L.A. Fitness Hit With Membership Con Class Action Lawsuit

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The national gym chain L.A. Fitness and its owner, Fitness International LLC, was hit with a putative class action lawsuit alleging that the company tricked members into signing a membership extension by stating it was only for a month, when members were actually charged for a year.

Lead plaintiff Beau Briones claims that an L.A. Fitness representative tricked him into signing on for a whole extra year-long membership.

The plaintiff alleges that when he asked to cancel his membership after a sales associate had extended it by, what the plaintiff thought was a month, he found that he had been conned into a whole extra year of membership fees.

According to the L.A. Fitness class action lawsuit, Briones was subject to high pressure sales techniques when he asked to cancel his membership in November of 2014. As a result, the plaintiff alleges that he agreed to pay for an extra month at his previous agreed rate of $140 and paid the gym for the extension the following day in cash.

Briones claims that a L.A. Fitness’ sales representative then had him sign an electronic device that only showed the signature line and allegedly did not indicate that he would be authorizing an extra year of membership fees along with automatic debits from his bank account to cover those fees.

The plaintiff further alleges in the L.A. Fitness gym membership class action lawsuit that he did not expect the company to debit $110 from his bank account in the following three weeks and continue the charges until early March.

Briones claims that he was charged $2,860 for a year-long membership he did not agree to and was told by L.A. Fitness representatives that he could only cancel the agreement if he became disabled.

“Upon learning this,” the class action complaint states, “plaintiff felt ripped off and cheated by the defendants.” “Such tactics rely on falsities and have a tendency to mislead and deceive a reasonable consumer,” continued the complaint.

According to the class action lawsuit, L.A. Fitness and its parent company violated both federal and California consumer protection laws with their sales tactics and debiting members’ financial accounts without their authorization.

If approved, the L.A. Fitness membership class action lawsuit would be open to Class Members whose bank accounts were debited by Fitness International without authorization, written or otherwise, over the past year, along with a subclass of California residents.

The plaintiff also proposes to represent a class of California residents over 65 years old whose rights under the Financial Elder Abuse Act were allegedly violated by L.A. Fitness’ sales practices similarly to the plaintiff’s.

According to the L.A. Fitness class action, the plaintiff is seeking damages on behalf of the class that may exceed $5 million. The plaintiff contends that the proposed class will have more than 100 members nationwide. Briones is also seeking an order from the court requiring L.A. Fitness to publish notifications of its misconduct in its gyms.

Another class action against L.A. Fitness over liability waivers was recently dismissed by a federal judge in New Jersey. In that case, the judge found that the plaintiff in that case had failed to establish that her membership fees were linked to the waiver.

Briones is represented by Todd M. Friedman and Adrian R. Bacon of The Law Offices of Todd M. Friedman, P.C.

The L.A. Fitness Membership Con Class Action Lawsuit is Beau Briones, et al. v. Fitness International LLC et al., Case No. 8:16-cv-00044 in the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California.

UPDATE: On Sept. 8, 2016, the Court was notified that the parties reached a settlement. The terms of the proposed LA Fitness class action settlement have not yet been disclosed.