Formal Complaint to the Consumer Protection Bureau of Manitoba

At this point, I am also filing a complaint against both Equifax and Citadel Credit of Canada (Shapes' Collection Agency) for violating The Personal Investigations Act

Citadel has violated by providing disputed evidence to a personal reporting bureau (Equifax) and failing to provide me with proper documentation to validate the debt. Since I have supplied them with evidence that proves, reasonably, that the debt is invalid they are required to either show me their proof or to correct their files and update the report to Equifax.

Equifax is also in violation of this act for failing to properly validate the information that I have disputed. The law says they must "verify" it, something that they have not done. Rather than verify it, they choose just to rely on the word of the Collection Agency to confirm ir(who obviously have a financial motive to lie).

So both of these companies are in violation of The Personal Investigations Act. Here's an excerpt from my formal complaint:

I would like to file a complaint under the personal investigations act.

Citadel Credit of Canada, a collection agency in Manitoba, has knowingly
supplied false information to someone making a personal report about me
(Equifax Canada Inc.) They have told Equifax that there is a debt
against me, that does not exist. I have proof that disputes the validity
of the debt. Under section 15 of the personal investigations act, they
are guilty of an offense. I have supplied them with evidence that the
debt is invalid in the form of a cancellation notice of a contract in a
timely manner, therefore they should reasonably be aware that the
information they are supplying is false.



In addition to this, I would like to make a similar complaint against
Equifax Canada Inc. (a credit reporting bureau in Ontario) I have sent
them a request to verify and correct the inaccurate information, but so
far, they have refused to do so. Equifax's "verification" process
consists of asking the reporting agency (Citadel Credit of Canada)
whether the information is true. The dictionnary, however, defines
verification as "to establish the truth, accuracy, or reality of a
claim". Equifax does not do this in their verification process, instead,
they simply ask the reporting agency (who has a financial motive to say
that it is truthful) whether or not the record is accurate. Even though
I have supplied them with evidence to the contrary, they still maintain
that they have "verified" the information.

Under section 17.1, I would request that the director investigate both
of these agencies to ensure that they are in complaince with the act and
to force compliance and/or prosecute both of these agencies if they are
found to be in violation.

I would also request, that since I have, on several occasions, made both
of these parties aware of their mistakes/violations that you make note
of the fact that they should not be exempt from civil liability under
section 16 due to the fact they they "ought to be reasonably aware that
part or all of the information in the report ... is false"

I'll be faxing this along with my documentation to the consumer protection office. As this is a formal complaint, the commissioner now has the right to levy fines and force compliance.

Complaints submitted

So I've submitted three complaints to the Privacy Comissioner. One about Shapes, one about Citadel, and one about Equifax. Can't wait to hear back from them. We explained in detail in each complaint letter the actions that I took, the actions taken by the businesses that violate PIPEDA and the way it needs to be rectified.

Good times. Hopefully I'll get to sue all three of them for the crap they've put me through after this.

My mortgage broker also had Shapes do this.

So I'm applying for a mortgage through a broker and I tell him about this collection and he says...

"I'm guessing it was a gym membership? If so same thing happened to me, they actually called SCU and SCU gave them my acct info and they forged my signature!! Was it shapes by chance?"

no fooling, I'm saving the e-mail if anyone wants to get a look at it. It's from a business e-mail address of a Winnipeg area mortgage broker. I don't want to post it here, but if anyone wants a look, let me know.

It would be funny if it wasn't so sad.

Also, he has a way of submitting a request for a re-score to Equifax and they'll be more likely to take it seriously since he's a paying member. In the U.S. it's called "Rapid Re-scoring." I don't know what it's called here

Either way, he says he can get any bank to overlook such a small collection, especially when he explains the circumstances and shows them my proof.

To Shapes: You can't treat me this way and get away with it. So to recap the consequences for you: Lost customers, lost time dealing with me, lost time dealing with complaint to consumer's bureau, lost time dealing with formal complaint to privacy comissioner, and soon to be lost time dealing with court and (God willing) lost money from a judgement against you.


PS dear readers: It seems like so many people have had a number pulled on them by Shapes, I keep talking to random people and they all seem to have similar experiences. Why are they allowed to continue their business? Everyone who has been wronged should complain to A) The Consumer's bureau and B) The Privacy Comissioner of Canada!
Perhaps with enough people, we can put these ass-clowns out of business.

Help from a most unlikely source?

So I've turned down Shapes's blackmail offer. Especially since they wouldn't even remove the hit from my credit anyway, so it would be pointless to pay them their blood money.
If the inept consumer protection bureau had any brains, perhaps they could have settled this, but in spite of their stated function of enforcing the consumer protection act, they actually have no power of enforcement.

But I got an e-mail the other day from a most unlikely ally. He doesn't want me to give out his name or position, but he has experience working with a federal law called PIPEDA that governs how organizations can collect and use my personal data. It is enforced under the office of the Privacy Comissioner of Canada. Apparently, Shapes has violated nearly every aspect of it:

- They have not allowed me access to my personal information that they have on file
- They have not implemented a transparent policy that investigates my dispute
- They have not allowed me to make a statement in my file which disputes their claim
- They have not made me aware of an internal dispute resolution method
- They have disclosed my information to a third party without my knowledge or approval (the collection agency). Apparently the contract I signed gives them the right to sue me if they think I have breached it, but it does not give them the right to share my information with a third party for ANY purpose

Also, the Collection Agency itself has violated this same act for much the same reasons as Shapes.

