Anytime Fitness, anyhow fitness - Part 2 (The aftermath)

This is a follow-up to my original post which can be found here. I will basically outline what happened after my previous post. Sadly, this probably won't go as viral as the previous one as it's not so 'juicy', but I do hope it gets shared so people know the full story.

Timeline of Events

1) Anytimefitness Malaysia contacted me

9th June: On the day of the post, just about 5-6 hours after the post at around midnight, I got a private message on Facebook from an Anytime Fitness staff from Malaysia.

I thought it was rather nice of her, so I thanked her for her message and told her that I hope that 'something is done to improve the service quality of such errant staff'. 

From the Facebook comments, it seemed that there were mixed responses - some came out to defend the franchise, saying their experiences were nothing but pleasant. There were also others who claimed to have been mistreated by the nex branch too. A recurring theme was this - Anytime Fitness isn't that bad as a franchise, but the nex branch may have some systemic issues.

2) My post on Anytimefitness Nex was deleted and I was blocked

10th June: Some people told me to complain on the nex branch's Facebook page, so I did, including the link of my post for details. However, it was merely deleted later in the day, and I was blocked from posting any further on their page. 

Can still see my blog's URL in the Google search result lol! But the post has been deleted, so if you click it you won't find it.

3) I wrote in to Anytimefitness Asia

11th June, 10 AM: Not knowing whether AF would care about my blog (I didn't know it would be going viral), I wrote in to their Asia HQ. I was seeking some sort of official response from the brand, as they had remained silent and also tried to silence me (on their Facebook page).

4) All Singapore Stuff picked up my blog and republished it

11th June: Shortly after the email, a friend texted me telling me that All Singapore Stuff (ASS) had posted my blog in full on its page. Wow. Shit just got real. I felt mildly comforted that my story was travelling and would be heard. 

5) The story began going viral

11th June: I'm not sure what it was - maybe it was the injustice of the situation; maybe the story struck a chord with people who wanted to band together to protect consumers' rights; maybe people had similar experiences; maybe it was my quirky writing (haha :p ) - whatever it is, people were sharing it. And sharing it fast.

Within a few hours, there were already several thousand views on the ASS website, and their FB post had 100+ shares.

This is the latest snapshot - 22.3k views... that's insane. I think it's easily the most viewed/shared article for the day. From the site, there were over 1.5k shares. (currently sitting at 24k views), and over 400 shares from their FB post.

6) Anytimefitness HQ begins to contact me

11th June, 3.17PM. I think they began to realise the gravity of the situation and how outraged people were, and they began to reach out to me. A friend's friend who happened to be a US spokesman for AF called me but I missed his call. Their Master Franchisee for Asia, Maurice, left a comment on my blog post and sent me an email.

The email is a little long so I won't republish it here, but it's identical to the comment from 'Yours in Health' on the original post here. Basically, they tried to apologise in a very long-winded way. Here's some snippets (the bolding of words was done by me): 

"I am the Master Franchise for Anytime Fitness Asia and our team and all of our stakeholders go to great lengths and invest heavily in time, effort, training and tools to foster enjoyable environments and to create uplifting shared experiences at our gyms in the hope of nurturing our sacred mission - to remove the barriers to a healthier lifestyle and to change lives....sometimes we get it wrong and in this instance, we clearly let you down and I sincerely apologize."

 He did address the main issue on the free trial, stating:

"it certainly is not industry practice to promote a free trial and then to attach conditions or deny the access."

The email ended with:

I seek your understanding and consideration - we have over 3,000,000 members peppered throughout the world and countless numbers of tremendous success stories to share and I ask you to please persevere and give us a second chance - we are making a blanket offer to all Singaporeans to use our gyms for a free one day trial by visiting any one of our Anytime Fitness gym websites and registering with us and we will welcome you with open arms.

I don't know how the 3 million members thing is relevant, and I don't see how the bolded text is new information. In fact, it is a downgrade from the previous 3-day trial (and lower than the international 7-day trial).

The rest of the day, I checked out the comments on ASS / FB once in a while, just to see what was being said, and exchanged an email or two with random commenters and Maurice.


7) Anytimefitness Nex posts an apology on Facebook... only to delete it?

11th June 10pm : Something strange then happens. AF nex posts an apology on their Facebook... which they promptly deleted some time throughout the night (or maybe in the early morning?). Luckily, I had some screenshots:

I underlined the first line in red because that really annoyed me. Firstly, I don't know how else you can interpret a finger hooking action apart from being a rude way to beckon a customer. Maybe this is perfectly normal in Australia, I don't know.

