Long story short,

my wife has 'Perpetual' membership with Extreme Fitness signed up on March 9, 2010 and as it states on contract, completion date is March 9, 2011.
On March 9, 2010 the initial payment was processed, and starting May 1, 2010 until January 1, 2011, the remaining 9 payments were processed.
Knowing these scammers would try to take money out, I stopped the payment on January 2, 2011 so that no further payment can be processed.

My wife went to the gym on February 8, 2011 and was rejected entry due to 'non-payment' and that when I spoke to the general manager today (Feb. 9, 2011) I owe them payment for the month of February 2011 and threaten that I will hear from their collection agency.

I am acknowledged with 14 days cancellation notice and I am willing to send them out a letter, 14 days before the contract completion date, which is MARCH 9, 2011, however according to their contract, (where I do not see a section), I was supposed to give them written notice 14 days before February 1, 2011, which in their record, is the next payment date. (I found out with the bank that I did try to take a payment out of my account on February 1, 2011 but was rejected as to my request)

My complain is,
1. Where in the contract says that 14 days before February 1, 2011 was the last day to give them the written notice of termination? Does anyone see it there?
2. They froze my wife's membership, probably as of February 1, 2011 when their payment withdrawal did not go through. Isn't the membership good through Mar-09-2011 anyway?
3. I never received a letter from Extreme Fitness, (30 to 90 days before the COMPLETION DATE) for renewal or how much my month-to-month membership would cost. In the contract is says that CAN increase the monthyl membership fee up to 10%. Was I supposed to agree to it without any written proposal?
It clearly states on the contract that my wife is obligated to make 1 initial payment and 9 monthly dues payments, not 10 or 11.

I do not really care about the membership anymore. I will probably stick up my third finger to them everytime I drive by any of their locations. The fact that the general manger threaten that I will hear from their collection agency in regards to the February's payment bothers me.

Attched is the copy of the contract with all names and addresses, info removed. I also submitted a complaint to BBB Canada. Will they help me?

I think I see a pattern here.

DO NOT fill out those stupid ballots - there IS no prize. EVERYBODY wins '2nd prize', and when you invariably discover you've been scammed, they will very conveniently tell you that the representative who signed you up and lied to your face 'no longer works there'.

I 'collected my prize' at the Yonge & Dundas location from a rep named Brooks, and gave them my credit card info ONLY after I made Brooks take me through the ENTIRE contract and made him guarantee MULTIPLE times that I could cancel the contract at any time with 2 weeks written notice.
As it turned out, my new residence and the company where I started working both had on-site fitness centres, so after about a month (I hadn't had time to use the gym even once at that point), I went in with my written notice to cancel my membership - note that this was ONE month into my 4 free months.
I was directed to the manager, Alex Kumar, who told me that I was actually locked into paying $125/month after my 4 months was up, for the remaining 8 months of the year. He was extremely rude, and clearly trying to intimidate me, and kept saying, "You SIGNED a contract, it's legally binding". I asked to speak to Brooks, and was informed, surprise surprise, that HE NO LONGER WORKED THERE.
At that point, I asked them to pull up my contract to look at, and they said their computer system didn't run on weekends (?!) . I went back three days later, and Alex, once again, said that their system was down. At that point, I lost my temper a bit and told them I would instruct my credit card company not to authorize any payments to Extreme Fitness. I also said that I thought their whole 'contest' was a scam and a rip-off. At that point, Alex magically snapped into action (maybe it was due to the fact that the office was busy with a bunch of other 'contest winners' who were there to collect their prizes). Within seconds, he pulled up a scanned copy of my contract on the computer. And wouldn't you know it - my signature was nowhere on it. It was a completely different piece of paper than the one I'd signed. It then took all of ten minutes for them to cancel my membership. Just to be on the safe side, I had my credit card cancelled and replaced, so that they would not be able to sneak in any charges after terminating my account.

Sign up in April 2009 for $8/month for 2 months no contract. Told the sales person that i wanted to try this location because it's close to work and want to see how it will go. Was instructed that to cancel need to send a letter 14 days before my 2 months special expired. So i did (and they have it on file, i saw it with my 2 eyes) After couple of weeks realized that they still charging me on my card (give them the card in the first place since it's their policy and they need to have it on file so i could have my 2 month special)

So i went to interchange location, talked with the manager (he was playing a game on his computer and had a grin on his face. Completely ignored me, kept repeating that there is nothing can be done. and i shouldn't sign up in the first place now it's my problem. The girl that(sales rep.) that sign me up in the first place no longer works there, so he smiled about it. Told me leave, nothing he can do, but to add all of the downtown clubs for free. I am moving soon to Barrie, Ontario, there is no extreme there, why do i need all these downtown Toronto clubs.

Yesterday I received a call - message from an Extreme Fitness representative Alessandra Panno stating that I had won the second prize (free month membership, free consultation and 240$ towards the purchase of anything relating to the center) to a contest I had entered (I had filled out a ballot at a local restaurant). My friend, Michelle, called Allessandra back and got all the information necessary to claim our 'prize' and finally we were scheduled for an appointment to consult with her about how to get my free month and other prizes. And now that I think of it, I know why they gave Michelle a free month as well.

