The Department of Trade and Industry has virtually admitted that they have no existing policy on the collection of gym membership fees, especially those covering the period when gyms were still closed.
It was only recently that the DTI and the Interagency Task Force for the Management of Infectious Diseases (IATF) allowed gyms to resume operations under the General Community and Modified General Community Quarantine classifications.
Advocates recently received information about a gym operating in Pasig City which was still charging its customers even though they have already cancelled their memberships. Ina Magpale-Asirit was a member of Anytime Fitness Capitol Commons. She said she was charged for the month of March, which happened to be the first month when lockdown was first implemented. After failing to get a refund, Ina decided to have her gym membership account frozen. But then, come October, she was again charged P2000 by the gym. Ina complained that the gym did not even ask her if she would like to continue, freeze, or cancel her membership before they charged her account.
She e-mailed the gym but did not get an immediate response. When she finally got a hold of them, she asked for an appointment. At that meeting, Ina got the gym to cancel her account and that of her three staff members. She paid the cancellation fees and residual charges. But, upon arriving home, she received a bank notification of yet another automatic payment on top of the settlement she had just made. At first, the gym denied charging Ina again and even blamed what happened on their system. The manager later admitted that he made a mistake charging her for another transaction. He reversed the error and e-mailed an apology to Ina.
Another user on the Anytime Fitness Philippines thread talked about his experience at a different branch. “This started when I got a call from AF Eton Westend Square around June 2020 asking if I would want to freeze my account. I replied "Yes I wanted to" since the pandemic was still high at the time and it was quite difficult to pay additional bills. I asked them what was the maximum number of months I could freeze my account and they said "Three months. Please email us for the request." I was amazed by this since they reached out first so I emailed them as soon as I ended the call. A couple of months went by and gyms were still closed so of course, no billing will be given to us since it was closed. I even emailed them if I could cancel my membership last August as well even though I recently joined again and still under contract. Eventually September 2020 came by and when I got my SOA for my credit card, there was an unexpected expense that was billed so I checked on this and found out that it was AF. My brother was a regular in AF but he did not experience any of this. So I messaged them and then they called. I asked why was I billed when I emailed for a maximum freezing time of 3 months? They replied that my email was June 2020 and I should have emailed September 2020. First, in my email, I did not mention a specific month/s on when the freezing will start because I did not know when the gym will be open during the time so it will be applied once gyms are allowed to operate. Second, I did not receive any text or call mentioning that the branch will be open or I was going to be billed. Third, I contacted them about this, talked on the phone and kept insisting that I should have emailed last September 2020. Isn't it common sense that the freezing period would not start if you guys are closed?!”
We reached out to Anytime Fitness to ask for any explanation on the auto charging and non-cancellation of membership of Ina.
The company said that what happened to Ina’s account was an isolated case and that they addressed the issue immediately as soon as the problem was discovered. “We are committed to continuing to provide training and development for our staff with the goal to improve our customer service. We strive to make our members’ journey as convenient and as safe as possible,” they added.
We asked DTI if they have existing policies covering these situations. It appears that they do not. The DTI’s Fair Trade Enforcement Bureau told us that they have not been made aware of this and encouraged affected consumers to file a complaint. A representative said that the existing policy only covers health protocols.
A clear policy on the collection of gym membership fees would have been a big help to those who ended up being charged for those months when the gyms were not even operational. The DTI is supposed to assist the public and grievances like these should not be ignored.
A lot of people have lost their jobs and income because of the pandemic. Assistance should be provided to help them keep whatever amount of money they still have.
