Wigan gym compensates customers after banking glitch

Xercise4Less, based on Chapel Lane in Wigan, permanently closed last year with memberships automatically transferred to JD Gyms Wigan.

Members who did not want to go ahead with this change could simply cancel their direct debit with the bank.

However, some members have reported receiving emails demanding payment for “overdue” payments while they said direct debits had been set up which had took money.

Xercise4Less and JD Gyms bosses said the issue had been redressed and caused by an error which was made by the company which processes the direct debits.

They said that only a small number of customers had been affected and that they are being contacted and refunded.

One concerned member who was impacted said they wanted to raise awareness to other members who may have faced the issue.

The member, who wanted to call themselves Nick, from Wigan, said: “We cancelled our direct debits, as instructed by Xercise4Less, and the following day we both received emails demanding payment for ‘overdue’ payments.

“Fast forward, and we discovered that JD Gyms had set up new direct debits and taken money for two gym memberships on January 4.

“Gym memberships we never set up or agreed to, and were never informed were being set up.

“We never received any communication regarding direct debits being set up.

“We’d followed their own instructions to prevent these gym memberships from being set up, and I’d even wrote to them on December 1 explicitly stating that we did not want these memberships at JD Gyms.”

Nick said they have contacted the bank and reversed the direct debit payments, and have tried to contact JD Gyms management about the issue, but is concerned that others may be affected by this.

Nick said: “Firstly, I am concerned that others may have followed the instructions directly from Xercise4Less to cancel their direct debits, but that others could have been scared into making payments that weren’t due when they received emails demanding ‘overdue’ payments as we did.

“Secondly, I’m concerned that others who have followed the instructions directly from Xercise4Less have also had money taken from their bank accounts this month by JD Gyms, just like we have, but that some people may not even notice for many months if they do not regularly check on their bank statements.”

Nick added: “I understand mistakes can happen, but here we have two separate Xercise4Less gym memberships that were transferred to JD Gyms despite us both following instructions from Xercise4Less to prevent this transfer.”

A spokespman for Xercise4Less and JD Gyms said: “Unfortunately, a localised error was made by the company who process our Direct Debits, affecting a very small percentage of X4Less members, where a subsequent payment was incorrectly taken post cancellation.

“An investigation into this error has already been undertaken with our Direct Debit company and the affected members are in the process of being contacted and refunded proactively.”

They added: “Remaining members need not worry, and any normal payments that have been taken recently around the time of the gym having to close will be given as credit post lockdown.”