Better - Waltham Forest Feel Good Centre Reviews 

I have been a member here for many years (even when it was the old Field and Track) but enough is enough and have now cancelled my membership and will be headed to the Olympic Pool instead.

The staff are lovely and professional but the reason I cancelled is as follows:

Olympic pool now under new management so cannot use Betters Swim UK membership to book
Feel Good have too many different sessions going on in the pool leading to swimming pool lanes switched around mid swim.
Emails not acknowledged.
Toilet area downstairs not being cleaned and topped up with paper in a timely manner.
Pool area overcrowded

Avoid at all cost!!!
Worst gym/health centre ever!!
I have been paying £93 per month for the use of the swimming pool, sauna, and steam room, but the quality of these services falls far below expectations, and recent changes to their policies (policy was there before, but no late charges until September)have caused further dissatisfaction.

Firstly, the cancellation policy is misleading. On the app, there is no clear indication of the 20-day cancellation notice period. This only becomes apparent after pressing the 'cancel' option, which I believe is a deliberate lack of transparency.
Secondly, the £3 no-show/late cancellation fee, which was introduced in mid-September without proper notice or any form of approval from existing members, is completely unjustified. Had I known this fee would be applied, I would have never signed up for this membership.

I have always attended my sessions, though I may arrive 10–15 minutes late on occasion. They suggested that I must wait for the full two-hour time frame to end before confirming my attendance is absurd and unreasonable. There is no logical reason why I should remain for an additional 30 minutes after finishing my session, purely for their system to update.

The state of the facilities is substandard:

Sauna benches are slimy and dirty.
Sharp, broken mosaic tiles litter the steam room.
Puddles near the drainage in the spa often have black, worm-like organisms in them.
The swimming pool is overcrowded, making it unusable during peak hours.
Only about 30% of the wristband-locking lockers in the changing rooms are functional.

Additionally, I once waited over 20 minutes for towels and bathrobes(usually is only 10 which is barely acceptable), significantly reducing my time in the spa and resulting in a no-show fee which was not waived. This points to a serious issue with understaffing at reception, where there is often a long wait for assistance with any request.

To make matters worse, their app system for tracking attendance is unreliable, leading to unjust no-show fees being applied to my account. I have had to call customer service multiple times to have these fees waived, and I was recently informed that they will no longer do so because too many fees have already been reversed in September. This is unacceptable, and a clear breach of contract, as I attended my sessions. Penalising me for system errors violates the basic contractual expectation of fair treatment.

Virgin gym is £93 a month when they have sales, much better in every way!!!!!

Update:you are misleading the people with your reply, you do get charged the no show fee if you are late 10 minutes, that's not a no show especially if it is because of the long wait and the understaffing. And you are not willing to waive it. You are recording the phone conversations so you could check when I was told to wait until the timeframe finish. You are right Virgin is incomparable to Better. Virgin is clean and maintained well, no 2 hours booking but you can walk in for free, you don't get charged for arriving 10minutes late, wait sorry you don't need to book at all. Just because you are nonprofit it doesn't mean you shouldn't maintain your facilities well and charge extras for showing up late for a spa experience, like if there is anyone who would attend the spa and would have to wait for you, no because there is no staff there at all.
AVOID

While the facilities are adequate (some nasty issues particularly with the pool change/shower/toilet facilities), the recent parking fiasco with the shift from use of the y-pay app to using the better app to pay Gemini's private parking fees, has been shambolic to put it politely. I've been slammed with a £100 fine from Gemini for apparently not paying for parking (a first since 2016 when I began going to the feel good? Centre!). WFFGC have admitted the parking changes have been chaotic but my question is what are they going to do about it? Will they support their customers by getting Gemini's incorrectly issued fines cancelled??

Gym is great and induction was fantastic to get you started when your at a loss but reception staff are really unfriendly otherwise would have given a 5

The App and website is literally does not work properly. I been trying to book a swimming lesson for my son via app and it took me to the website and when I enter my email and password it comes up with an error. I even tried to reset my password but never received a link.

Great! Staff are very helpful and friendly, especially the reception staff, which makes it a nice atmosphere

I had a problem renewing my membership online, contacted the Support team who were very helpful and friendly. Problem solved very quickly and efficiently

My son loves to go there

Friendly and helpful staff, no pressure but support given when needed, clean venue, plenty of parking with excellent rates if a member. Varied activities for children and adults.

