CURVES AUSTRALIA Franchise Complaints

65 thoughts on “CURVES AUSTRALIA Franchise Complaints”

• Have just had my tax return done and recorded a loss of $19000 for the last financial year. Its great to be at Curves.

• Whats the deal with Curves wanting all the curves smart equipment back if you close your club. We all paid good money for that and some of us took out loans, and when we bought our franchises didn’t we pay for the 8 pieces of equipment, and then have to purchase the rest out of our own pocket, Over my dead body will they get it back for nothing, so they can sell it again to someone else. Is this even legal.

• After reading these comments I am ashamed to even be associated with Curves. We are told that WE ARE NICE PEOPLE well its about time Gary showed some compassion and treated his franchisees with some respect. If clubs are closing down it is because they DONT have the money to continue, which means they DONTt have the money to repay huge royatlies bills and exit fees. Why would Gary want to see us go into bankruptcy, he must remember what it was like when he didnt have a penny to rub together. Why doesn’t he take the money owed out of our Advertising royalties which we have paid. Where does that money go I have seen any advertising in my area for a long time. I think it is about time we aussies stuck together remember WE ARE STRONGER TOGETHER and started a class action here. ANybody know a good lawyer that would want to take it on?

• Dear Desperate Aussie, get as many of the other clubs as you can to speak their mind on this forum. The more we can get the more ammunition we will have against the might Gary (Howie) Heavin.

• Is there anyone out there who is prepared to go on Today Tonight and speak on behalf of all the franchisees that have been burnt by Gary (Howie) Heavin.

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• Well the time has come for me to make that decision do I stay open or do I close down. What a hard decision but I can’t keep running at a loss. No hope of selling a business that doesn’t make a profit. So I am stuck with a hefty bank loan to repay plus whatever CI decide to charge me. Oh joy its so great to be at Curves.

• Who is Chip Baird? Does he think that he is going to save Curves, Nothing is going to change, the hole that has been dug is to big to fix. So Gary and Diane are taking a step back well it seems to me it is like a rat deserting a sinking ship, he’s been burned a couple of times I am sure he doesn’t want to go there again. But where does that leaves all of us owners who are scraping the bottom of the barrell financially. I will soon be out of the Curves web and feel like a big weight has been lifted off my shoulders. Financially screwed but I will now have a life.

• Does this new company thats taken over Curves really think that they can fix the problems. They say they want to make the clubs more proftiable for the franchisees, the only way a club can be profitable is to have more members. If they put the monthly fee up that will only cause members to leave so how are they going to do this. Gary and Diane still on the board (heaven help us). Another 6 clubs in Western Australia disappeared off the curves location website since 30th July 2012. Australia is now down to 279 clubs was at 400. Seems to me that Curves is the fastest failing franchise in the world.

• To the administrator:- I emailed you with comments for your website regarding Australian franchisees of Curves as well as a request regarding the contact details of aussie z. I spoke to my accountant yesterday and hope to see my solicitor again next week so we can start to make a plan to shut down. Please email me as above ASAP.

  Thanks.

• I am a Curves Franchisee in Australia and like so many, I am seriously thinking of closing the doors and walking away. I would like to contact some of the other franchisees in Australia who are in a similar situation to see how I might best get out of it. I understand that privacy is a priority but are you able to request that they contact me? I would particularly like to hear from aussie z because she seems to have gone through the process fairly recently and so would have up to date info for me.

  If you would like to be put in touch with another commenter, please email me at unhappyfranchisee[at]gmail.com. Thanks – ADMIN

• I have just had a letter couried to my home from CI telling me that I owe $65,000, back on the 18th July it was only $17,000 (go figure). I have sent off my franchise agreement and all relevant paperwork pertaining to the closure of my club to a franchise lawyer if anyone out there wishes to get in touch with the same laywer please get in touch with me.

• I’ve lost everything – I had a Curves in New Zealand and Heaving sold me a turkey – God help all Franchise owners

• Waynetta you are not alone. Most of us have lost everything. But hopefully we can legally get back something. Feel free to contact me via the admin of this website.