Secondly and more importantly, that was NOT the reason why I felt aggrieved! If you read the original post, you would know I actually felt he was justified for behaving that way because maybe he thought I was a trespasser. What made me write the whole blog post was what happened after that 'non-verbal gesture'. The entire interaction, how I was 'suckered' into paying a walk-in fee (as some netizens say), his odd long stares, his refusal to give me a trial even though I asked several times.

Reading the whole message as a whole, I think it may have been eventually taken down because a more seasoned PR person realized that despite 'apologizing' twice,  it makes three mistakes:
1) Absolves personal blame by putting the blame on me (for misconstruing the gesture)
2) Sidesteps the bigger issue of the entire rude interaction
3) A little too lengthy

Again, these are just my guesses, and I have no idea why it was deleted.

8) Stewart personally apologizes

12th June, 630am: If you missed it, Stewart is the Australian boss, AKA Mr Bull. I woke up this morning to find that he had left a comment on my blog. Here it is:

Hi Alan,

On behalf of Anytime Fitness nex, I would like to offer my personal apology for your unpleasant experience. We pride ourselves on being personable and your experience and feedback shows that we must always work to improve.

Although no longer available we would like to offer you the opportunity to fulfill your No Obligation 3 day pass with us at your own convenience.
Please accept my apology and take up the opportunity to see how good we really are.

Regards
Stewart Hine 

Ah. This is how it should be done. Short and simple and direct. I like it. I appreciate that he did this, even if it was because AF HQ was putting heavy pressure on him. This was also posted on ASS's article.


9) Anytimefitness nex FB has a change of heart

12th June: First thing I noticed was that I was unblocked, and could post on their Facebook page again. [EDIT: Nevermind, I don't know if I am still blocked or they are moderating posts, but I can't see my post appear on their page when I tried to share this. Oh well.]

 Next thing was that whoever managed their Facebook page became disarmingly humble. For example, this interaction:

Chinno: -links my blog- I don't know this author but I pity him. Is this true?

AnytimeFitness nex: It's true. We failed.

And a few more along the same lines where they addressed the service failure head on, owned it, and apologized for it. I respect that. That should be how good PR/service recovery is done! Just acknowledge the mistake, don't make excuses and don't be defensive (unless clearly wronged), and promise to try to improve.

They also mentioned publicly that they had reached out to me, and hope that I would give them a second chance. They also mentioned that Stewart was 'not doing sales anymore', not sure what that means.


10) Outstanding Questions

I had some outstanding questions that were not answered.

a) "Free passes are still available and in fact we have increased the number available due to popular demand"

This was what was posted on their FB page in response to someone asking whether the trial was available. This means the number is still limited? Does this mean it's possible someone may get rejected for a trial when he goes down? Or will the staff manage it properly and not let something like this occur?

UPDATE: I got an answer from Maurice, the Master Franchisee.
"Nex and all of our Anytime Fitness gyms will honor the one day pass. They will definitely not get rejected for a one day pass"
If any of you actually get rejected for your trial from now on, do share it in the comments below!

b) After the trial, does the individual 'lapse' into automatic membership and gets charged for it if he does not return the transponder? Some of the comments I've seen complained about how they were double charged, etc, so I'm concerned about this.

This was what I asked Maurice. It felt like a strange process to have, from a customer perspective.

UPDATE: From Maurice:
"They pay a $68 DEPOSIT which is fully refundable if they do not proceed to membership. They are not double charged"

So basically what Stewart said previously is in complete violation of the franchise's processes(he said that you would lapse into membership and be charged if you didn't return the transponder). 
If any of you get told this from now on, do share it in the comments below!

--

11) Conclusion

Some of you may be wondering - so will I return to AF nex? Or AF at all?

Well, despite the sour experience with the nex branch, AF has shown that they have decent service recovery standards, which is commendable. I may end up going to Fitness First though, simply because it is right next to my office at one north, while nex requires a slight detour and by the time I reach after work it is rather late for a workout on an empty stomach, though AF is dangling some offers at me. I haven't decided, will need to start work first and see how the workload is.

Anyway, thanks for reading, and for sharing the previous post if you did. I hope you don't walk away from this thinking that Anytime Fitness is a shitty franchise, because I really don't think they are, they may just have a few black sheep.

Some people have also asked whether AF is truly and sincerely sorry, or just sorry that they got caught and this blew up on the internet. I've a feeling it's a bit of both. Regardless, from some of the comments, there were people with exceedingly positive experiences as well. With a large franchise like this, there are bound to be a few blips.

Take care everyone, and train hard (wherever it is)!

Have you been denied a free trial at anytimefitness before? Let me know in the comments below or drop me an email, with as much detail as you can, and I'll try to seek some sort of redress for you with the Master Franchisee.