And Equifax has violated it as well by not properly investigating my claim and reporting their findings.

So, my new friend sent a letter to Shapes telling them all of this. And we're also filing a complaint with the Privacy Comissioner.

He has experience with this kind of thing, and he says from what he's seen "it's a pretty open and shut case." And once the Privacy Comuissioner finds against Shapes, the Collection Agency and Equifax I'll be able to sue them for large civil penalties.

So maybe this will all turn out awesome in the end.

The day of reckoning...

So the time is soon coming where I will have to decide whether or not to pay Shapes their blackmail....

I return for $700 I get about a yearlong membership and I get a slanderous black mark removed from my credit.

On the one hand, I'm applying for a mortgage soon, so it will save me money in the long run. On the other, I hate the thought of these vile vultures getting a penny of my hard earned money.

An story e-mailed to me

Here's another Shapes horror story I've recently been informed of...


"A friend of mine worked at Shapes a few years ago. When she worked there, she recieved a call from the St. Amant centre asking why Shapes was debting one of thier client's account. (St. Amant is a centre of adults with physical/developmental disabilities). Long story short, someone at Shapes had signed up a developmentally disabled adult for a gym membership that they were unable to use. This person had wandered into Shapes while on a field trip to Petland. Obviously, this person was not competent to sign any kind of legal papers, nor were they able to use a gym membership.
Shapes refused to refund the money or cancell the membership.
St. Amant had to threaten legal action and contact the Free Press before the membership was cancelled. To my knowledge, no money was ever refunded."

They sound like a reputable company don't they...

E-mail them at fitness@shapes.ca and let them know your outrage about this incident which happened in 2008. Ask them if they still follow these shady business practices and tell them that you won't have anything to do with them until they clean up their act

So what can you do?

Well, the way I see it, if I cost them even one customer, I'm ahead. A 1999 revealed that a dissatisfied customer will tell 10 people and each of them in turn will tell 5 more. That's a total of 50 people. Now 11 years later, with the help of the internet, I can tell a heck of alot more than 10 people.

I would ask that you write to fitness@shapes.ca and let them know that you've read this. As I said, if I cost them 1 customer, I'm ahead. If I cost them more, maybe they'll stop blackmailing me.

By the way, I have all the necessary documents to prove I don't owe them money. They just don't care! If I could post my credit report on here, you'd see that it's perfect, other than this one thing; this isn't something I do regularly.

Shapes Fitness Center in Winnipeg is Evil

On October 4^th, 2010 I signed a one year long contract with Shapes Fitness at their location on Nairn Avenue. The contract contained a provision for a one week review period in which you could cancel the contract. I was given the contract to take home and review. After reading the terms on the back of the contract, I decided that I would rather opt for a monthly membership. I discussed this with one of the employees of Shapes the next time I was in their gym and they told me to write a cancellation notice which I did and hand-delivered on October 7^th to a gentleman at their Nairn Avenue location.

At the beginning of January of 2006, I attempted to cancel this membership and was informed that I could not as I was signed to a one year contract. I told the person working at the counter that originally I had signed a one year contract but that I cancelled it and opted instead for a monthly agreement, as outlined in my cancellation notice. I was informed that they hadn't received the notice that I hand-delivered and thus couldn't cancel the membership. I told the employee to just do it, and left. My credit card continued being billed, so I contacted Visa and had further charges from them blocked at the end of January.

Everything was fine, until I started getting letters from Citadel Credit of Canada.. I received one letter probably every 2 or 3 weeks in February, March and April. After each letter, I would call the number on the letter. No one would ever answer the phone so I left a series of messages explaining the situation. None of my calls were ever returned and my messages became ruder and ruder as time passed and I received no response. Finally, the letters stopped coming, and I assumed that perhaps they had gotten the message.

A few months down the road, I was doing a routine credit check and noticed an entry from Citadel under the collections section. I contacted them again, and again received no response. I appealed to the credit reporting agency (Equifax), explained the situation to them and asked them to remove the entry on my report, and they refused.

I attempted to get in contact with both Shapes and Citadel. Phone calls to Shapes were unhelpful, everyone just told me “we didn't get your notice”, even though I hand-delivered it. And phone calls to Citadel went unreturned.

Eventually, in July of 2008, I was made aware of my right to appeal to a review board at Shapes, via e-mail. I sent them an e-mail outlining my situation. They responded by denying my appeal and telling me to pay the money. I responded with a sharply worded e-mail.

Following that e-mail, someone actually called me with an offer that if I paid the full amount immediately, they would remove the mark on my credit report and would reactivate my membership for the remaining term. However, I declined this offer because I did not feel I could trust them. I felt that if I paid them the money, then I would have no leverage over them and it would be admitting that I was wrong, and I refuse to reward them for their bad behaviour.

So I called the so-called "consumer protection bureau of Manitoba." They were no help. They 'negotiated so that instead of paying the full amount, I could take $100 off of the cost and they would reactivate my membership (As if I'd go.... would they really want me there anyway?)... ooohhh, wow. So now Shapes is blackmailing me for less money.