• Please is there anyone out there who would like to join me in suing Curves. I have lost over a million $ to them (home I owned for 25 years, apartment, block of land and inheritance money) their bullying made me keep my clubs open with threats to take legal action . They are nasty and so out of touch with today.

  I’m a single mother with a 3 year daughter, we now live in a derelict house. I told Curves all this as I begged them to let me close 2 of my clubs “of course you can if you $50.000 for each one” I didnt even get a reply when I told them about my situation just send the money.

  I’ve tried for the last 3 month to give my clubs away but no-one wants a Curves and I’m stuck with the leases I cant pay and Curves couldn’t careless. It’s lack of duty of care.

  I would be more than happy to go on today tonite any of the shows I could get on and expose them for what they really are. The new people can’t change Curves is to outdated and we will be the ones to pay for anything new. There is so much more I could write.

• We are closing our club the end of this year. Would anyone that donated their equipment to a non-profit let me know how you got CI to approve., ASAP.

  We have a non-profit adult day care we would like to donate too and they would sure like the equipment.

  Any help would be appreciated.

  Thank you

• Teejay pls contact me via the admin of this site. I can help you.

• Aussie z. would like to know who your franchise lawyer is. Were contacted by debt collector in Western Australia. They had no success negiotiating with CI so they closed our case. Now we are being harrassed directly from some legal mob in America
  Cheers

• Deborah pls contact me thru the admin of this website. Have a lot to share.

• Aussie z I’m glad to see you found a good lawyer I did also. Hope all goes well for you. I lost your email but I didn’t get any response from you on the last 2 emails

• More club in Oz have closed down and lots more up for sale. I haven’t heard from CI since August last year I know that they will eventually catch up with me BUT at the moment I am trying not to think about Curves at all. I am still offering advice to other club owners who are at a loss to know what to do next. I have ONE big piece of advice for you DO NOT let CI bully you into doing anything. If well all stick together and DO NOT give into them we will come out on top because after all we are nice people, and we have done nothing wrong.

• To all the clubs that have been affected by the dreadful flooding in Qld and NSW I hope that CI offer you some relief in regards to your royalties. As one owner mentioned on this forum that they fell behind in their royalties due to the time that they were closed due to a natural disaster in 2011-2012. CI didn’t care or have any empathy for that club.

• In Holland the situation is as bad as everywhere else. One club closing after the other. But what strikes me most is: club owners rat each other out to Curves constantly. Unbelievable! Why?! In stead of supporting each other we ruin each other. And Curves Europe laughs. It saves them a lot of trouble.

• Hi everyone has anyone else been shut down by ezidebit. Last week my manager got to work and found all my members from 3 clubs had been cancelled out of my ezidebit system. I called ezidebit and they said that curves told them to cancel all my members and they did!!!!!. I have managed to get one club back but only to be told that I MUST sell it in 3 months I not allowed to keep it even if I wanted to. The clubs were to close IMMEDIATELY not one month not 2 weeks but that day.
  Amy wrote to me and told me to pay a member who had written to her and also cc her when I write to the member I, of course wrote back stating, “HOW you have cut off my ezidebit”!
  So beware owners as it seems ezidebit is on curves side.

• Sharon, in the united states we are not familiar with ezidebit…..why is curves shutting that down, why are your members cancelled? Why are you told to sell in 3 months? Are they doing this because you didnt comply with their requirements? Im wondering what is happening, and I wish you all the best!

• Sharon, What the !!!, Is ezi debit now a subsidiary of CI. What right does CI have to contact ezidebit and have them cancel all of your direct debits I thought ezi debit worked for us. When I closed down ezi debit wouldn’t do anything I had to cancel all the members direct debits myself. I wonder what the hell they are playing at. The club that you managed to get back belongs to you, if CI is forcing you to sell then I would be asking CI for the any monies that you might be out of pocket if you are unable to sell within that 3 month period and CI then force you to close down. What a crock. Just a bit of trivial information there are 674 clubs worldwide on the buy curves website, that doesn’t include ones that aren’t on it or the ones that have closed down already. I would be really interested to find out if anyone knows of territories being resold once a club in that territory has closed down.

