In January 2012, my husband purchased a Groupon for Extreme Fitness. It was for a 2-month membership, for $24. He went to redeem it in March, but they would not allow him to redeem it unless he gave his credit card. He specifically told the sales person he did not want to be a yearly member. They did not state they were signing him up for a yearly membership, even though this is what they did. They did not tell him he would have to cancel within the first ten days (as per Ontario law) in order to cancel without penalty.
After the first two months were up, we received our Visa bill and saw my husband had been charged for his first month of membership. He emailed the rep and told them to cancel his membership. They never replied. He emailed them several more times and they did not reply. We called and they did not return our calls (their voice mail boxes were full). They kept billing us for subsequent months. We cancelled the credit card.
This month we received a letter stating we owe them $173 for the past several months, and if we don't pay, a third-party collector will be sent for us. We called them to cancel the membership but were met with excuses such as "you had to cancel in the first 10 days", or "you signed the contract".
Yes, he signed the contract, but the contract was a big stack of paper and the sales rep was being pushy and aggressive. Of course he didn't read through all the fine print, which is exactly what the rep hoped. We realize this was a big mistake on our part, but my husband did not expect what should have been a 2-month promotion from Groupon turning into the cost of a year's membership, a big hassle, and the potential to ruin our credit ratingespecially when Extreme Fitness is the one being deceitful.
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