No Issue and Who Gives A Crap not being able to meet their toilet paper orders or giving refunds under the ACL.
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We can always trust business to do the right thing, while our business friendly legislators refuse to enact lemon laws for vehicles, price gouging laws, and are happy for voluntary non-binding codes of conduct to replace mandates.
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Absolutely disgusting.
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I joined Fitness Passport in January 2020, a nod towards a resolution to get fit for me and my kids. When COVID 19 broke out and Gyms and Pools closed in March 2020. I cancelled my account. Fitness Passport charged me a cancellation fee of $275. I refused to pay as I could not access the services contracted and still today the public health recommendation it not to use public swimming pools. Fitness Passport send a debt collector and have now charged me $335 which I have paid as I do not want a bad credit rating. I am raising this as a consumer right issue and I would like CHOICE to investigate on my behalf.
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Hi @mbell, welcome to the community. I have moved your post to this thread as it contains information about other businesses behaving badly during the COVID-19 pandemic.
It is a shame that some businesses which can’t deliver services take the strict letter of their T&Cs and penalise their customers when they are unable to deliver the services they have been contracted to provide.
As you have terminated the contract, Passport Fitness T&Cs make it clear that early termination of a fixed contract results in cancellation fees, namely $275 in your case. While it may be legally possible for them to do so, enforcing such cancellation fees when neither the customer nor the business is at fault in relation to failure to deliver services (due to government restrictions) is very poor business practice. They could have prevented cancellations like yours, I suspect, by suspending memberships during the COVID restrictions and then reinstating them after gym access was possible.
In hindsight, it may have also been better to, rather than cancel the membership, write to them stating that under the Australian Consumer Law they can’t deliver on the services outlined in the contract with them, and under the ACL they need to provide a resolution suitable for both parties. This may have included termination of the contract by them (at no cost to you) or suspension of the contract using forced majure as the reason.
As outlined elsewhere and for our own accommodation business, we allowed guests who booked with us to cancel bookings without penalty where they could not fulfil the booking due to COVID-19 restrictions. We took this approach as it wasn’t our guests fault that they could not fulfil the booking and we decided that we shouldn’t be penalising them for something outside their (or our) control. To me the action of the gym is like our accommodation burning down and then guests cancelling when they found out…and for us then to charge cancellation fees eventhough they couldn’t stay in the accommodation anyway…a reasonable person would think this would be totally unreasonable.
What the COVID-19 shows is which businesses try and look after their customers first, rather than looking after themselves at the expense of or cost to their customer.
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Welcome to the Community @MBell and I’m sorry to hear of your problems.
CHOICE has done an article on Gym memberships that may provide some guidance for you.
You may wish to read the posts up above as they may offer some helpful hints as to what you may be able to do. I don’t think CHOICE will investigate a claim for you but they do offer advice on what steps you can take. This is done through their CHOICE Help Service if you are a member. I am also sure they will be interested in your problem. They may make contact with you in regards to it, to better understand what the Gym industry might be up to.
What follows I have previously offered as similar advice to another Community member. You may be interested in the description of what a Major Failure is when it comes to services that is included in that post.
First steps for you would be to make a formal complaint by letter or email to the Gym outlining what you would like them to do in regards to your problem if you haven’t already done so, this is probably repayment of the fees you have been charged. You should give them a reasonable time in which to respond eg 7 business days. Send the letter by email or Registered post so that you have proof that it was sent. If they do not respond to your demand or they refuse your demand then you can lodge a complaint with your Office of Fair Trading or with your Civil & Administrative Appeals Tribunal. You need to put your demand in writing because if you wish to go further with your complaint the authorities who deal with the complaints require proof that you have tried to resolve the issue before you escalated the complaint to them.
You can also make a complaint to the ACCC but they are unlikely to take action in a single case unless their threshold for taking action has been reached, but they do use the information to better understand when and if action by them should be taken.
CHOICE provides a checklist of what to do, some Templates for creating your email/letter and some other helpful contact addresses at https://www.choice.com.au/topics/choice-help-service.
The ACCC also provide advice & a Template for similar emails/letters at Contacting a business to fix a problem | ACCC & Contacting a business to fix a problem | ACCC.
You should seek some legal advice about what you can do and there is certainly free legal advice centres that you can use. On this site we have a topic that lists a few for each State and Territory, this isn’t a complete list and in your area there may be some more that offer Community Legal advice. The list on this site can be found at
I hope you have success in your case.
