It seems like the Washington Sports Club in our neighborhood is almost universally hated. I’ve heard bad things from friends and acquaintances who go, but then I decided to check out the Yelp reviews — and yikes. Not good.
The place has an average of 2.5 stars out of 5, and it seems to be worse lately — almost every review from the past few months is 1 or 2 stars (you can’t give zero) with a lot of similarities — people complain about hidden fees, like a $40 “rate lock fee” that you automatically pay to keep your rate from changing, and other cancellation fees and getting charged for training sessions they never took. Folks complain they aren’t told about these fees and have a terrible time trying to get them fixed, getting the runaround on the phone and with management.
People also report unfriendly staff (at best) and lots of broken machines — wear and tear is to be expected at a popular place like this, but people report machines being broken for a long time. One reviewer described it as the “McDonald’s of gyms,” meaning that you shouldn’t expect much, which is kind of funny — though I feel like a trip to McDonald’s at 3 am on a Friday night would be more fun than many of these reviews.
One person even mentioned birthday clubs for kids, which is kind of bizarre — and actually does even sound like McDonald’s. I hope they get those Mickey D’s character animal crackers that they gave away, those were pretty tasty.
It sounds like our area is ripe for another gym, since the only other one nearby I can think of is Vida at 16th and U and then the personal training on farther down 14th.
Have you used this WSC? What do you think? Any other gym suggestions?