Anytime Fitness, anyhow fitness?

ANYTIME FITNESS REVIEW

I just had a terrible customer experience with anytimefitness, and I felt obligated to make their poor service quality and sneaky sales tactics known.

If you haven’t heard of anytimefitness, they are a 24-hour gym global franchise that has sprouted many branches in Singapore. One of the more recent ones was anytimefitness @ nex, which is conveniently located near my house. I didn’t consider working out there previously as I had an existing EnergyOne membership which was considerably cheaper.

With my recent career move, my new workplace meant my usual EnergyOne gym wasn’t convenient anymore. Thus, I was looking out for a gym to sign my life away to sign up for a new membership. One of my friends was free to workout with me, and he recommended that I try out anytimefitness, where he had a membership. He linked me a URL to sign up for a free trial (it used to say 3 days) :

Note the bolded words especially – ‘no obligation’ it says. Try to remember the phrase ‘No obligation free trial’ as you progress through this post.

I keyed in my details, and I received an email shortly:

‘Free, no obligation, 3-day trial’. Sounds good so far. I tried calling the number provided but no one picked up. I dropped them an email instead, which was replied rather promptly.

So far so good. On the day (8^th Jun 15), I went to the gym ahead of my friend, and wasn’t sure where to go when I entered the gym. The staff was sitting in the glass office but was busy on the phone, so I sat down at the couches, planning to wait for my friend to arrive to proceed.

I got a little engaged using my phone and browsing Facebook and stuff, and was waiting around for about 10 minutes at the couch and my friend wasn’t there yet. At that moment, the Australian staff (let’s call him Mr Bull) came out of the office, shot me a glare and did the finger hooking gesture you use to beckon a dog to come to you.

Here doggy!

I was slightly taken aback by the rude gesture, but realised I probably should have gone in after his phone call ended, so maybe he was upset that I just walked in. Alright, no issues, I walked in and quickly opened with “Hi, I signed up for a free trial, do I activate it with you?”

Mr Bull shot me another quick glance and probably realised his earlier assessment of ‘unwanted intruder’ was inaccurate, and his face changed slightly and he beckoned me to sit down to ‘discuss’.

I was a little confused as to what he wanted to discuss. I figured he was going to try to sell me the membership, though advertised as a free trial with ‘no obligations’. That's fine, it's part of his job as sales. 

[All quotes here are reproduced ad verbatim to the best of my memory]

Mr Bull: “Mate, I just got an email this morning, there is no more 3 day pass, the trials are all one day now.”

(his constant usage of ‘mate’ was what led to my deduction that he’s Australian)

“Oh… ok sure”. That’s a bummer, I had planned to come on Monday and Wed. Why would they still email me just the previous day that I could go for a 3-day trial? Let's just give him the benefit of a doubt that this is not a bait and switch but company policy literally changed on that morning. 
(Edit: their website now puts 1 day, as in my screenshot above, so I guess the policy really just changed) 
Ok fine, I can try out the place for a day then.

Mr Bull: “So how this works is, you have to put down a deposit of $68… - “

My ability to pay attention to the remainder of his sentence was impaired by this sudden requirement. What? I have to pay $68? I recovered quickly to catch the rest of his explanation, that it was because he would give me one of their purple tracker devices, so the money was a deposit in case I didn’t return that device. This new piece of information is annoying and should have been mentioned upfront in the email, but seems fair. I didn’t have $68 on me, and had to borrow from my friend. Well, unpleasant already, but not too bad, right?

No. He carried on by saying that if I did not return the device, they would assume I want to sign up and I would lapse into a one-month membership immediately, and I would be charged for that (at something like $148/month I can’t remember).

[Try out our gym, and we will automatically sign you up even if you don’t want to! Yay!]

Woah woah woah hold it. I am just here to try out the facilities, to see if it’s a nice place to workout, to see if it’s convenient to come here everyday after work or before work. I don’t want to sign into a pseudo membership immediately with a stupid bait and switch sales tactic! What happened to the ‘no obligations’?!

I tried to clarify the details – so I would pay the deposit, and if I returned the device after my workout, I would get my deposit back? He responded by giving me an accusing, long hard stare, for a good 10 seconds. I’m not sure what he was trying to do here, intimidate me or size me up or something, but I just kept his gaze, and gave a questioning shrug. What? After 10 awkward seconds, he finally spoke.

Mr Bull: “These trial passes, they are limited mate. I can’t just be giving them up to everyone. If I give you one, I am depriving someone else of their slot you know that mate? Are you serious about signing up or not? If you sign up now, we are having a sales promotion, we can waive the administration fee.”