Like so many others have stated, they sweet talk you and get you to think that you actually won something. we were a little skeptical about signing up on a contract but for monthly fees, its 129$/month. So we asked Alessandra if we could cancel anytime during the contract as we might be moving away. She said and I quote 'Oh yes, for sure, no problem there. Here hold on, it's written here on the contract...' She paused because she couldn't find it then said 'Hold on, I'll go see the manager'.

We waited a minute or so and when she came back she said 'Yes, there's no problem there, all we need i proof that you moved at least 25 km's away.' So we signed without actually reading through the whole contract and they now also have our credit card information. Alessandra clearly stated 'We need your credit card information on file to process all the information. We weren't quite done yet.

A dude came along and booked us for an assessment evaluation as to where we were physically. Both Michelle and I didn't really want this physical assessment as we just wanted to hop on a treadmill and do our own thing... But they pressured us into one. And then we shook hands and left.

When we got home, I really didn't like the way they pressured us into getting an assessment done so Michelle called and asked if we could skip that and just get access to do our own thing in the gym... They didn't want to. Michelle spoke with a manager and he told us and i quote again 'It's the first time in my life that I've heard people say they don't want a free assessment done'. Oh really? well there's always a first and I'm not proud of my body and don't need anyone telling me how bad it is, that's why I don't want... I can assess myself thank you.

So michelle got really upset with the way they handled the situation and I told her to nevermind my so called 'prize' and call back to cancel everything. What do you know... nobody was available. We have 10 days to cancel and this is day 2... I will be going there tomorrow, in person to cancel everything and I will show them that they are committing FALSE PRETENCES. I've read many cases of individuals who fell victim to their scam... and it's not right!!!

I am sure I won't be able to get out of it unless drastic measures are taken. Whatever it takes, whatever I have to do, whoever wants to help... I've got a few teachers and old co-workers who have worked all their lives in the law enforcement field and I have personally attended college and have basic knowledge regarding the Canadian Law. We have rights and Extreme Fitness is taking them away from us. We put our trust in to this company and they put our money in their account.

FALSE PRETENCE is a representation of fact, either past or present, by words or otherwise known to be false, made with fraudulent intent or to induce a person to act on it.

I decided to get a gym membership at Extreme fitness in February. Several people told me not to go there because they rip you off and continue to charge your account after you cancel it. I decided to go there anyways because I figured it would not happen to me and that I would take care of it when the time came. When setting up my account I was told that I would be the primary on my account if I decided to add someone to it. I was also told that they do not do paper bills and that I would have to give them my credit card number so they may bill me every month. I paid the outrageous membership fee and agreed on forty dollars coming out of my account every month.

I went to the gym for a couple months and kept checking my account to see that they had not pulled any money out of my account. I called the gym and they could not locate my account and said they do not deal with billing. They instructed me to call the company that does the billing, ABC financial. After waiting several minutes I was transfered to someone who had no idea what was going on. She tried to locate my account and decided that I did not exist and that I was simply not being billed. Well that didn't make any sense so I once again called the gym and they told me not to worry about it. I asked them to have a manager call me back and of course no one did. April came around and I still hadn't been billed. Again I called giving them the other girl on my account, and they said again that I didn't exist. I gave them my agreement number that the gym had given me and she still couldn't find me. I called the gym again and of course they gave me the run around. Every time I called the gym they simply stated that someone would call me back and that it would be pointless for me to come in.

So, I went in, they looked up my account by the second person on my account. I asked him if he was sure that was the correct account because I was suppose to be the primary and that didn't make any sense. He said 'yea this is you, here is the right agreement number.' So I left and called ABC financial yet again. The person on the phone was again incompetent. I gave her the agreement number and explained to her what had happened. She claimed she had found my account and asked me if I lived off of college view. I said no that must be the wrong account. (The other person on my account has a very common name, so it was very plausible that there would two people with her name going to this gym). She insisted that was me and began to enter my current information in place of hers! She told me that I had been going to the gym since October. I tried explaining again to her that that was not my account and that she had just replaced someone elses information with mine because that was not my address nor the second person on the account. She also gave me the other persons credit card! Which I told her I don't have a credit card with those numbers and that this was again not my account. She basically just talked to me like I was a crazy person and created more problems for the company she works for.

By doing this she made it more difficult for me to located my account. I kept calling and began to feel very helpless. The gym would send me to ABC and ABC would send me back to the gym. They made it impossible for me to pay my bill. All I wanted to do was pay them. After going through this mess I decided that it would be best to cancel my account because it was causing so much stress that I didn't need, and ruining my perfect credit. Again I called in June and tried to find my account and cancel it. They kept taking me to the wrong account that wasn't mine. I finally talked to someone who found my account through another name and the wrong address and she told me that I had been sent to collections! I was furious! Here I was trying to pay them thinking my account didn't even exist and maybe I didn't owe them anything and I had been sent to collections. I was never billed and the agreement they made with me was false. She continued to tell me that she couldn't and wouldn't help me because now it had been sent to collections. She told me to call the gym and they would deal with it. Well I have been calling the gym for two weeks twice a day and still have not received an email or a phone call. They won't even talk to me there! So now I have decided to take them to Better business because of their lack of interest in one of their paying customers. I'd also like to add that when I called the collections company they had no problem finding me and I paid my bill in full that was suppose to be over several months.

I found extreme fitness's staff to be rude and not helpful. They were not knowledgeable of their job and could not even tell me the number to their corporate. ABC financial employees incompetent employees and I will never go through any company that uses them.