Crunch Fitness - Mason — Local services in Deerfield Township

This is an update to my review below. I was contacted by the Crunch Fitness management team, and they have made this right. I have been completely refunded for everything I was charged. I really appreciate the willingness to understand the situation, and then taking the appropriate action. I wish it didn't require the time and effort I spent on this, but in the end, they did the right thing and I respect and appreciate that!

Beware! The cancelation procedures are very shady, unclear, and EXPENSIVE! Do yourself a favor and make absolutely sure you want to join this place before you actually sign up. Because if you decide to cancel, it will cost you! I signed my son up to work out here because we live close and it seemed like a no brainer. He visited one time and absolutely hated it (crowded, lack of equipment he likes, wait time to get on certain machines.... personal preferences. That is not why I'm reviewing). So I called to cancel 2 days later (a Thu), with the expectation that I wouldn't be charged anything since he only went one time and we canceled so quickly. I was told I needed to speak with a manager because I may be charged the "annual fee". I was told there was no manager there at the time, but he was due in that afternoon. They took my number and said he would call me later that day. No call. I called back the next morning and went over the same thing with another person, and again was told a manager wasn't there, left my number... same story. Again, no call back. The following Tue, I went into the facility personally and finally found a manager (general manager, Matt). I explained the entire situation and history to him, at which point he told me that they had a 3-day window where memberships could be canceled without be charged. I laughed, and then explained again that I had been trying to cancel since 2 days after I joined, but he didn't seem interested in understanding or helping. He informed me that not only was I going to be charged the annual fee, I was also going to be charged a whole month's membership fee. Obviously I wasn't happy about having to pay so much for a one-time visit, so I asked him if he could at least waive the annual fee, as I hadn't seen that written anywhere in the membership contract paperwork. He said he couldn't do that, as it was company policy. I asked him to show me in the contract where that was stated, because I hadn't seen it anywhere. He pulled up the contract on his computer and we both stood there reading through it, not seeing anything about this situation. He told me he couldn't find it, but that he was "sure it was in there somewhere". Frustrated and irritated, I finally left when it was clear I wasn't getting anywhere. After a few days, I decided to let it go, pay the fees, and just chalk it up to a bad experience. Well, exactly one month after all of this, I found that ANOTHER monthly fee was charged to my credit card! So a second monthly charge, plus the annual fee!? I called them immediately, asked to speak to Matt, and was certain he would tell me that the second charge was a mistake. Nope. I was put on hold for a few minutes, and the person that answered the phone came back and told me that Matt said that the policy was actually TWO month's membership fee, PLUS the annual fee! So now I'm up to $100 for that one-time, disappointing visit for my son. An absolute joke. I want to acknowledge that Matt was calm, mature and was not at all rude or short with me, which I appreciate. Bottom line though, this whole thing is bordering on a scam. At minimum, the lack of understanding of a very obvious situation, and unwillingness/inability to help rectify it is simply astounding....

The management here is very unprofessional. The GM treats members and staff poorly. The GM is incredibly rude, condescending and lacks the necessary relationship and empathy skills to provide a quality member experience. Members and staff alike continue to leave this location due to poor management. The gym is incredibly overcrowded and the equipment is often out of order, which again falls back on lack of management involvement. Members have requested new bars (as half of them are bent) and all requests have been ignored by management. All staff (aside from management) are incredibly nice and easy to work with. I enjoy coming here to see other members. Myself along with many others (members and staff) will be leaving this location at the end of the year. Finally, I’d like to complete my review with a call to action by Crunch ownership to investigate the following issues: Astronomically high employee turnover rates - since joining crunch fitness I have seen countless faces come and go. From managers, to trainers to every day employees it has come to my attention that there is an obvious problem with high turnover rates. A gym is not just a place people go to workout and go home, it’s a place people use to escape long days at work, release stress and to most importantly cultivate meaningful relationships with staff and other members. However, at crunch it seems to be nearly impossible to do so due to employees being “fired” or quitting. Nearly every day I come in I find out someone new has started or someone has quit. While I understand that in this type of environment turnover rates will statistically be higher than in other industries, I find it incredibly hard to believe that they could be this high. I’d like to challenge crunch ownership to do a comparative analysis of other crunch locations and their turnover rates, and in turn contrast those turnover rates seen at the crunch Mason location. Secondly, I’d like to challenge crunch ownership to again conduct a comparative analysis of the attrition rates of crunch members. Again, I understand that attrition rates in low cost gyms is statistically higher than at other gyms, but I find it very difficult to believe they should be this high. I’d be curious to know how the mason membership attrition rates compare to those of other crunch locations. I write all of this to encourage ownership to be a catalyst for change and continued improvement. There are glaring issues at this location that should not be ignored or swept under the rug any longer. It starts with ownership to be made aware of these issues and to take action to...

Remember when Crunch was 24hrs? Pepperidge Farm remembers. Many other commercial gyms in the area reinstated 24hr access (you know, what we originally signed up for?) back in February. Membership costs have not gone down in order to compensate, so still paying full price for a service that we're not getting.

Whenever a piece of equipment breaks, expect 6-8 months to pass before it gets fixed. Been here for 4yrs, I've seen it time and time again. I don't know if the GM or someone higher up is at fault here, but after my first complaint, and now this, I cannot help but think that the owner simply just does not see the gym as a gym, but as a money printing machine. It's not like these corporate chains are desperate for money, so it's either obscene greed or pure laziness on their part. "Oh look how much money we're saving not staffing the gym 24hrs!" I havent seen anybody else come forward with this complaint, under the current restrictions (wear a mask, although not enforced in 95% of businesses in the area, along with that mandate being only a week away from being rescinded starting 6/2) it makes absolutely no sense why the gym cannot go back to 24hrs.

Incredibly difficult to find a rack to use during peak hours. There's a giant blue rack setup in the back of the gym that offers two spots to squat. Unfortunately, during peak hours you'll find that trainers are running circuit classes on that setup where they have their clients doing things you do not need a rack for. It's very frustrating to be told you can't use a squat rack only for it to then be used as a low height rack for those in the class to do RDLs with a 2.5lb plate on each side of the bar, when they could just as easily do that same exercise with dumbbells or any other barbell but starting from the floor.

Employees are mostly cool. There's one girl who works up front in the mornings who can come off as a bit rude sometimes but other than that everyone else seems really friendly.

Other than that the machines (when they're not broken), dumbbells, and plates are all pretty good quality and most of the regulars are...