Bally Total Fitness Bally Fitness Charged My VISA for an Unauthorized Membership Renewal Internet

For the first time in the 17 years that I've been a member at Bally Total Fitness, they just charged my debit VISA card (August 2011) for an annual membership renewal without my approval. In the past, they had always mailed me a reminder, but then waited for me to contact them to authorize a renewal. I see on one of the other ripoff reports that they are in bankruptcy, so I guess that explains - but doesn't justify - their suddenly unethical business practices.

A call to Bally's customer service number got me a recording that says my wait time would be over 30 minutes, which I'm sure is a deliberate attempt to get people to just give up. Next time I'll try waiting and see if I get someone, but I doubt it.

I have disputed the charge with Wells Fargo, but of course that'll take 10-14 days to resolve. The encouraging news is that I was able to get a similar disputed charge - with my old bank Wachovia -reversed two years ago, thanks in large part to my ability to point them to other people having posted complaints about the same scam, here at ripoffreport.com. (I love this site) Hopefully Wells Fargo will also listen to reason.

Anyway, for about the 3rd time in the past 3 years, I will once again be asking my bank to issue me a new debit VISA card and void the old number, to avoid further ripoffs. It's ridiculous to have to do that so often. (Maybe it's safer to go back to mailing checks to pay my bills, like back in the good old 1990's?)