• Hi Aussie Z good to hear from you. CI or ezidedebit has no right to what they did and everyone ive told here is dumbfounded. Im off to a lawyer monday with my ezidebit contract which has nothing in there about letting curves cancel my ezidebit. At this moment im going after ezidebit and moving all my members to another company. Ive already written to a lawyer in the states. Will keep you posted.

• Whilst I was going thru the closing bullshit with CI I became very angry with all the procedures that CI wanted me to do especially the part relating to the equipment. As I have said before we all paid thousands of dollars for them so I didn’t just want to dump them, for a brief moment I thought about opening up another gym and calling it something else, so I got in touch with Mytrak to see if I could purchase the equipment that made up “CS” to use in another gym. Imagine my surprise when the quote came thru and it was only $3123.80 for exactly the same thing minus the “Curves Smart” written on them. So that is a huge profit for CI as they probably negotiated a price with Mytrak for buying so many. Like probably many of you I had to get a loan to purchase my CS equipment as it cost me $15,000.00. Once again we have all been sucked in and ripped off by CI.

• Hi aussiez . We closed our club down last Feb 2012 and in the beginning of this year we have been getting letters from a debt collection office in Perth telling us we have to pay the money we owe. When we informed them we can’t as we have no jobs they told us to get a loan what the !!!! WHO will lend us money without out a job. Have read you have gotten advice from a lawyer can you share that advice. We really can’t afford to see a lawyer.

• Hi Vicki can u get my email address off the admin for this site and I will gladly share with you.

• I don’t know what is going on with the Curves locations website but according to it, as of today there has been another 29 clubs close down in Australia since the 7th Feb 2013. Thats huge.

• Just found out that another club owner has had to file for bankruptcy WHAT A SHAME. How can CI live with themselves. Bankruptcy seems to be the road a lot of ex owners or even current owners that are going thru hard times seem to be taking. Not only have we all lost lots of money from our experience with CI now some of us have to have bankruptcy hanging over our heads for the next 5 years or more. Its a very sad place to be in. If anyone would like to get in touch with me I have the name of a lawyer in Australia that is willing to take CI on.

• Just wondering if I could get a direct email address for monty sharma or Charles Baird ? I want to send a letter with a petition and letters from my members for change. I can’t get it on their site but if anyone in America has this opportunity to call north castle partners and get an email address this would be greatly appreciated. We need to the changes that the plan for curves to happen now not a year down the track .

• Well just heard that CI have brought out Mytrak. I wonder what that will mean for curves franchisees. Whether the monthly fee that was paid to mytrak now being paid to CI will go up or down. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer.

• can anyone interested in taking on Curves please contact me as I have spoken to a solicitor who believes we should band together and sue them!

• Sue there are a lot of us that are willing to. BEWARE any letter you might receive from “Jones Business Group” they are working for CI to recoup monies owed.
  One ex owner has already received on.

• Thanks aussie for the warning! Sue we do all need to band together, what have you heard, any updates? Someone I know suggested we all go to investigational news stations, and gather to picket in front of curves international….

• I have a curves also. Contacted CI and told them the same story, not making money. Got the same letter as all of you. CI now have an office in Brisbane and the new area leader told me CI would not be nice to anyone wishing to close and I would be expected to pay out fully. Would love to close and get a job to pay bills. How is the Aussie group going.

• Jan this is just another bullying tactic. Lots of us have not paid a cent and have no intention of. Today Tonight are interested in running a story will keep you informed.