This made me pissed because firstly, why do I need to be ‘serious about signing up’ when I am just TRYING out the damn place? Secondly, why are the trial passes even limited? That made no sense to me. If there was a capacity issue, I’d understand, but the place was pretty empty – I think there were less than 10 people in the whole gym at that point of time. Thirdly, this whole bait and switch tactic just felt quite unethical so I was annoyed.

I tried to respond calmly and sensibly, explaining that yes, I was interested in eventually signing up, but I couldn’t decide then, as my work had not started. I also wanted to try out FitnessFirst (I didn’t tell him this) and compare the two, as there is a FF very near my workplace.

This was followed by another intense 10 second staring contest. I shifted uncomfortably in my seat as Mr FingerBeckoner continued his creepy silent gaze. Why is he so weird? He finally spoke after he won the staring contest (I glanced out to see if there was anyone paying attention to this strange interaction and also to see where my friend was).

Mr Bull: “Look mate, if you aren’t going to sign up, I’m not going to give you the trial pass mate. You can train with your mate, but I will charge you the walk-in rate of $34. Oh wait, since you are here with him, I’ll give you 50% off the walk-in rate.”

???

So now I was being rejected for a “NO OBLIGATIONS FREE TRIAL” because I apparently need to be very obligated to get the trial. And I’m not familiar with commercial rates, but only knowing Energyone’s walk-in rate of $5.30/$10.70, $34 sounded exorbitant.

I tried to persuade him to just let me have the trial, but this was met with further accusing dirty looks, and he seemed to have made the assessment that I wasn’t a worthy ‘trial-er’, and continued:

Mr Bull: “No mate, you just want to work out for free. These passes are for those who are serious mate. There is a limited number. I’m not going to give you one. You can pay the walk-in rate, at 50%. If you do sign up in the next 2 weeks, I can factor in the $17.”

I was getting very annoyed with his condescending tone and the false promise of a ‘no obligations free trial’. If I wasn’t working out with my friend, I would have just walked out then I think. But because I didn’t want to abandon my friend, I decided to succumb to Mr Bull’s pushy and annoying demands, and just pay the $17.

Is this standard industry practice for gyms – to offer a ‘free’ trial to get people to come down, then make them sign up for stuff and refuse them a trial when they have already came down if they are assessed as ‘not serious’? Just wanted to know if I was treated unfairly or if this was standard practice. Whatever it is, Mr Bull just came across as obnoxious and condescending the whole time. It was a terrible customer experience.

Did you have a bad customer service experience at anytimefitness nex too? Leave your reviews of anytimefitness in the comments below! 

UPDATE (10 Jun)  : I posted on the anytimefitness nex Facebook page, but it just got deleted within 24h and I am blocked. Guess they want to silence this... 

UPDATE (12 Jun) : I wrote a part 2, which can be found here.

Lessons for a Fresh Graduate

Have you recently graduated from school / university? Are you thinking about what career path to go down? Can't figure out what job to try for? Are you in your first job but looking to move out?

In the past year, I have learnt many things that I hope to share with people who are going through similar situations. Hopefully, you learn from my mistakes and not commit the same errors I made.


1. Money is a strong but flawed motivator

I still remember why I was motivated to work at MIN D E F when I was still in school - I knew they were the highest paying government organisation, so I set my sights on them. When the offer came, I instinctively knew I shouldn't take it - the location was retarded (it takes 3hours total for me to go to and fro work), the work didn't sound that exciting - but I tried to rationalise why I should take it. And eventually I did. That was a mistake.

I didn't enjoy what I was doing, and despite the high salary, I was bored to death. I kept feeling uncomfortable thinking about my long-term career, knowing that I was going nowhere. I wasn't learning anything new, and I wasn't doing things that I enjoyed. I looked forward to 5.30/6PM everyday, and found no meaning in my work.

Having a lot of money is never bad, but money shouldn't be your primary motivator. A high starting pay is pointless in the grand scheme of things. Heck, even a high pay is pointless.

There is a simple concept in Psychology called the hedonic treadmill. The gist is that while we may experience blips of significant happiness (e.g. you got a huge raise), we eventually return to a baseline level of happiness as we adapt to our new situation. Thus, let's say I earned $3000 now, and I got a pay raise to $4000. I'm ecstatic! But then I soon figure out how to 'live the lifestyle of a $4000 income person' and I won't feel considerably happier than before. You can't fight it. It is only human.

2. Find an industry that makes you curious.

I had a conversation with a wise friend Jiamin who shared why she enjoyed her job, and one recurring line that kept appearing in what she said was this: 'You have to be curious about your industry'.

