24 Hour Fitness Membership Cancellation Class Action Lawsuit

A RICO class action lawsuit claims that despite paying the first and last month fees when joining 24 Hour Fitness, the fitness club charges members an extra month of dues when they cancel.

According to the 24 Hour Fitness class action lawsuit, 24 Hour Fitness obtains the credit card and bank account information of customers when they sign up for “Unlimited Guest Services” to automatically charge monthly membership dues using Electronic Fund Transfer (EFT). Upon signing up for a 24 Hour Fitness membership, each new member is also required to pre-pay the first and last month’s membership dues at the time of enrollment.

The 24 Hour Fitness class action lawsuit alleges that when members cancel their membership, 24 Hour Fitness makes “one additional EFT ‘tap’ to the bank or credit card accounts” of the member, and then applies the last-month dues it already has collected to the month after that. By doing so, the class action lawsuit says, 24 Hour Fitness forced Class Members to pay membership dues for a period of 60-90 days after they cancel their membership.

The 24 Hour Fitness membership class action lawsuit alleges that fitness chain does this for all such accounts at all of its 346 health clubs in 14 states. It also alleges that no Class Member has ever received a full refund of the extra “EFT tap,” even though 24 Hour Fitness never “secured valid authorization, in writing or otherwise” from Class Members to collect the final EFT tap for membership dues after their notice of cancellation.

The 24 Hour Fitness class action lawsuit is brought on behalf of all persons who were charged an EFT made by LaSalle Bank National Association or Paymentech Merchant Services, Inc., or any other payment processor, on behalf of 24 Hour Fitness for dues charges associated with an Unlimited Guest Services SPA after they filed a request for cancellation or termination of their membership.

It is seeking class certification, general damages, treble damages, punitive damages, restitution, attorneys’ and court fees, and order prohibiting 24 Hour Fitness from failing to state the cancellation policy in plain and simple language.

A copy of the 24 Hour Fitness Membership Cancellation Class Action Lawsuit can be read here.

The case is Albert Alatorre v. 24 Hour Fitness USA, Inc., Case No. 11-cv-4318, United States District Court, Northern District of California.