Terms of service

1. Who you are dealing with

These terms are between you and ASCEND, at Bonifacio High Street, H22X+8V2, 7th Ave, Taguig City, 1635 Metro Manila — referred to below as “we”, “us” and “the club”. You can reach us at support@ascend-performance-ph.com.

ASCEND is a trading name. If you need the registered company name and SEC registration number — to raise a formal complaint, or for your own records — ask us at support@ascend-performance-ph.com and we will give them to you.

2. What these terms cover

Sections 3 to 8 apply to anyone using this website. Sections 9 to 21 apply if you apply for, or hold, a membership.

Three other documents sit alongside these terms and are not replaced by them: our privacy notice, which governs personal information; the health declaration and waiver you sign at the club before your first session; and the house rules displayed at the club. If anything here conflicts with a document you have signed, the signed document wins for whatever it covers. If anything here conflicts with the privacy notice about personal information, the privacy notice wins.

3. Changes to these terms

We may change these terms. If a change materially affects you as a member, we will email you at least 30 days beforehand, and you may end your membership within that period and have the unused part of your fee refunded. Changes that affect nobody’s rights — corrections, clarifications, changes the law requires — take effect when posted.

The version in force when you applied or paid is the version that governs what you agreed to.

4. What this website is

This is a marketing and enquiry site. To be exact about it, this website:

• —has no member accounts, no login, and no mobile app
• —has no payment gateway, cart or checkout — no payment of any kind can be made through it
• —stores nothing you submit: your application is checked and sent to us as an email, and there is no database behind this site

Nothing on this website is an offer you can accept. Rates and terms are quoted to you individually after we have read your application and met you. A membership exists only once we confirm your place in writing and the fee is paid.

5. We will never ask you to pay through this website

There is no facility to pay here and there never has been. Fees are settled by bank transfer or GCash, directly with the person who spoke to you, after your place is confirmed and using account details we give you ourselves.

If you receive a message that appears to be from us asking you to pay through a link, a web form, or an account you were not given directly by us, it is not from us. Please tell us at support@ascend-performance-ph.com so we can warn other people.

6. Using the website

You may read this site and send us one genuine application. What you may not do is the ordinary list, and we set it out because Philippine law turns on whether access was “without right”, which means it matters that we say what is authorised:

• —reach, or try to reach, any part of this site or its systems not offered to ordinary visitors
• —alter, damage or degrade the site, its data, or the program that receives applications
• —introduce a virus or other harmful code
• —send automated, repeated, false or impersonating applications, or use the form for anything but a genuine enquiry
• —scrape or systematically copy the site
• —probe or test the site's security, or interfere with the bot protection on the form
• —use the site unlawfully, or to send anything defamatory, harassing or threatening

Unauthorised access to, and interference with, a computer system are criminal offences under the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012 (RA 10175) and the E-Commerce Act of 2000 (RA 8792).

7. Our content

The words, film, design and code on this site are ours or used with our licence, and original work is protected by copyright from the moment it is made, without any registration being needed. We claim what the law actually gives us and no more. You may read, print and share this site for your own personal use. You may not republish it commercially, frame it, scrape it, or use our name in a way likely to confuse people about who they are dealing with.

This does not limit fair use under section 185 of the Intellectual Property Code, which we could not remove by contract and are not trying to.

8. Availability, and what we do not disclaim

We try to keep this site available and accurate, but we do not promise it will be uninterrupted or free of every error, and we may change or withdraw any part of it.

That is a statement about a website, not a licence to mislead. It does not limit our responsibility for what we have actually told you about the club, the fee, or what membership includes.

This site links to third parties — our Instagram, our coaches’ accounts, Google Maps. We do not control them and they have their own terms.

9. Membership is by application

Places are limited by the capacity of the floor. Applying does not create a membership, reserve a place, or oblige us to offer you one.

What we do commit to, and mean:

• —Every application is read by a person, and you will hear from us within two working days.
• —We book you in to see the place before anything is agreed.
• —If it is right for both of us we hold your place, and the first year is settled then.

