Consumer Protection Law in the Large Scale Indian Gym

Introduction

Consumer protection rights exist to protect the consumers from malpractices in business transactions that include goods and/or services. However, consumer protection rights are usually unknown to the common consumer due to which companies often get away with violations of consumer protection law. Our report examines one such violation by Dallah Gym, which is a successful large scale gym, located in a popular area in Doha. We state the violation in this report, and discover the way Dallah Gym breached the consumer protection law by misrepresenting information to consumers.

Act of Law Breaking by Dallah Gym

As stated by Article 2, the customer has the right to get secure, accurate data and information about commodities or services. In our case, the Dallah gym has broken this law specifically. As some members of the gym state, that when they paid for their membership to have access to the gym area, depending on how long they wanted, they paid QAR2000 for a personal trainer per month if they wanted to have one, as it is the ideal way to prevent injuries during exercise. The gym receptionist has explained to the customers that the trainer would be available for an hour to personally train the client. However, they did not mention that the trainer will work with six or more other clients at the same time, which in this case should be called a group training instead of a personal training session. The clients explained their problem to the gym manager, and they were surprised by her response that it is not her problem. She referred to the issue as the client's problem as they did not know what they were paying for exactly, even though the manager explicitly stated at the beginning that it will be a one on one training session.

Violation of Specific Consumer Protection Law

The act by Dallah Gym does not comply with Law No. 8 of 2008 on Consumer Protection, Article 2 specifically. Article 2 in Al-Meezan clearly states that the consumer has “The right to obtain correct data and information about commodities or services” therefore, the gym broke this rule by lying to the consumer by saying that the session is a one-to-one training session but after paying the fees, the consumer was surprised that it was not the case and she had been lied to, as it turned out to be a group training session, therefore, the gym did not give the right information to the consumer.

Sanctions and Penalties Applicable

According to Article no. 2 on consumer protection, a consumer has the right to receive accurate data and information on the products and/ or services they are being presented to. Dallah gym did not provide the customer with accurate information and provided false advertisement about their services, thus violating Law no. (8) of 2008 on Consumer Protection. The law prohibits showcasing, selling, promoting or offering any products or services with misleading information. Chapter Four discusses about the sanctions and penalties for violating different laws mentioned in the article number 2. The premises of Dallah gym that has committed a violation of law must be closed for a temporary period of time. The duration of the suspension shall increase if the law is violated multiple times. Moreover, the department responsible for the management and the legal department of Dallah gym are jointly responsible to pay the fines for or on behalf of the employee who did not mention the information clearly. The customer is also entitled to receive a full refund of the amount paid for not being provided the services mentioned.

Suggestions for Dallah Gym to Improve

A suggestion to Dallah gym is that they should change their marketing manager because the marketing manager is not professional enough to do his/ her job. Dallah gym should also provide the customers the services they offered to give in the advertisement or else they will lose the customers because they provided customers inaccurate information.

Conclusion

Implementing the suggested sanctions and penalties on Dallah Gym will lead to the deterrence of behaviours that are not compliant with the consumer protection law. Businesses must operate with higher integrity and must prioritize the rights of the consumer over their personal benefit, since fundamentally the greater and the more satisfied their customers are, the more successful their business would be.