Lawyers in big sweat tormenting gym members

By Jon Abbott

A firm of attorneys who claim to have been instructed by a gym group that went bust nearly six years ago continue to harass former members with letters of demand threatening to sell their homes unless they pay small amounts.

J M Meiring Attorneys of Randburg states that it has been "instructed" by its "client", the Health & Racquet Club, when, on its own admission, it has never been involved in the liquidation of the club or its holding company, LeisureNet.

It also tells people to pay their debts into a Leisurenet trust bank account. Its letters continue to contain this information even though the local law society has ruled that letters of demand must not be misleading.

Former members of the club in KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng have been told to pay debts allegedly incurred just before the club went under in 2000.

Some of them have had up to four similar letters of demand in the past few months.

The club of 80 gyms with 900 000 members was part of the LiesureNet group that was liquidated. Soon afterwards it was taken over by Richard Branson's Virgin Group and renamed Virgin Active.

Most of the letters say that as a result of an investigation into the person's "financial affairs" it has been established that they own a particular property.

"This means," the letters continue, "that we can now institute legal action against you in terms of the magistrates' court Act, which will enable us to sell your property at a public auction."

The letters also state: "Numerous attempts have been made to contact you, regarding your outstanding debt to our client, with no positive response from you."

This is in spite of the fact that people have responded to similar, earlier letters without getting any response from the attorneys.

Cathy Bouwmeester, of Randburg, recently received her fourth letter since last April.

Prior to that, she received a letter of demand relating to her Health & Racquet Club membership from a different firm of attorneys in 2001, and she then paid R453 93 in full and final settlement.

She paid Van der Venter Majapelo Incorporated (VVM), which subsequently split when one of its directors, Johan Meiring, formed JM Attorneys, which operates in the same Randburg building as VVM.

"After I got the April letter I went to JM's office with my 2001 cheque, which I had luckily kept," said Bouwmeester.

"I was told they would look into it. After that I phoned them every day for two weeks, and as I couldn't get any sense out of them, I gave up.

"It is deplorable that they can threaten to sell my house, which is worth more than R1-million, to satisfy a debt of just over R1 000. What's worse is the way they go on harassing people when they are in the wrong."

A legal expert said a debt became prescribed and could not be legally enforced if a summons was not issued within three years of the date when the person, who was owed the money, became aware of the debt.

Ben du Randt, a director of KPMG Administrators, the Cape Town firm that is doing the administration for the LeisureNet liquidators, said JM Attorneys bought the book debts of individual members of the KwaZulu-Natal and Gauteng clubs. However, this was denied by the JM Attorneys. All it would say was that it had "been instructed on a portion of the debtors' book".

Asked if there had been any complaints to any law society about the firm's letters of demand, JM Attorneys replied that due to the "sensitive" nature of their credit recovery work, "complaints are received on an ongoing basis, which are duly attended to".