I sent an email to my gym in June last year asking if I could put my membership on hold as I was pregnant and unable to use the gym for a while. I said it would be at least May this year before I returned. I was no longer under a contract as my 12 month minimum term was up but I didn't want to cancel in case I wanted to go back after I had my baby and then had to re-sign a 12 month contract. I never got a response to the email but the payments stopped coming out so I assumed they had cancelled my membership.
At the start of May, I had a random payment taken out of my account for the usual membership fee. I was quite a surprised as to how they can just start taking out money again without contacting me. I called up on the Tuesday and the girl I spoke to had no idea what was going on. I asked her to cancel my membership but she said she would get someone to call me back the next day to go over it.
That did not happen, so I called back again on the Friday and spoke to the same girl. Same story, she couldn't help so she promised someone would call me back the next morning. Yet again, no call. So I waited until Tuesday and called again and yet again I get the same girl with the same story. I was quite frustrated at this point, but remained calm. She assured me someone will call me the next morning. At 4:30pm the next afternoon I finally received the call.
This was a different girl, she says they did send a reply to my email confirming my membership was on hold until May. I said I never received that email so I assumed you'd cancelled it. She was very rude and said I shouldn't assume anything. She said they got a bounce back as they email didn't go through because whoever sent it didn't put the right email address in. I said that was not my fault if they don't check their emails properly.
She said I would not get a refund and I need to give 30 days notice to cancel my membership. I said I was unable to go and do that (for reasons I shouldn't need to explain to her), but she said that's the only way I could cancel. So, I sent another email addressed to the owner of the gym. This email went over everything that had happened and I asked if she could contact me to help sort it out. I have still not received a response to that email and that was over 2 weeks ago.
They have since taken another fortnight's payment out of my account so I have had my bank cut them off.
I posted something on Facebook last night to see if anyone had a similar story and if they got their money back. There were a lot of people had the same problems with this gym, so its not the first case. The post started to get out of control with nastiness towards the gym so I removed it before they saw it. However, someone else saw it and has told them. I got a phone call this morning from them saying if I did not take back what I said, they would take legal action. I then told then that I was taking legal action to get the $80 they took out of my account illegally. That's where the conversation ended.
So, my questions are:
A: Can they just start deducting money from my account without contacting me first?
B: Do I still need to give the 30 days notice if I am no longer under contract?
C: Can they take legal action if what I said on Facebook was 100% accurate?
D: Is there any chance of me getting my $80 back under Australian Consumer Law?
I've never been in this situation before. I am so mad over this. I just want my $80 back. Please give me some advice as to what to do next, thanks.
At the start of May, I had a random payment taken out of my account for the usual membership fee. I was quite a surprised as to how they can just start taking out money again without contacting me. I called up on the Tuesday and the girl I spoke to had no idea what was going on. I asked her to cancel my membership but she said she would get someone to call me back the next day to go over it.
That did not happen, so I called back again on the Friday and spoke to the same girl. Same story, she couldn't help so she promised someone would call me back the next morning. Yet again, no call. So I waited until Tuesday and called again and yet again I get the same girl with the same story. I was quite frustrated at this point, but remained calm. She assured me someone will call me the next morning. At 4:30pm the next afternoon I finally received the call.
This was a different girl, she says they did send a reply to my email confirming my membership was on hold until May. I said I never received that email so I assumed you'd cancelled it. She was very rude and said I shouldn't assume anything. She said they got a bounce back as they email didn't go through because whoever sent it didn't put the right email address in. I said that was not my fault if they don't check their emails properly.
She said I would not get a refund and I need to give 30 days notice to cancel my membership. I said I was unable to go and do that (for reasons I shouldn't need to explain to her), but she said that's the only way I could cancel. So, I sent another email addressed to the owner of the gym. This email went over everything that had happened and I asked if she could contact me to help sort it out. I have still not received a response to that email and that was over 2 weeks ago.
They have since taken another fortnight's payment out of my account so I have had my bank cut them off.
I posted something on Facebook last night to see if anyone had a similar story and if they got their money back. There were a lot of people had the same problems with this gym, so its not the first case. The post started to get out of control with nastiness towards the gym so I removed it before they saw it. However, someone else saw it and has told them. I got a phone call this morning from them saying if I did not take back what I said, they would take legal action. I then told then that I was taking legal action to get the $80 they took out of my account illegally. That's where the conversation ended.
So, my questions are:
A: Can they just start deducting money from my account without contacting me first?
B: Do I still need to give the 30 days notice if I am no longer under contract?
C: Can they take legal action if what I said on Facebook was 100% accurate?
D: Is there any chance of me getting my $80 back under Australian Consumer Law?
I've never been in this situation before. I am so mad over this. I just want my $80 back. Please give me some advice as to what to do next, thanks.
