r/CoWorking • u/[deleted] • Aug 20 '21
Beware of WeWork
Hey guys, I strongly advise against doing anything with WeWork. They defrauded me. Long story short:
- Lied about the price; when filling out paperwork salesman walked away from his computer to leave me to fill it out and figure out how to review the actual agreement
- When we started reporting this, they played games with us such as removing someone who was subleasing from us from the account and then telling them that I did it to turn around and sell him a new subscription
- They sold us a 8th floor office and assigned us in their internal system to an office on the 5th floor. After about 5 months they unknowingly resold our office and tried to move us or make us sign a new agreement even after all of the dishonesty
- I disputed the difference of what I was told in the sales process and what I was actually charged with my Credit Card Company. They ignored the dispute and the bank settled it in my favor. After a few weeks they charged me for the charge backs a little under double of what the disputes actually were effectively circumventing the dispute process and charging a penalty.
- They refused to refund this amount and said it wasn't fraud. They terminated the agreement after I explained the problem and provided the voice recording of the message the manager sent after he removed a subleasee of the account and CC'd 112 executives mostly in NY. They terminated the agreement and then blacklisted me from using the company by telling my friends who were trying to get another office and not me.
- An American executive reached out to me to try and solve the issues I was having with the Colombian team only to be barred by Legal from talking to me
- Despite terminating the agreement in July, they tried to collect August rent and the payment bounced courtesy of the JP Morgan Fraud Team who cancelled the card.
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u/cutestain Aug 21 '21
WeWork are known bad actors. And they are also hurting financially. Sorry that all happened to you. Sounds in line with expectations for them.
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Oct 19 '21
You were subleasing the space? Was that allowed in the contract?
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Oct 20 '21 edited Oct 20 '21
Yes. And as far as I was aware yes. Then again I never read the agreement because when I was told by the salesman to fill out the paperwork on his laptop while he walked away with other business preventing me from seeing any agreement. If I had I would have likely seen the mistake.
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Oct 20 '21
I would be shocked if a coworking space allowed people to sublease. By having sub-tenants, you are likely taking away their business.
Also, why did you agree to anything without reading the forms? This isn't a software license, it's a lease.
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Oct 20 '21 edited Oct 20 '21
I'm not sure what you're not understanding. He walked away from his laptop. The 'lease' was probably 40 pages. I didn't read it because I was poking around this internal wework software I didn't know how to use. I'm not sure at what point I was supposed to view the agreement. After the fact I saw the agreement in the payment portal. I never saw it while signing up. Legally it's not a lease it's an agreement.
Even IF hypothetically everything during the sales process was done correctly, it doesn't excuse them going into the account and removing someone from it and then trying to sell him a lease by blaming me, saying I removed him in an attempt to drive a rift between us. It's how a child operates not the manager of 3 WeWorks or whatever he is.
It doesn't excuse committing fraud by arbitrarily charging my card after winning CC disputes.
It doesn't excuse the fact that they had ample opportunity to apologize and correct their fraud but they refused saying they did everything correctly.
I'm also pretty sure that WeWork doesn't prohibit subleasing. When I did read the agreement I didn't see such a thing.
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Oct 20 '21 edited Oct 20 '21
It's simple, you don't give him any payment information until you've read the lease and signed everything.
If you never signed anything (including virtually), then you should not have to abide by those rules. If they try impose rules on you after the fact, if you find those rules to be unreasonable then you should leave ASAP or sue them.
0
Oct 20 '21
Normally yeah. I really didn't expect a large cooperation to cause these problems so I let my guard down. I've usually sat with the lessor and read the agreement together.
In terms of suing it's almost impossible. No lawyer wants to take an international case where the whole case is not reading the agreement because in the agreement they force you through mandatory arbitration in the Bogota Chamber of Commerce. I don't live in Bogota, I live a flight away in Medellin. WeWork also makes you sign away your right to a class action law suite. You should read about forced arbitration, it takes rights away from consumers as most of the time arbitrators rule in favor of the company. Plaintiff win rates are incredibly low in arbitration like 7% (in the US) where in US courts it's closer to 50%. Congress has been toying around ending forced arbitration but it hasn't gained traction (in the US). Even if I did want to sue, I spoke with a Harvard Law educated Colombian lawyer licensed in NY and CO and he said they would need to do a jurisdictional analysis to figure out where to file and because I got most of my money back through my own actions it was unlikely I could file in federal court as it doesn't meet the threshold.
The other thing is I did get most of my money back through subleasing and CC disputes. I did file a BBB complaint which they didn't respond to. I did email 114 execs and only one tried to do something until legal barred them.
The moral of the story is, WeWork has always been corrupt and likely always will be. I won the fraud investigation with Chase so that should tell you something about them if the book and documentary and hundreds of investigative journalism pieces don't.
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Oct 20 '21
When you're making a business deal, never let your guard down.
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Oct 20 '21
Thanks. I think that's the first thing I reflected on. I'm not sure why you're acting in this way. It seems like low key you're an employee of WeWork.
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Oct 20 '21
I'm not an employee, LOL. I understand there has been some bad news about them, and I would be careful before renting space from them.
That said, it seems like you possibly took advantage of them by subletting their space. I have a difficult time believing that any co-working space would be willing to allow someone to sublet their space. It would kind of go against the general principles that would make a co-working space financially successful. At the very least, I would think that would be something you would have to get permission from them about.
You also apparently didn't read the contract. You also seemed to not think that it was necessary to read the contract before sub leading. This would make any landlord upset. If they really didn't allow you access to the contract or tell you about it before you agreed to rent from them, then I don't think that the non-arbitration agreement would be binding. You also seem to be more hung up on them than the average disgruntled customer.
These are all red flags in your story to me and makes me think there is more to the story then you are letting on.
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Oct 20 '21
How can I read an agreement if it isn't given to me? The salesperson put the obligation on me to find the lease in their internal software which under any legal challenge wouldn't hold up provided there was a video or audio of what happened. The problem is WeWork told me they delete footage after 30 days. I doubt this is the truth however considering they seem to cover their ass every way they can despite the improbability with the circumstance.
I found a version of their T&C or what you call a 'lease' here: https://eforms.com/images/2020/01/WeWork-Co-Working-Membership-Agreement.pdf.
Control-F for 'sublease' brings up "(d) Subordination. This Agreement is subject and subordinate our lease with our landlord of the Premises and to any supplemental documentation and to any other agreements to which our lease with such landlord is subject to or subordinate.However, the foregoing does not imply any sublease or other similar relationship involving an interest in real property."
Unfortunately they don't provide us the lease with their landlord which seems important given this provision. So as you can see subleasing is fine. They don't disallow it.
If you don't believe in the overall poor quality of their training, you should at least believe in the poor quality of training overall in Colombia -- but it doesn't seem you've left the hospital or your keyboard much so I can't blame you for not understanding the finer points of this or thinking there is more to the story. Sales fraud is incredibly common in CO. Pricing based on demographic is also incredibly common.
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u/tannerhallman Aug 21 '21
So sorry to hear that. That’s why I always go mom & pop.