and try to find a manager ... not a rep taking new members but an actual manager, the reps can't help you to cancel. I went twice to my neighborhood LA Fitness to try to cancel my membership and the manager was 'not available at the moment'.
https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2023/03/...
https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/p064202_negativ...
https://consumer.ftc.gov/consumer-alerts/2023/03/pros-and-co...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9CWbc6pekd8&t=1310s ("We have a complaint database, we collect information, and are always eager for information" -- FTC Chair Lina Khan at Y Combinator)
More of a value-based pricing thing, LA fitness costs more per month than Planet Fitness and is also a much smaller market.
Somewhat tangent, but everyone says "nvidia doesn't play nicely on Linux", I've never seen that! I've installed cuda, switched to cuda drivers/nvidia proprietary (non-cuda) drivers, FOSS Nouveau drivers, ran x11, wayland, never seen a bona fide issue. I'm not denying others' experiences, but dont make up your mind before you try. worst I've seen is laptops that have dual video cards (nvida + intel, for instance), but that's on par with any other Linux snafu you could have, it goes with the territory.
Apparently there's a thing called a "force post" that the merchant can do, which blasts right through Privacy.com's veil. I didn't understand this until they explained it to me:
> From: Sigourney (Privacy)
> Jun 1, 2022, 5:21 PM EDT > Hi, [Name]
> I've been reviewing your dispute and wanted to touch base with you to explain what happened.
> It appears that the disputed charge is a "force post" by the merchant. This happens when a merchant cannot collect funds for a transaction after repeated attempts and completes the transaction without an authorization — it's literally an unauthorized transaction that's against payment card network rules. It's a pretty sneaky move used by some merchants, and unfortunately, it's not something Privacy can block.
> We are refunding the transaction to the original funding source used for this purchase. You should see this refund reflected in your bank statement in the next 5 business days. However, please note that since this merchant uses force posts, they will continue to do this monthly until the subscription is cancelled. Please contact them to have the subscription cancelled.
> Let me know if you have any questions or concerns!
Okay, so Privacy refunded it, and I'm not clear whether they ate that cost or if they pulled some lever to claw-back the money from the NYT, but the fact that this is even possible in the first place is alarming, and it completely shattered my idea of what Privacy.com is even good for.
They somehow sucked $25 right through that.
This is all like trying to cancel an apartment lease by not paying your rent for a few months.
You might get lucky and they decide it’s not worth it to pursue it, but they still have a legal claim to that money.
No, it’s not.
No, it might be a tort. It is almost never (the few exceptions are things like failure to pay child support) a crime.
There's a contract between LA fitness and someone commiting fraud with my CC. My identity can't be stolen because I still have it - LA Fitness has been defrauded by a 3rd party and they shouldn't involve me in their mess.
If you've been going for nine months, good luck. They'll pull up all the photos they automatically took of you entering the doors to check in.
In this case, your argument was that you never had a contract with them in the first place. But this would be hard to believe if you actually used their services. Your cancellation email would undermine this argument even more, as you don't request cancellation if you don't have a contract.
So a court could perfectly well decide that the gym acted in breach of the law by making it deliberately hard to cancel, but that you acted in breach of the law too by stopping payment without even trying to cancel.
If you argue that you made your best effort to cancel, as documented by the email, that would be a more convincing argument I think (not a lawyer tho) but that's a different argument than claiming there never was a contract at all.
Obviously, nowhere in the communications with the gym I'd acknowledge there is any contract. It's no different than going to a grocery store: just because I've been using it for years doesn't mean there's any contract, even if the grocery stores believes so.
I’d know, I’ve won 17 Nobel prizes.
It's far from ideal, and the process should be easier but keeping the membership is costing you actual money and a solution is possible with a little extra effort. That effort shouldn't be necessary but we live in the world that exists not the world that should exist.
:)