I am a Better Member and have been for a number of years. I have been going to the Waltham Forest pool multiple times a week for a little over a year. Today, I felt incredibly unsafe swimming in the pool where some of your management, swim and external school teaching staff and two male swimmers failed to recognize the lopsided power dynamics at play. As a woman in 2024, I expect people to recognize having two males (the swimmers involved) verbally harass, chase and physically kick a female swimmer creates an unbalanced and inequitable power dynamic. Your red shirted life guards and female manager were the only ones who seemed to recognize this inequality.

Yes, a separate lane was provided to me (I appreciate that) it did bring more attention to the situation and allowed me to further be ganged up upon by the school teachers and heckled by the male swimmers, who continued to communicate with me after moving lanes. The managers should have not allowed that.

Swimming is a safe space for me and it was completely destroyed today through the actions of other swimmers, visiting school teachers, and Better management. When other female swimmers entered the changing village and saw my distress, they came up and asked me if I was ok. I felt more supported and understood by the other female swimmers than Better management. I do not feel safe going back to Waltham Forest Pool, which is a shame because it has become a regular part of my week.

Better needs to do better to recognize how aggressive male behavior, especially when multiple males are involved and create situations that make female members feel unsafe. This is 2024 and a recognition of power dynamics is a standard part of businesses that want to be considered inclusive and equitable.

I look forward to understanding how Better intends to address this situation so other female swimmers can swim safely and without fear in its facilities. I can provide additional details about the specifics of the situation.

I booked the soft play party for my daughter’s 2nd birthday and it’s safe to say I’ll be booking with better again. We got the soft play room to our selves and both my daughter and the other children loved it. Walthamstow feel good centre really made my daughter birthday the best.

Very useless customer service! I had problem with a payment and requested refund because I didn't not use their service. More than week later no response from them.

Our College offers a once a year trip to our students. (we dont tell our students the venue - its a secret and a surprise) The place we chose was the Waltham Forest Feel Good Centre trampoline... the service George & Lucy the Managers gave us was absolutely incredible. They were welcoming, gracious, understanding and very helpful. Want to have a good time? Best place! We would recommend them anytime. Have fun. Judith

I had a party for my daughter on Sunday 21st January 2024 at the Waltham Forest feel good centre and I would strongly advise anyone against doing the same.
I was extremely disappointed with the organisation of the party. You are not allowed into the party room until the children are in the soft play. At this point you have to stay to supervise them so cannot spend any time setting up. There is nowhere to collect the children’s belongings or the presents/cake/balloons so items can easily go missing. One child lost his shoes and the centre have no answer as to where they have gone.
The food is mediocre (frozen nuggets/fish fingers and chips) and nothing healthy is offered but the rules say you must not bring anything but a cake.
The cost of the party is very high (£22 a child) but you get very little for your money.
Unfortunately the staff whilst being very polite and friendly are very few and far between. Our party host was very difficult to find.
I’m very sorry to say that Better has prioritised money making over providing an adequate and enjoyable service. I am embarrassed to have held my daughter’s party here and would not go back.
I have waited to write this review after attempting to contact the centre to allow them to respond to my complaint. I had to chase a response and after almost 2 weeks it was unsatisfactory.
Avoid at all costs.
- IN RESPONSE TO YOUR REPLY BELOW -
- Disappointed with our review. No apology?!
- An amazing birthday programme?!
Amazing on your part perhaps as you make good profit because you poorly staff the events.
You are clearly deluded.
Read the review and look into the incident.
This is a poorly worded and condescending reply. You haven't answered any of the issues at hand.
That has not dealt with anything, you continue to ignore the fundamental issues and have no resolution. How can you 'better' yourselves if you can't accept responsibility. Terrible management and leadership, How can you expect your staff to act in the right manner if this is how you treat your customers at the 'top' level.

Showers in the changing rooms have no real pressure and have no soap in any dispensers.
I have used the gym couple of time and I have notice loads of younger children - not sure what the age policy is.

The place is really good but the gym no the best, because anyone can go in they don't have any access control for the members.

Easy to book, good equipment

MY OLDER SON ATTENDS SWIMMING LESSONS, AND MY YOUNGER SON WANTED TO BEGIN AS SOON AS POSSIBLE.
I GOT A BIG DISCOUNT.

Not enough staff or security. I was followed into the gym by two men and there were no members of staff anywhere. In the changing rooms for the pool, there are people wearing shoes and no staff to remind them to take them off.

The gym is very pretty but honestly the number of machines, free weights, and the space dedicated to these is very small for the price. Any standard gym should have multiple bench presses and you have just one. There are no incline bench presses that I saw, either.

Finally, staff don't follow the hours posted on their site. The cafe was closed more than 1 hour before it's supposed to and staff just disappear on Sunday evenings.