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Many people have fallen into a similar trap across many businesses in many industries. The crux of your problem is that according to the T&C as expressed in their FAQ if a member cancels there is a fee.
https://fitnesspassport.freshdesk.com/support/solutions/articles/43000029151-how-do-i-cancel-
In contrast there is a ‘suspend’ documented on this page
Based on the information in the ‘Reopening Dates’ pages, it is implied that monthly direct debits were paused while the gyms in one’s respective state was closed per Membership direct debits will recommence shortly after in line with your previous direct debit dates. It is conceivable, but not written I could find, that for those who prepaid the time was suspended and the period gyms were closed in one’s state might be added to the end of a membership.
Have you contacted Fitness Passport to discuss, possibly get a credit toward rejoining, or otherwise negotiate?
FWIW the ACCC has issued advice on travellers cancelling tours before the touring company took action, as well as for event venues, and the ACCC advice was to read the T&C because they apply.
Edit:
Debt collectors have two business models AFAIK. One is working on commission and get a percentage of whatever they collect; the other is some debt collection companies actually buy the debt for cents on the dollar and make their money from whatever they can collect. In the latter case if the debt is $100, they buy it for $50, and if they can collect the $100+fees, say $135, they have made $85 on their ‘investment’. Sometimes they will never collect and lose their $50.
In either case once it goes to a debt collector chances of negotiating much with the original company one did business with become slim.
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The Federal Government must consider that there is not enough complaints about essential item price gouging or votes in it to warrant any action, so we have no action. More consumers need to complain and maybe Choice should start a petition for legislation to protect consumes from price gouging on essential items.
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However I get a dark chuckle from the ‘…during a global pandemic’, suggesting it might be OK during normal times 
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An article regarding airline passengers having their flight cancelled unless they upgrade to Business or First Class.
Pity the article does not name the grubs but perhaps the 7:30 program on ABC TV tonight will.
Lorna Jane forced to change branding of its “anti virus” clothing line.
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Changing the branding/marketing only after being called out should not be without penalty. Unfortunately Lorna Jane is not on my shopping list, hence avoiding their stores will have zero impact. Hopefully others make a conscious decision to shop elsewhere.
No comment on what the ACCC may be considering, however the TGA may also have an interest per the report. Any formal outcome may see Lorna Jane tarred with the same brush as Pete Evans (well one of his companies?) which was fined In an action brought by the TGA for misleading claims.
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I think the concept has great potential. What about grub-repellent brassieres and T-shirts, and spirochete-proof underpants.
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The clothing industry has being doing and getting away with it for centuries. Clothing that promises to deliver outcomes that can never be realised.
Fashionista style tip:
My one fashion tip, is that no matter how expensive tight fitting clothing is, or how flattering the sales assistant is at fitting, if your bum sags, it will still sag. We are all free to insert any other aged bodily variance as appropriate, all of which are invisible to the well trained sales assistant. If I ever need a new partner, in later life, clothing store sales assistants may be a good choice given their ability to not see imperfections in the human form!
Passing off their (Lorna Jane) clothing line with false promise, was just business as usual. 
And it has come to pass.
Will $40,000 hurt the bottom line?
Possibly not so much as the negative publicity, or do die hard Lorna Jane customers have more in common with Jeep customers than we might imagine.
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An article regarding grubby landlords refusing to provide assistance to their struggling tenants.
Absolutely disgusting.
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The prospect of having a tenant in place with a business that has hope of future prospects, vs the prospect of an empty retail space and no one looking to gamble the last of their life savings on starting a new business, prior experience lacking. The gambler looks to be more likely the landlord. New tenants may be in very short supply.
Every landlords financial circumstances are different. Although most would be in a better position with the banks to negotiate a loan extension given assets than most tenants with goodwill (not negotiable for much these days) the greater value on their ledger.
Thoughts qualified as variously an ex owner, lessor and lessee of commercial property.
Memory has it that the Federal Govt made commitments some few months back to ensure this did not become a problem for the future. Short memory?
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The federal government put the onus on the states who, as usual each seem to have done their own thing differently all together
https://www.workplaceassured.com.au/news/commercial-rent-relief-a-state-by-state-breakdown
Small but important differences appear to exist, such as some states requiring enrolment in Jobkeeper and others just eligiblity for Jobkeeper. The onus is always on the business to document to the landlord they are affected and eligible. Most states seem to leave how that is done to the negotiation so a landlord seems able to set whatever bar they want up to forcing the tenant to produce their ATO accounts.
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$40,000 is just a joke in terms of impact on the Company particularly with the views that LJ herself seems to have made previously (before the action took place). So what it appears to me is that it is just a small slap, they probably sold a lot more than 40K worth of these goods before action was taken. And so a great outcome financially for the business with a small reprimand to be more careful in future not to get caught, because the only sin is getting caught (my opinion only not a statement of fact).
Weak efforts as far as my opinion matters by those who are supposed to enforce rigourous compliance.
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