GoodLife Fitness member says she's out $3K after gym closes childminding service

A single mother says she can't use GoodLife for personal training sessions after the gym closed its childminding service and now she can't get a refund.

Krista-Lynn Rivers tells blogTO she bought personal training sessions at her nearest GoodLife gym at Bramalea City Centre last summer when gyms briefly opened but then closed again.

She claims she paid for a package of 52 personal training sessions but used only about 12. She says the remaining 40 sessions cost about $3,000. But when the gym opened again in July, she discovered the childminding service, called JUMP! was closed.

"And I was like, well, what am I supposed to do," Rivers says. "I really don't have anybody to watch him."

She had used the childminding service before with her other children and now has a five-week old baby. She contacted the gym in the summer but they just got back to her a couple of weeks ago, offering online personal training or outdoor sessions.

GoodLife spokesperson Trevor DeHaan tells blogTO they can't comment directly on any particular member’s situation.

But DeHaan says the childminding program has been closed since March 2020, and when the clubs reopened, to ensure member and associate safety, they were never able to reopen the childminding program.

He says they conducted a survey and re-evaluated the program and decided that "given the lasting impacts of the...pandemic, the ongoing decrease in usage over the last several years, and the results of our survey," they would close the service.

He adds that GoodLife can offer remote personal training via one-on-one video, members can transfer their sessions to a family member. They would also work with members to be as "accommodating as reasonably possible in extenuating circumstances."

Rivers says the option to do training sessions from home doesn't work for her as she is working on strength training and needs access to weights. Outdoor sessions wouldn't work because she would still need someone to watch her baby.

"I had a specific goal and I can't do that now with the options they've given," she says.