If you want to operate a gym startup or have a plan to open your gym, the first thing that hits your mind is the hefty profit. As per Gitnux’s research, the average income of a gym lies between $300,000 and $500,000. Moreover, the profit margin in the annual income lies between 20% to 30%. But you might forget that the most crucial thing that made your fitness easier is the completion of all the legal requirements related to your gym.
As a gym owner, if you don’t meet the legal requirements set by the government, then you will face legal lawsuits. Legal requirements set by the government are not about fulfilling the business permits. However, it also requires you to create an environment in your gym that reduces the risk of injuries. As per Gitnux’s research, around 17.9% of members in the gym face injuries, while 2.1% of the injuries lead to fractures. Thus, to avoid these injuries in your gym, you have to meet the legal requirements.
However, as a gym owner, you might have questions about how to protect a gym from legal issues. But you don’t need to worry. Here, we will discuss the legal compliances that you have to face in your gym while ensuring a remarkable fitness experience for your clients.
Why is legal compliance substantial?
Before finding an answer to how to protect a gym from legal issues, you have to find the answer to why legal compliance is essential. If you want your gym to have a good image among clients and attract new clients from far away, you have to make sure that your gym meets legal compliance. Legal compliance enables you to run your studio operation smoothly and easily.
For example, you open a gym in a remote location. In the area, you have one competition, a gym that has operated in the area for around 5 years. Both you and your competition offer the same services, and even though you are competing and using the same gym management software, the main thing that sets you apart from your competition is fulfilling the legal requirements. You have all the papers completed related to insurance, follow employment law, and ensure a safe environment for your clients. In the past 5 years, your competition reports around 100 injuries at the gym.
Moreover, they also fail to complete all the legal requirements. Due to this, their gym image among clients gets blurred. Your competition’s bad reputation enables you to improve your sales by ensuring an environment with no legal lawsuits. Here are some other reasons to answer the question of why gym legal compliance is essential:
- Allows you to develop the gym image that enables you to build trust among your investors, employees, and clients.
- It allows you to protect data and maintain privacy
- It saves your gym from legal repercussions
5 legal concerns that you need to address
To ensure an environment of legal compliance, you need to address the issues that might lead to gym lawsuits. The list that you have to tackle as a gym owner is quite lengthy. The list contains different problems, such as ensuring employees’ safety at work and injury liability. Here are the 5 legal concerns that you need to tackle even before starting your gym.
Insurance
If you want to do so in case of an emergency, you don’t need to face any legal issues and pay for the damages at work. Then, You have to buy insurance for your gym. An insurance policy is one that you buy to cover the damages in case of unexpected financial loss or mishap. You have to buy an insurance policy from a company that offers coverage for premises, equipment damage, and personal injury.
So, if any mishap occurs, you can pay the damages from the insurance claims. The price of the insurance may vary depending on the location and the number of gym employees. However, it is quite important to have some sort of protection as lawsuits are quite expensive.
For example, You are the owner of the gym that has not bought insurance and thinks that buying insurance is just a waste of money. After some time, an accident occurs in your gym where your employee’s hand gets fractured. You have to pay a large amount of money for the treatment and also get fined by the officials for not having your employee’s insurance. So, it is quite essential for you to have an insurance policy in your gym to avoid lawsuits. Here are some other insurance that you might purchase for your gym:
- Liability insurance
- Commercial property insurance
- Worker’s compensation claims
Discrimination Issues
During your journey in the fitness industry, as a gym owner, you might deal with different discrimination issues. Although we all live in the 21st century, we still face some sort of discrimination in daily life. So, you have to deal with the issue so that no one can file a lawsuit against your gym, highlighting the discrimination issue.
For example, in your gym, you also offer weight reduction services and hire a special personal trainer for it. The reason behind it is to aid clients who are overweight and grow your gym business. But at first, the client, who was overweight, came to the gym, and others at the gym started laughing at that client. This leads to discrimination issues in your gym. As per ORIGYM’s research, 28% of the plus-size and 1 in 5 (21%) of the underweight say they are uncomfortable going to a local gym.
If a person facing that issue complains to you in your gym, but you don’t take action against that and finally decide to sue your gym in court, it might lead to paying you for the damages. Thus, to deal with the issue, you have to make sure that each detail about the discrimination issue is documented. So, if any such issue happens, you might be able to provide proof to the court.
Employment law
Another crucial legal concern that you might face in your gym is employment law. When hiring new employees or while retaining the older ones, it is essential for you to provide them with necessary information related to government employment laws and pay their wages per week or month. It is your responsibility to ensure that your gym obeys all the labor rules formulated by the government. If you overlooked any rule that came under the employment law, you might have to face legal lawsuits against it.
For example, the government decided that the minimum wage a gym owner must pay the gym trainer is around $27.04. But you hired a trainer at $20. This means you violate the law, and that trainer may sue you in court. So, if you want to avoid all the legal lawsuits, you have to understand each and every detail of the employment law. Failure to fulfill the law might lead to heavy fines or even jail sometimes. So, you need to provide your employees with all the benefits as per the employment law.
Occupational safety and health act (OSHA)
To ensure a protective environment and avoid legal lawsuits based on safety, it is essential to follow OSHA safety standards. OSHA safety standards are the minimum standards that a person can follow at a workplace to ensure a secure environment for clients and employees. Most of the safety standards set by OSHA are not applicable to gyms, but you still have to make sure that your gym follows safety standards during workouts.
As a gym owner, you have to make sure that your clients and staff follow all the safety standards and have safe access to equipment with anti-slip surfaces. Moreover, you also have to make sure that all the weights in the gym are stacked properly and locked. So, no accident occurs due to the falling of the weights. Thus, following all the safety standards at the gym allows you to avoid all the lawsuits filed as per the OSHA Act. Furthermore, it also enables you to create a secure environment where your client has a remarkable fitness journey.
Getting your business license
Before considering opening a gym, you must ensure that you have all the important gym certifications and permits. As a gym owner and as a personal trainer, you have to ensure that you have obtained your fitness training and teaching certification from one of the renowned accredited institutions. These certifications not only allow you to avoid lawsuits but also enable you to attract new clients and gain their trust.
For example, you are a gym owner who operates a gym in a nearby location. You follow all safety standards in your gym and have tackled all the legal issues you might face during work. But, your gym lacks fitness training licenses and certification.
If, in this case, any accident happened in the gym or government officials make a visit to your gym, it might lead to a lawsuit. This will happen because you have not fulfilled the government requirement of getting an appropriate business license. Moreover, it also leads to a decrease in client retention rate. Thus, to avoid these gym lawsuits, you have to make sure that your gym has all the necessary certificates needed.
Final takeaway
If you want to ensure a successful gym business, you have to make sure that your gym has all the necessary certificates and licenses to avoid gym lawsuits. Apart from being expensive to prosecute and defend, gym lawsuits blur your image in the competitive fitness industry.
As nobody wants to join a gym that has some legal allegations, so, to avoid such a situation in your gym, you have to ensure that your gym follows all the instructions and has documented all the necessary paperwork.
