Hello. My name is Ginger. I am an addict. I am addicted to
massages.
It started when I was teaching at Virginia College, and I
could get an hour-long massage for $20. Hardly a Saturday passed that didn’t
find me at the college’s massage therapy suite.
When that job went away, so did the $20 massages, but I
found Massage Envy. For the next 3 years, I belonged to their “club”. I signed
up for monthly massages at a huge discount. There are a couple of “catches”. One
is that they are paid by automatic withdrawal from your debit card or your
credit card, and the second is that you have to agree to do this for a
pre-determined time. I think it is a year.
Anyway, I enjoyed a monthly massage for the next 3 years.
But by then I had retired from work, and no longer had time to go over there every
month. So, a year later (by then about 4 years of membership), I told them I
was stopping my membership. They said I was already paid for that month (I
think it was October of 2015 at that point), and that I had already paid for 8
massages I hadn’t collected yet, but would forfeit if I didn’t collect them by
the end of the month, when my membership ended. So, since they are open day and
night until 9:00, and 7 days a week, I managed to get over there on Sunday
nights, Wednesday afternoons, and other odd times to get my 8 massages in
during the next 3 weeks.
Oh, how I missed them! But for the next 3 Christmases, my son
gave me Massage Envy gift cards, because he knew how much I missed it. About
one or two a year was all I really had time for anyway, so this was the perfect
gift for me.
Well imagine my surprise last weekend, when I stopped for
gas and the pump declined my debit card! I tried twice, knowing there was some
mistake, because even with one check that hadn’t cleared yet, I had way more in
the bank than gas was going to cost. So I checked my bank app. To my (extreme)
surprise, I was $300 overdrawn. IMPOSSIBLE. So I looked at the account to see
what the hell happened. There was a debit from MASSAGE ENVY for almost $900.
Standing agape at my cell phone at the pump, with an almost empty gas tank, I called
Massage Envy to see wtf. After talking to several people, and after finally
getting someone who knew what was going on, I was told that I never “officially”
ended my club membership, so I owed for the last 3 years, and they had debited
my account for the $896. I was BEYOND angry, because I was helpless to correct
this until Monday. (Thank goodness I have an old-fashioned savings account, and
can auto-transfer into checking.)
But I wanted to know more about how this happened in the
first place. The debit card I had when I registered for Massage Envy’s club had
long since expired, so how in the world did they get access to my bank
account??? And WHY, if I was still a "member", they hadn't continued to debit my account 3 years ago??? Then, I could have known they hadn't "officially" cancelled my account, and could have nipped this in the bud.
THIS IS THE IMPORTANT PART: Massage Envy Corporate has
developed a “bot” that searches old accounts that haven’t been “officially”
cancelled in writing, or for which they have no piece of paper with a signature ending the account. Once identified, the bot searches these accounts for bank account information,
and debit them for however many years in arrears they are. The lady I talked to
at Massage Envy said the manager had spent the whole last week explaining this
to the numerous people who called and complained all day.
I am told I can get the total amount back, but first I have
to go in and sign an agreement to cancel my account that was cancelled 3 years
ago. They can reverse the charge in 3 to 5 business days.
So, MASSAGE ENVY, here is my message to you: I will NEVER
AGAIN darken your doorstep. If my son wants to give me a massage gift card for
Christmas, I will give him a list of the MYRIAD other spas and individuals around
me that offer therapeutic massage just as satisfying and comforting as Massage
Envy. I wouldn’t be surprised if there didn’t pop up a “class action suit”
against them for this. Although I’ve never sued anyone in my life, given the
opportunity, I will enthusiastically hop onto THAT train!
AAAAALLLLL ABOARD!!
