Solinca Reviews 28

I am member of Solinca Light Estoril, Lisbon since last 2 years. The facilities in the Gym are pretty good but the most horrible is their manager who is very arrogant and does not believe in customer service. I had issues with my absence due to some emergency but they charged me for the full period and when I requested them for compensation, he refused to oblige and was enforcing his rules. When I requested to speak to the higher management, he refused to give any contact details and he said that he is the ultimate manager of the gym. Very pathetic level of customer service.

The Solinca Colombo has a very serious issue - the showers in the male Locker room have no doors. This has created many uncomfortable situations (i.e. harassment) for some of the users. When a formal complaint was written in the complaints book, the manager replied saying that there were "no plans to install the doors and they're aware of the issue ". She also added that "they're monitoring the situation closely ". My question is: how do you monitor it and why not just address it? This inaction clearly shows that Solinca Colombo condones harassment.

Interesting facts:

Portugal's Constitution (Article 26) and GDPR-inspired laws guarantee the right to personal privacy and data protection. Shower areas without doors violate bodily privacy, potentially constituting unlawful processing of personal data under Law 58/2019 .
- The European Convention on Human Rights (incorporated into Portuguese law) also protects the right to private life (Article 8), which courts have interpreted to include protections against forced exposure in intimate settings.

During our 3 years of living in Portugal, we have encountered very friendly and welcoming people, but a very unpleasant exception was the manager of the Solinca club in Viana do Castelo.

While my wife was exercising on the exercise machine, another client intervened (which is against the rules of the sports club) and created a conflict situation, in which I was forced to intervene. When trying to clarify the situation with the manager (I don’t remember the name) of the club, we encountered a very biased (not in our favor) attitude from the manager, who decided to terminate our membership in the club unilaterally, and this despite the fact that the instigators of the conflict were other clients.

But the most unpleasant experience for us was the mocking and contemptuous tone of the conversation from the manager, where she directly made it clear that she did not care at all who was the instigator of the conflict, and without even listening to us, she made a decision in favor of the other side of the conflict. Based on this, and the fact that we are from Ukraine, the conclusion suggests itself that the manager has racist views either towards Ukrainians or foreigners in general.

So today around 10 AM in the morning, I visited the solinca gym in norteshopping to get a membership. I have a membership card of continente and there I am always getting notified exclusive membership deal in solinca gym with my card. I also checked their website and their also these promotion offers are mentioned.

I went to the gym and tried to talk with receptionist. The moment I asked about being a member, the guy was not happy to see me. He gave me a piece of paper with the plans. These plans are completely different and quite expensive around 15 euro per week, so 60 euro per month. I tried to ask some questions about contract length, instructors. The guy did not had any answer.

Right at that moment a portuguese woman came in for a membership. The receptionist told that woman everything and also the discount offer with cartaho continente. I do not speak fluent portuguese but i understand conversations and speak limited. I asked the guy if i can get the offer with the continente card and just with a very rude tone and body language the guy replied , no offer with coninente card.

I was quite shock by this guy’s behavior. I am just wondering what kind of management runs solinca that their employees can actually behave like this. Very unfortunate. If the offer is only for portuguese speaking mationals, then they should advertise like that. Or if their employees are allowed to behave like this, solinca management also should put a warning saying “Our employees are rude, come at your own risk”

They keep your data even if you don’t finish subscribing, got a call from an assistant asking why i didn’t finish the subscription…very unsettling

They advertised a pack and when I got to the counter telling them what I needed they ended up saying I had to join a more expensive plan. After I realized I fell into a scam, they refused to give me a refund. They're not worthy people's trust. I recommend looking for their competitors.

The worst gym. You're literally punished and asked for money every now and then.
Poor business ethics. What a waste of €€

Mostly excellent. Friendly and professional staff that are always attentive and helpful. A good gym atmosphere. Could have more machines and quicker to fix broken down machines. Please improve the music! ;-) But overall highly recommendable.