fitnessblowout.com Fitness Club Warehouse Scam, never-sent/faulty products,horrible customer service, liars, cheats, stay AWAY! Los Angeles, California

I purchased a treadmill from Fitness Club Warehouse online on 09/16/11 for $1230+. After long weeks of waiting for its arrival and many emails and phonecalls, it finally arrived in a damaged cardboard box. We assembled it with the help of a very mechanical friend, but he discovered parts were missing and it couldn't be folded due to unwelded parts.

We waited another long time to have a technician come out and inspect it, who said the same thing, and that it was useless to the company, so we could keep it or give it away or throw it away.  We contacted their customer service multiple times until they finally said they didn't have that same exact model but would try to find something comparable. They offered a model that was advertised as $997 with $33/month pmts. I contacted them way before it arrived and requested that they create a new account on this different brand/lower-end model, but we're still getting billed for the higher-end model.

Anyway, after another very long wait, the "comparable" model arrived and the same technician assembled it. For about 6 weeks now, we have daily either emailed or spend countless hours on the phone with "Jared" at their customer service, who says he will pass our request on to his supervisor, Steve Balilak (sp?), who has NEVER returned any of our calls.  We definitely feel we are getting the run-around.

I have set up disputes over this with the BBB and the Attorney General's office, as well as their bank, TD Retail in New Jersey, stating that all we want is a change made in our billing to reflect the cheaper purchase and have lowered payments.  Now, I am reading reports at RipOff and other sites that Fitness Blowout tries to destroy your credit and do other nasty things that are very upsetting.

I am not kidding - please do not be tugged in by their very appealing prices and website and extremely friendly and helpful salespeople.  They ask for your Soc. Sec. number to check your credit. They won't let you make the purchase without giving your credit card number to them over the phone (or I suppose online, we used the phone).  They talk very fast and are VERY enthusiastic.  Don't be fooled.  You will never get any enthusiastic support from this company ever again.

I have canceled future payments to them with my bank, as my banker advised me to do.  I found TD Retail Bank online after much searching and wrote them an email (I found one person with an email address at their site). TD Retail Bank seems to take only multi-million dollar businesses as customers, so Fitness Blowout must be making lots of money for them.

I hate to spend money on a lawyer to simply get "customer service" to make changes on our account and statement to reflect the true value of our replacement treadmill, but it appears I must, or get my excellent credit ruined, or have them come after me with collection agents.

We have been trying to get a host of problems solved with their customer service people, and all we get is a run around.  I've been making regular payments to them for four months and only a week ago finally got the replacement, which is less expensive and which I HOPE will last a couple of years.  I feel stuck with this treadmill, but come hell or high water, I am not going to give them one red cent until they behave like professionals.  Which, I must add, I highly doubt they will.
Sheila, Lompoc, California