SAN FRANCISCO (Legal Newsline) - A California customer is suing a fitness center, alleging it raised rates that were supposedly fixed.
Russell Marchewka of Orange County, individually and for all others similarly situated, filed a class action lawsuit April 29 in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California against 24 Hour Fitness USA Inc., alleging fraud and violations of California's Unfair Competition Law, the state's Consumer Legal Remedies Act and its Health Studio Services Contract Law.
The suit alleges 24 Hour Fitness had a longstanding practice of representing that if a customer purchased a prepaid membership for either two or three years, thereafter they would be locked into a fixed, annual renewal rate for life. Beginning in 2014, however, the complaint states 24 Hour Fitness began increasing the promised annual renewal rates for customers who had purchased the lifetime memberships.
The lawsuit alleges 24 Hour Fitness has increased many of its prepaid customers' annual renewal fees by more than 100 percent.
Marchewka and others in the class seek a jury trial, actual damages, restitution, disgorgement, injunctive and declaratory relief, interests, attorney fees and costs. They are represented by attorneys Rosemary R. Rivas and Quentin A. Roberts of Finkelstein Thompson in San Francisco, and by Marc L. Godino of Glancy Prongay & Murray in Los Angeles.
U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Case number 3:16-CV-02359-MEJ