• We are closing too. November 2013 will see the end of us. So many promises and no action or too little to late. Hung on for 2 years, what is taking them so bloody long? Wish I had never heard of Curves. I believe it’s easier to force us to close than to turn it around. They still get their money if they are successful in bulling us. Not paying them. And the machinery issue, what a joke. We paid for it along with Curves Smart and when I am able to sell it off in my own good time I will. Very interesting about the amount of head office staff leaving lately.
  Co-incidence, I think not. Ones with a conscious would resign I am sure after they see the bulling tactics they employ to failed Curves Clubs. So sick of Curves and it certainly is “NOT” great to be at Curves”

• ahhh.. its great to be at Curves!!!
  We are currently going through the same crap all of you have been through. We have made the executive decision to close down at the end of the year and start next year fresh. I’ve informed CI of this but haven’t received a response. What is involved in the intent to close package… and what will Curves require us to do? They have told us we have to pay $39,000… which we refuse to pay… has anyone actually paid this amount? Or has anyone had any success in negotiating it down? I don’t understand how they can charge us the maximum royalty fees per month.. when if we were to stay open they would never get anything close to this amount!!!
  What a joke.. looking forward to getting my life back again.

• Hi I’m very interested in suing, and would love to get tv involved. I’ve lost more than everything and I really feel people should know what kind of people they. It would take me all day to tell you all what’s happened to me it’s beyond what they have done to most I won’t pay them another cent. Every morning I wake up wishing I’d never ever heard of curves.

• OMG what is going on with Curves, I’ve just heard that the membership is now $79 a month for direct debit members, $89 for month to month and $99 for CC. Plus the initial joining fee. My members were having enough trouble finding $59 a month. Also there is new equipment which incorporates the CS. SO much for the ones of us who spent $15000 on purchasing CS in the first place now they are obsolete and you cannot sell the old equipment. What the!!!! Thank god I am out of my club because this price hike and being forced to purchase the new equipment at $1350 each will no doubt cripple some of the remaining clubs. I would not have been able to put my prices up or have been able to purchase the new equipment. I wonder what CI would have told me to do.

• I have just heard that the big topic at convention was about how many clubs are up for sale or closing down. They didn’t seem to have any answers. Funny that. I think that Curves has just run its course and no amount of rejigging it is going to help. I know that the original Curves workout worked but then came CS which in my opinion didn’t help my club at all, then came Zumba and Curves Complete, I think they should have left well enough alone. I know progress is great and you need to keep on top of the game but we should not have been forced into applying thesenew things into our clubs. We as Owner/Managers knew what was or is best for our clubs and what the members do or do not want. I know of two more clubs that will be closing down within a couple of months as they haven’t been able to sell. Its really sad that alot of us haven’t been able to reach the end of our 10 year agreements and are now looking down the barrell of losing everything. I have also read on the American unhappy franchisee website that ex owners are getting the assistance of a lawyer in the hope of suing curves. Lets hope that that goes ahead and we can do the same here.

• WOW I just skimmed thru most of these comments & am shocked!!
  Im actually in the process of buying a franchise myself!!

• Dont do it Mia!!!!!!

• Mia don’t do it unless you have a good financial backer. It will cost you heaps in the end. I can tell you that since 2010 43 clubs have closed in Victoria and I know of another one due to close next week. So beware.

• Mia I have just checked the listings and thats 46 clubs that have closed in Victoria another 3 have closed since January 2014.

• Hey Team …… I have been in the fitness industry for over 35 years and have owned several of my own successful gyms in two different countries. Three years ago I bought into a poorly run and run down Curves. It is now a thriving healthy gym with great members. First thing I did was throw out the stupid CS and simply told Mytrak that if they wanted it , then they could come and collect it from the footpath outside my club (they did). Well after three great years … along comes Curves and tells me that we have to buy all new machines complete with CS and implement the Complete Meal thingy …… and oh you have seven days to sign off on the deal and it will cost you about $20’000 and you can get the money back by charging your members $99+ per mth. I damn near fell off my chair laughing. End result will be a letter to CI telling them to come and collect their signs and I will reopen under my name using MY MACHINES that I bought off Curves. Watch this space I say.

• Jeff you are very lucky that Mytrak came and got your CS machines. I hope you were duly reimbursed some of the money that CS cost. Be very careful how you go about opening up under another name. I was very tempted to do the same thing. I know that the machines belonged to us we all paid alot of money for them but as far as CI are concerned we don’t own any of it. It makes me laugh now when I think about the restrictions CI has put on all of us who have closed down our clubs. “You are not allowed to sell your equipment to anyone except another Curves, CS had to sent back at your own expense etc etc”. Good luck.