Business Uncultured

I have been trying to return to my gym, after an absence of...months and months. The gym has been taking a membership fee from my bank each month. When I went to the gym this week, the gym is not there any more. The building is covered up and underconstruction. I don't remember receiving communication from the gym that they were closing down.

In the last few days, I've been phoning the gym's corporate head office and have not been able to reach anyone, not their customer service line, their media line, nor their advertising line. They all ask you to leave a message. I left one on their members line. No one has called me back.

Finally, I called another club belonging to the same chain of gyms. They said my gym had been closed for at least three months. But a lot of the members from my old gym now go to theirs. They accept these members without problem, without additional fees. I just show up and show my membership card.

Do I feel better now? I am not sure. Why didn't my gym tell me they were closing down and that I could transfer my membership to another gym in the chain? Why isn't head office phoning me back? Theirs is a bad business practice, as if there isn't already a history of gyms shutting down and walking away with their members' money.

But now I can use another gym that's inside a mall and has free parking. I am pissed off that I'm all out of excuses for not going to the gym. I don't want to give my money to an organization that is so negligent in its communication to members. But I am only paying $15 a month, and I hadn't been going, so what does it matter whether I not go to the gym downtown, or not go to the one in the mall, as long as I have available access to one? It's feels like I'm facing some kind of personal dilemma. Oh god, I'm so slovenly.