Addicted to Massages

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!!