Bally Total Health Club Failure – Bankruptcy, Filthy, Unclean and Unprofessional

Bally Total Fitness Health Clubs are filthy, unsanitary, unhygienic, a breeding ground for sickness and disease and the corporate offices running the company are unprofessional.

As a lifetime member (with 2 memberships) Bally Total Fitness never responded to my phone calls (telling me to write), nor my written complaints seeking a refund after they shut down two clubs in the Orlando metro area.

My complaint is below which Bally’s to date has not replied to.

The United States Surgeon General should close Bally Total Fitness health clubs because there is nothing healthy about them!

The cardio machines are rusty, creeky, not balanced, falling apart. The gyms are never cleaned adequately. The clubs are a breeding ground for germs, disease and illness.

And corporate only pockets the money of new incoming members without refurbishing equipment or cleaning the gyms. The carpets in the aerobics room are filthy and need to be replaced. Meanwhile Bally’s closes gyms without forewarning, keeps the money and carries on while the consumer suffers and jeopardizes their health.

My wife and I got eye staff infections using Bally’s health club.

The two Orlando managers who used to work for Bally’s have since gone to 24 Hour Fitness and Lifestyle Fitness wisely abandoning this sinking ship.

All wise consumers will stop using Bally’s asap!

Paul F Davis – consumer advocate, former fitness trainer, author and worldwide speaker

November 16, 2009

Bally Total Fitness
PO Box 1080
Norwalk, CA 90651

Dear Bally Total Fitness,

As a lifetime premier plus member of Bally’s (0020110045000 and 0020110045109), my wife and I have been greatly disappointed by your health clubs.

This year you closed without forewarning your health clubs in Altamonte Springs and Casselberry within the Orlando Metro area.

Beyond the closing of these local health clubs, other Bally’s health clubs across the country have also been closed. Obviously the value of a lifetime premier plus membership at Bally’s has greatly and significantly decreased as a result of your clubs being closed.

As a world traveling professional speaker and author, I personally chose Bally’s for myself and my wife because of the numerous locations throughout North America where I could exercise when traveling and away from home.

However your closing many health clubs has substantially reduced the value of my membership. Moreover the local health club on Semoran Blvd in Orlando closest to my home is so filthy that I and my wife (we both work from home) both got staff infections in our eyes and incurred medical bills visiting an optometrist and $150 for the antibiotic / steroid eye drops.

I therefore want a full refund for my and my wife’s Bally memberships immediately or I will file a health complaint with the government (locally and in the State of Florida) for poor sanitation in your health clubs. Your health clubs in my area are rarely cleaned, never require members to use towels when working out and the sauna, pools and bathrooms are worse than many third-world countries I have traveled to.

Above and beyond this, as a consumer advocate and former fitness trainer (24 Hour Fitness – California) I have seen countless pieces of equipment in Bally’s health clubs that are broken and dangerous still on the gym floor, which could cause injuries to health club members.

As a worldwide speaker, consumer advocate and videographer if I am not promptly refunded for my wife and my memberships in full for what we paid upon purchase (along with the annual CPI consumer price index upward adjustments for inflation), I will file complaints with my State senator, congressman, governor, governmental sanitation and the federal surgeon general concerning your health violations endangering the general public.

Most damaging however will be the YouTube videos I shall produce with other disgruntled Bally’s members and post across the internet as I travel throughout N. America and document the sad state of Bally’s Health Clubs and the risk to the consumer using your facilities.

Thankfully after nearly a year you finally repaired some damaged equipment (particularly the lower back extension, which was without a foot pad) at the Semoran Blvd. Health Club the last time I was in there.

If you would like to resolve this matter swiftly and peaceably, then kindly fulfill one of two options:

1. Send me a check for the purchase price of the two memberships I bought with Bally’s (in addition to the upward adjustment of the CPI to ensure the present value of the purchased memberships).

2. An alternative option would be to renew our annual memberships for free this year in lieu of all the health and sanitation violations, poorly maintained equipment and shutting of your gyms last year greatly diminishing the value of our memberships.

I will give you 5 business days to expedite a check to me for the two memberships or renew our annual memberships at no charge to make amends for the sad state of affairs at Bally’s this year.

Paul F Davis

Orlando, FL

info @ PaulFDavis.com
http://www.PaulFDavis.com
http://www.YouTube.com/greatawakening

I now will only accept option 1 as Bally Total Fitness is a disgrace and too shameful to use as my health club.

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Bally Health Club Bankruptcy & Bacterial Viral Infections at their Gyms

Bally Health Club where I work out in Orlando, Florida has already shut down two of their 4 gyms. Without forewarning the Bally Health Clubs in Pine Hills and Casselberry were closed.

