Legal Question in Consumer Law in Virginia

Re: how to terminate membership contract

I do not want to give you much reason for optimism, but I will answer the question what can you do. I do not say that the following will necessarily succeed. But it is what you can do to give yourself the best chance of canceling the contract.

First, it is a bit dangerous to ask an attorney a question about a contract without letting the attorney READ the entire contract. It is quite possible that reading the WHOLE contract could result in a DIFFERENT opinion than what I am suggesting here. The following is only based upon what you wrote in your question, which might NOT be a good approximation of what the contract actually says, legally.

Also, I do not understand at all what you are saying about a collection agency. That does not make sense to me this early in the process. I would like to know more about what this collection agency is doing before making a final decision.

Second, I think you need to formally terminate the contract, that is send them a written notice that you are terminating the contract. Double check if the contract says anything about termination. If there is any provision about notice or termination, make sure you follow what teh contract says, in terms of what address to use, etc. I recommend sending both a regular letter and also a letter by certified mail. (It is easy for someone not to go pick up a certified letter, but it does give proof if they do.)

Third, you will have to wait for them to sue you, because I assume they will not agree to your position. When they do, you object that they have not proven their actual losses. Because they did not actually teach you for the classes you did not attend, they have not lost money, except perhaps for lost profits. In other words, they did not reeive money from you. But they also did not have to spend money on teaching you anything. So the court needs to see the DIFFERENCE between what they SAVED by not having to teach you anything from the lost revenue they would have receivd. It is not enough to simply talk about the retail price, if they were able to avoid the work and time of teaching you. I realize that they might be teaching you in a group, and the judge might give them a pass on that basis. But it is also possible that a judge will not be satisfied with that as proof of how much they have actually been damaged.

They must prove what they actually lost. Since they saved money by not givin you lessons, they must show the judge the difference between what they saved by not giving you lessons and what they would have received had you gone through with the contrct.

As I said, this might or might not work. But it is your best shot at getting out of the contract, based on what you told us in your question.

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