LA Fitness

"I wish they would update the equipment. Then that it’s a good gym with good gym etiquette, everyone mind their business."

"If you're thinking about joining this gym, run away and run away fast. We all know about the fitness industry's track record of dishonestly, overcharging, hidden fees, and sleezy sales tactics, but the people running this LA Fitness take lying to an entirely new level, especially their general manager, Von. It must be a systemic issue stemming from the way LA Fitness trains their managers, or quite possibly doesn't train them at all. Here's my experience. My 16 year old son wanted to join a gym, and this was the closest gym to our house. He looked into the costs, and we decided to sign him up. While doing so, it came down to two options: a seventy dollar annual fee and $20 per month, or no upfront fees and $30 dollars per month. We were told that both of those options were "local club only" deals meaning he couldn't go to any other location but this one. I was asked for a credit card, but being leery of being overcharged, opted to pay cash instead. I was then charged double the monthly amount after being told that all memberships were required to pay first and last month's fees at sign up. Fast forward 30 days, I dropped my son at the gym, and get a call 3 minutes later that they won't let him in. I return to the gym and ask to speak to the manager and for the first time met Von, the GM. This man proceeded to tell me that if my son wanted to come in, we owed $30 for his monthly fee, and $79 for his annual fee. I explained that we signed up for the $30 / month package with no annual fee at which point Von told his first of many lies and said "That's not an option." I told him that we had never been told there was an annual fee (on top of the annual fee we opted out of by paying extra monthly) and that we didn't agree to that. He then said that it was LA Fitness corporate who charged every single person in the country this annual fee, which I suspect was lie number two. I asked why we would be assessed a fee from LA Fitness corporate when we signed up for the local only deal and weren't allowed to go to any other LA Fitness. He then got combative, took a condescending tone, and told me to look at the name of the business on the front of the building. Again I asked why the national LA Fitness would charge an annual fee for people who were prohibited from using their services nationally. He had no explanation for this and said "It's their business." I asked him to show me where it was disclosed in the paperwork we signed, which should have been a simple enough request even for somebody with Von's limited mental capability. He then proceeded to pull up a blank contract on his computer for a package that wasn't the package we signed up for, and pointed at an annual fee, (lie number 3). My son pointed out that the package he was showing us on the screen wasn't the package we signed up for and asked if he could pull up the package we signed up for. Von refused, simply saying "All packages have that fee." (I assume that was lie #4, otherwise... no reason to hide from us the screen we were looking at when my son signed up). At this point, I said, "Let me show you the screen that we saw when we signed up" and I pulled out my phone and showed Von a picture that I took while my son was being signed up of the screen disclosing the fees. Just like we had claimed, the picture shows $30 a month with no annual fee. Von responded by saying, the pic (taken of LA Fitness' system, displayed on Von's own computer) was the wrong screen. Lie number 5. I asked Von if he was sure he wanted to do this explaining that I would write honest reviews depicting my experience on every possible site alerting people that he was trying to rip folks off and reiterated that when we specifically asked if there were any other fees and were told there were not. Von told me that it's my right to post as many reviews as I want and it wasn't him who told us that there weren't any additional fees so he was in no way responsible for something that one of his employees said, as if the law doesn't say the exact opposite. LA Fitness must not train these people at all."

"As a traveling senior lady, I have exercised at a lot of gyms…. Beyond measure! THIS La Fitness is a 5 Star; Friendly, Clean, Huge variety of class options, professional staff, safe, well organized…. And on and on!!! THANK YOU!"

"I've been training at this gym for a few months now and cleaning is always poor. The bathrooms look like they've never been cleaned, they always have a bad smell, the employees don't seem to be trained to make the environment clean and comfortable, they simply don't care, they just keep talking and using their cell phones. Mirrors haven't known what a Windex is for a few years now. I love the location of the gym, but the cleanliness and hygiene of the place is far from ideal"

"The facility looks dated and dilapidated. Dull lighting, sanitizer stations broken or often empty, the lights in the racquetball courts are often out or the brightness amongst bulbs is different, which affects visibility when you have darker areas and are trying to track a fast moving ball. The flooring in the courts is just plain miserable, some door handles stick, and they don’t care to fix or replace any of it. The staff is eager to sign you up but once you are a member the service level is poor. I stayed a member for a few years trying to overlook the issues, but there were too many to ignore and affected my experience negatively. And the worst part… they intentionally make it difficult to cancel your membership. They require you to visit in-person even though you can sign up instantly online. When you do go in, they don’t let you cancel during business hours - only Mon-Fri, only 9-5 and even then you must meet a specific person who will keep trying to talk you out canceling. So if you work a 9-5 and want to cancel later in the day or on the weekends, you are SOL. If you frequent the gym after 5 and were hoping you can cancel on your next workout visit, not gonna happen. You will have to take time off of work to comply with their schedule. And if the one person who can cancel you membership isn’t there, you will have to take more time off of work and try again. These restrictions are intentional so as to prolong their revenue stream. By making you jump through hoops and make it difficult to cancel, LA Fitness succeeds in wearing you down and hopes you forget to cancel altogether since we all have busy lives, and that means more $$ for them until you remember again snd make time to cancel. Good riddance!"