Planet fitness needs to take responsibility for their staff and the information they relay

I was approached by a sales consultant from planet fitness Meadowdale about joining. I was not too sure whether I would be able to continue gyming at Meadowdale. He advised me that I could cancel the contract at any time with 30days notice, for free as this was included in the promotion at the time. Since signing up, I have had to cancel my membership due to relocation. I followed the process I was told by the consultant by taking in a letter stating I wanted to cancel my membership. I was then informed that I needed to phone customer care, who told me I had to a over R1000 to cancel my membership.

When I went to speak to the club manager about this, he just passed me onto the sales manager. I was then told that the consultant has been fired BUT the manager cannot accept my situation as it would be the consultants word against mine (nevermind that the consultant has been fired since, evidence for my case) and that I have to pay the cancellation fee or I will be blacklisted.

This is not okay! Managers need to be responsible for the staff they hire and need to take the consequences of poor staff training!!