You must be 18 or over. This is a rule, not a preference, and there are no junior memberships, no guest access for under-18s and no supervised sessions for minors. Two reasons. The floor is open and largely unsupervised, with heavy free weights on it. And under Philippine law a person under 18 cannot validly agree to these terms or accept the risks in section 14 — not even with a parent signing — so we would be putting someone on that floor with none of the understanding every other member here has. We may ask for proof of age.

10. What membership is

• —An open floor, not a class timetable. You train your own session, when it suits you.
• —The room and the equipment. Coaching is booked and paid for separately, on top of membership — membership does not include it.
• —A capped room, so the equipment is free when you need it.

The floor is open Every day, 6:00 AM – 10:00 PM

If we permanently change the hours we will tell members at least 14 days beforehand. Short, one-off changes — a public holiday, maintenance, something forced on us by the building — we will tell you about as soon as we know.

Coaching bookings. Coaching is booked and paid for separately from your membership. What a session costs, how far ahead it can be moved and what happens if you miss one are given to you in writing when you book, and belong to that booking rather than to these terms. Ask before you book if any of it matters to you.

11. The fee

A place is twelve months, paid in full in advance. We will tell you the fee and everything included in it before you pay anything. There are no charges beyond what we quote you.

Your membership does not renew automatically. When your twelve months are up, they are up. We will contact you before then and you can decide whether to take another year. Nothing is ever taken from you because you forgot to cancel — we hold no payment method on file and there is nothing here for a renewal to charge.

12. Refunds

This section is written to be accurate rather than favourable, because a refund clause that overreaches is unenforceable in the Philippines and we would rather tell you where you stand.

If you simply change your mind or stop coming after the club has delivered what it said it would, a fee already paid is not refundable on that ground alone. That is the only thing “non-refundable” means in this document.

Seven days to change your mind. For seven days after you pay, or until your first session if that comes sooner, you can cancel for a full refund, no reason needed. After that, the rest of this section applies.

If the club is not what we told you it would be, the Consumer Act of the Philippines gives you the choice — not us — between having it put right at no extra cost, an immediate refund of what you paid, or a proportionate reduction in the price. We do not pick one of those for you and these terms do not try to.

If the service is rendered unsafely, or we gave you inadequate information about its hazards, our liability under the Consumer Act does not depend on our being at fault, and nothing here limits it.

If we close, move, or cannot open, see section 17.

Refunds are returned by the same route the payment came in, to the person who paid. We do not operate a “no return, no exchange” policy of any kind.

If you are injured. If a doctor says you should not train, send us the letter and we will pause your membership and add the time back on at the end. We do this on medical grounds because a year paid in advance should not be lost to something outside your control.

Passing your place on. If you need to give up your place, you may transfer the remainder of your year to someone else, provided we would have accepted them as a member in their own right. Places here are limited and applications are read, so we do have to agree to the person — but we will not unreasonably refuse.

13. Health, and training safely

Before your first session you complete a health declaration at the club, and where it indicates, get medical clearance. Tell us about anything — a condition, an injury, medication, pregnancy — that affects how you should train, and tell us when it changes. That form is signed on paper at the club and never through this website.

Nothing on this site and nothing from our coaches is medical advice. See a doctor before starting or changing how you train.

We do not guarantee results. What you get out of training depends on your effort, your consistency, your sleep, what you eat and your own physiology, and nothing here should be read as promising a particular outcome.

14. The risks you are accepting

Strength and conditioning training carries real risks, and a general “I accept all risks” means very little — under Philippine law you can only accept a risk you actually knew about and understood. So here they are, specifically. By training here you accept that you may be injured by:

• —muscular strain, sprain, tear and delayed-onset soreness
• —a dropped, mishandled or failed load, including under maximal or near-maximal lifts
• —failure of a barbell, collar, rack, pin, bench, platform or other equipment
• —falls and slips, collisions on the floor, and impact from someone else's equipment
• —joint, tendon, ligament and spinal injury, including aggravation of something you already had
• —cardiac events, fainting, heat illness and dehydration during hard effort
• —your own failure to warm up, to use a spotter, to set safety pins, or to follow instruction or the house rules

The sauna and the cold plunge. These carry their own risks, separate from anything on the training floor. By using them you accept that you may be harmed by:

• —heat illness, dizziness, faintness and dehydration in the sauna — most likely straight after a hard session, when you are already low on fluid
• —the cold shock response on entering the plunge: an involuntary gasp and a loss of breath control that you cannot train away, and which is dangerous with your face under water
• —a sharp rise in heart rate and blood pressure moving between extreme heat and extreme cold
• —cramp, numbness and loss of grip or footing in cold water
• —slips and falls on wet tile, on the steps into the plunge, and on sauna benches
• —burns from the heater, the stones, the guard or a hot bench

The rules for that room. They are short, and they are part of these terms rather than advice:

• —Do not use either one if you are alone in the club.
• —Never put your head under the water in the plunge.
• —Stay out of both if you are pregnant, or have a heart condition, high or low blood pressure, epilepsy, or anything else affected by heat or cold — unless your doctor has told you it is safe. Tell us on your health declaration.
• —Never use either after alcohol, or anything that affects your balance, alertness or sense of temperature.
• —Come out the moment you feel dizzy, sick, confused, short of breath or your heart is pounding. That is not something to push through, and nobody here will be impressed that you did.
• —Let your heart rate settle before you get into the plunge. Do not go straight in off a hard set.
• —No glass, no phones, no shoes, no oils or scents, and nothing poured on the heater.

The sauna and plunge are open during club hours and there is no attendant in that room. None of the above is medical advice, and where it conflicts with what your own doctor tells you, follow your doctor.

15. What we remain responsible for

Accepting those risks does not mean accepting the consequences of our failures. Whatever else these terms say, and whatever a waiver you sign says, nothing excludes or limits our liability for:

• —fraud — a waiver of an action for future fraud is void under the Civil Code and we do not ask for one
• —negligence showing bad faith, or wilful misconduct
• —defects in the way we render our service, or inadequate information about its hazards, for which the Consumer Act makes us liable independently of fault
• —anything else Philippine law does not permit us to exclude

A coach may use hands-on correction to fix a position or prevent an injury. It is always optional, you can decline at any time without giving a reason, and declining changes nothing about your training with us.

We may stop a session or restrict access to particular equipment where we reasonably believe it is unsafe for you or for someone else. That call is made by whoever is coaching the floor at the time, and if you disagree with it you can ask us for the reason in writing.

16. The floor, your things, and filming

The house rules displayed at the club form part of these terms.

There are separate changing rooms for women and men, with showers in both, and towels are provided. There is somewhere to put your things while you train, but please look after your own belongings and don’t bring valuables.

Filming. Filming your own sets is normal in a strength gym. Filming other people is not. Don’t post footage in which another member is recognisable without their agreement, and no cameras or phones in the changing rooms at any time.

Photography by us. We may photograph or film at the club for our own marketing. We will ask you first, separately, and you can say no or change your mind later without it affecting your membership. Agreeing to appear in our marketing is never a condition of training here.

CCTV. The entrance and the training floor are covered by CCTV. It is there for the safety and security of the people and the equipment in the room — theft, damage, and being able to establish what actually happened if someone is hurt. We do not use it to watch how you train, how long you stay, or how often you come.

There are no cameras in the changing rooms, the showers or the toilets, and there will not be. Those rooms are placed out of bounds by the National Privacy Commission, and we would not put them there in any case.

Recordings are kept only as long as we need them for those purposes and are then deleted. Only the people who need access have it. We hand a recording to anyone else only where the law requires it, or where it is needed to bring or defend a legal claim.

You can ask whether you appear in a recording and ask to see it — write to support@ascend-performance-ph.com. What we can show you is limited by other people’s privacy: where you cannot be shown without showing someone else, we will tell you that rather than hand it over. How we handle the footage, and the rights you have over it, are set out in the privacy notice.

17. If we close, move, or cannot open

We are not responsible for failing to perform because of something outside our reasonable control — typhoon, flood, fire, earthquake, loss of power or water, a closure imposed on the building, a government order, a public health measure.

But you have paid for a year, so:

• —For a closure of up to 30 days in a row, we add the days back on to the end of your membership.
• —If we are closed for more than 30 days in a row, or we permanently close or move somewhere that does not work for you, you may end your membership and have the unused part of your fee refunded.