Now I have to clarify that an industry and a job are two different things. It may seem obvious, but I think people (including myself) may conflate the two sometimes. I used to think 'I want to find a job that is interesting', but I realised this is too micro a level to start thinking from. There are literally THOUSANDS of jobs out there and it's really difficult to scroll through all of them to figure out what you want to do.

A better starting point is to think 'What industry interests me?' Some examples could be Fashion, Travel, Sports, Healthcare, This is important as when you are in an industry you have a genuine, personal interest in, you are going to be more willing to invest time and effort to find out more, to learn more, to work harder, and to perform better. When you have narrowed down the industry, then you can ask the next question : 'What skills / experiences do I have that will allow me to work in this industry?'. And with that, you can start narrowing down companies and jobs to apply for.

3. Timing is very important.

Life is about doing the right thing at the right time. Some of life's biggest success stories were of people who got 'lucky' and made the right decisions at the right time. If they had done what they did at any other time, they wouldn't have had the same success as they had.

When hunting for a new job from Feb - May this year, I had very little luck finding anything that interested me. There just weren't things that caught my eye. Sometimes, when you want to find a job, it may not be the right timing for you and there aren't those windows of opportunity for you to capitalize on. Thus, if you are planning to find a new job, I'd advise you to start early, and keep your eyes open. Opportunities come rarely, and you need to seize them when they come.

For me, I had a 'job search' routine that I performed weekly, where I would browse a fix set of job sites and comb through for any potential new jobs, exploring with different sets of keywords. This wasn't really working after some time, so I decided to try a different job portal. I happened to see a job opening for my current company then - one that was up since April (this was in May). I decided to apply for it.
I think a combination of factors led to a very quick selection process - the company was expanding into this sector, they were trying to fill this position for a while, and I kinda pressed them to expedite my process (citing reasons like I had other interviews / potential offers).

If I had applied earlier, maybe they would have weighed me against other potential applicants and found me unsuitable. If I had applied later, maybe they would have found other better applicants. Who knows? I think what I took out of this was that you must not be afraid to try new methods, and be decisive about what you want, and take advantage of windows of opportunity.


4, Real goals versus lazy goals

If you were to ask me to describe my ideal job a year ago, I would have said something like this: " A stable, well-paying job that gives me time to spend time with my family and do my own things"

It took me several months to learn and realise this, but this was a lazy goal. In essence, I didn't want to work hard. I wanted free time. I wanted leisure time. I wanted to go to the gym, play my computer games, spend time with my gf. I didn't want to work hard. I wanted to be lazy.

The funny thing was I actually had my ideal job, if the above descriptor was all I wanted. My job was a government job, paying me way above the median salary for fresh graduates, and I had time to gym often and do my own things. It was only when I considered the long-term implications of having such a job - no personal growth, no skills acquired, no successful career- that I realised I was stuck in a rut and I needed to wake up. I needed to stop being lazy. Having all those things are good in the short run, but extremely detrimental in the long run. I felt little sense of accomplishment nor mastery.I would deeply regret it if I looked back 5 years later and I realised I have wasted 5 years of my life.

Of course, there is an assumption here that you are not genuinely happy and comfortable with being a lazy sloth doing nothing. But I'd like to think that most people of my generation desire a sense of accomplishment. Most people want to feel like they've done something with their lives. Even if the motivation to spend time with your family is one of your key desires/pursuits in life, I believe many want more than just that.

You spend 1/3 of your day at your job. That's a huge amount of time. In fact, most people spend more hours on their job than on their family/friends (excluding weekends). And I'm talking about the average person, not a 80 hour workweek doctor or something. Thus, you need to have real goals for your career, otherwise you're shortchanging yourself. A big part of your life will be empty and directionless and purposeless.

Think of what gives you meaning in life. What do you get satisfaction doing? What do you enjoy doing? How can this be translated into a career? Make some real goals. And work towards them.

Just to reinforce and end off this section with a personal example.... I enjoy gaming. I've played games since young, and I would really like to work in the gaming industry. I also enjoy having a comfortable life with my gf/wife/family. Thus I need to do something that would have long term prospects for me to get a well-paying job. Simply doing something like games management/operations/community management is very attractive to me, but doesn't seem like it will be good for me long term nor transferable to other jobs. Thus, I decided on a marketing position, which will equip me with many useful skills for LIFE. If I eventually move to another industry, or move to another type of job in the gaming industry, I know that my skills/experience acquired in this position will be very useful.

--

That's all folks! Have any questions? Feel free to drop me an email at atqhteo [at] gmail [dot] com. I reply them fairly quickly! :)