Now I’m told the only remaining Bally Health Club in the Orlando metro (as someone said the Altamonte Springs Bally Health Club was also closed) is the one nearest the airport at Semoran Blvd. where I workout and the Bally’s near International Drive on Kirkman Rd. near Valencia Community College.

Beyond the bankruptcy, as if that wasn’t bad enough as I have a premier lifetime membership with Bally Health Club (for which I can use any gym anywhere in North America, as Bally’s is also operating in Canada where my wife is from), Bally even more surprisingly has stopped properly cleaning its equipment.

Nobody is required to bring a towel into the club where I workout. This means pools of sweat are often left behind on the equipment. Paper towels are nearly nonexistent at the gym without requesting some from the staff, who often reply they are “out” and “don’t have” them. The equipment often appears to be greasy, oily, and holds bodily fluids of other gym members who previously used (without a towel) and didn’t bother to clean up after themselves.

Even worse (and another lawsuit waiting to happen) is damaged equipment that has not been repaired. For example the lower back extension has been broken for nearly a month. When I sat down to use the lower back extension and noticed the foot bar had been broken off (which provides stability to the lower back to prevent injury), to my surprise a Bally’s personal trainer (or should I say salesman) approached me to pitch PT (personal training) to earn himself some money, but never bothered to put an “out of order” sign on the damaged equipment.

I am a former personal trainer myself and know a lot about gym equipment and proper management of health clubs. I worked for 24 Fitness in California and at a local private gym in Orlando years ago, which I pretty much managed in the absence of the owner.

When I recently saw what looked like pink eye appear in my right eye and what looked like herpes on the right side of my mouth, I started freaking out and wondering what was going on. I’m a married man and definitely am not playing around sexually. Yet I have been working out at Bally Health Club regularly.

When the optomotrist put a liquid solution (which burned profusely) in my right eye to test me for herpes, thankfully it was negative and I don’t have herpes. What the doctor did say I have however is a bacterial viral infection. I immediately told the doc about Bally’s going bankrupt and being too cheap to clean their gyms as of late. He was a bit surprised to hear this.

Incidentally, the optomotrist visit cost me hours out of my schedule (as I was made to wait for an hour in the doctor’s waiting room until I could be seen and had to drive two hours to and fro) and $125. The eye drops cost another $97 from the pharmacist. Bally Health Club should at least pay me $1,000 for my pain and suffering, their negligence, and time stolen from my schedule.

If there is anybody facing a similar situation at their Bally Health Club, please put your name, address, and state your situation and email on a comment after this post to be added to the forthcoming class action lawsuit and let your voice be heard.

Bacteria and viral infections (with the recent outbreak of the swine flu) need to be prevented and every precaution taken. Health Clubs such as Bally’s who fail to take proper hygiene and sanitation procedures required by law need to be punished and shut down if they fail to comply. Refusal to clean your health club is gross negligence and should be punishable to the full extent of the law.

The carpet in the aerobics room at Bally’s Health Club is filthy and needs to be replaced. Their are cigarettes all over the ground at the entrance to Bally’s. A lifetime member (an elderly man who has been attending the Semoran health club for years) told me some years back a manager at the health club was involved in a homosexual relationship with an underage young man who he was having sex with in the men’s locker room after hours.

Health Clubs such as Bally’s and other private clubs need far more scrutiny from sanitation and law enforcement to ensure the general public is protected.

If you are an attorney reading this and would like to represent me and the members of Bally Health Club, please kindly reply to:

RevivingNations@yahoo.com

www.PaulFDavis.com – consumer advocate, worldwide speaker & life-changing author

America – Bankruptcy Central, Global Financial Turmoil

Global financial markets were mightily shaken when Lehman Brothers declared chapter 11 bankruptcy.  Australian banks took a big hit as did Asian banks across the Orient.  Banks across Japan were hammered taking losses between 5 to 20% depending how heavily invested they were in Lehman Brothers, some say up to $700 million for some.

Asian stock markets plummeted Tuesday as the collapse of Lehman Brothers and takeover of Merrill Lynch spurred fears of an imminent global financial crisis. European markets extended losses in early trading after falling sharply Monday.

Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 index sank nearly 5 percent to 11,609.72, its lowest close since July 2005, while Hong Kong‘s blue-chip Hang Seng Index shed 5.4 percent to its lowest point in nearly two years.

America is quickly becoming bankruptcy central as major corporations and governmental institutions go belly up.  Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac governmental lending institutions themselves are having difficulty remaining solvent considering all the bad loans and sub-prime mortgage crisis.

Singapore wisely hasn’t tied itself too tightly to the U.S. having a bit of foresight it seems.  Others will have to live and learn.

Paul F Davis – debt arbitrator and author of United States of Arrogance

www.PaulFDavis.com

RevivingNations@yahoo.com