18. Ending a membership

You can stop coming at any time. Whether a fee is refunded is governed by section 12.

We may suspend or end a membership where someone endangers or seriously disturbs another member or a member of staff, repeatedly ignores the house rules after being asked to stop, gives us materially false information about their health or identity, or damages the club deliberately. Unless the behaviour is serious enough that someone has to leave immediately, we will put the problem in writing and give a fair chance to put it right first.

What happens to the fee. If we end a membership for one of the reasons above, we refund the unused part of the year less the cost of any damage caused. We do not keep the balance of the year as a penalty. If we end a membership for no reason at all, the unused part is refunded in full.

19. If something is wrong

If anything in these terms is unclear, ask us before you apply rather than after. We would far rather explain a clause than argue about it later.

If something has gone wrong, tell us first — it is faster than anything else and most things are fixable. Write to support@ascend-performance-ph.com. We will acknowledge within two working days and give you a substantive answer within fifteen calendar days.

Nothing in these terms stops you taking a consumer complaint to the Department of Trade and Industry, or a complaint about how we have handled your personal information to the National Privacy Commission. Those routes are yours and we do not ask you to give them up.

20. Governing law, and where disputes go

These terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of the Philippines. We will try to sort out any dispute by talking about it first.

If that fails, any action arising out of these terms or your membership shall be brought exclusively in the proper courts of Taguig City, Metro Manila, to the exclusion of all other courts — except that nothing here prevents you from bringing a claim in the courts of the place where you live.

There is no arbitration clause in this document, and that is deliberate. Most disagreements between a club and a member are worth far less than the small claims limit, and small claims is faster, cheaper and needs no lawyer. We would rather leave that open to you than close it off.

21. The rest

If any part of these terms turns out to be unenforceable, that part is removed and everything else still stands; and where a clause would be valid if read more narrowly, it applies as narrowly as it needs to.

These terms are in English. If you would rather have them explained in Filipino, ask and we will.

You can agree to these terms electronically, and an electronic agreement is as good as a written one under the E-Commerce Act.

These terms, the privacy notice, the health declaration and waiver, the house rules and the written confirmation of your place are the whole of what is agreed between us — but that does not limit our responsibility for what we actually told you about the club, the fee, or what membership includes.

22. The ASCEND member app

This section covers the ASCEND member app. Sections 1 to 21 above are about the club and this website; everything here is about the app.

22.1 It is not a medical device

ASCEND is not a medical device and does not diagnose or treat any condition. Nothing in the app is medical advice. It records training and shows you what your coach has planned — that is all it does.

It does not monitor your health, it does not detect injury or illness, and it will not tell you when something is wrong with you. Do not use it to decide whether to see a doctor, and do not delay seeing one because of anything it shows you. If you feel unwell while training, stop and tell whoever is coaching. Section 13 of these terms covers training safely and still applies.

22.2 Who can use it

The app is for current ASCEND members, aged 18 or over, on their own account. The account is yours — do not share your login, and tell us if you think somebody else has it. If your membership ends, your access to the app ends with it.

22.3 What you put into it

Your workout notes are yours. We use them to coach you and for nothing else, and what we hold and for how long is set out in section 12 of the privacy notice. Do not put anything into the notes that you would not want a coach at the club to read, because a coach at the club will read them.

22.4 The AI summaries are optional, and they are summaries

If you switch on AI coach summaries, workout data — without your name — is sent to an AI service to draft a short summary for your coach. It is a drafting aid for a human coach, not a coach. It can be wrong. Your coach reads it and decides; the summary itself decides nothing about your training.

22.5 The app is provided as it is

We will keep the app working and fix what we can, but we do not promise it will always be available or free of faults, and a phone, an app store or a network we do not control can stop it working. Your training does not depend on it — the floor, the coaching and the equipment are what you are a member of, and section 8 sets out what we do not disclaim.

We may change or withdraw the app. If we withdraw it, that does not change your membership, your fee, or anything else in these terms.

22.6 Deleting your account

Delete your app account at any time in Settings → Delete my account, or use the form on the account deletion page if you cannot get into the app. Deleting the app account does not end your membership — section 18 covers that.