Self Care and Wellness: Consumer Tips

Photo by Jeremy Thomas on Unsplash

Health and wellness goals impact many of our day-to-day consumer choices. From the food we eat, to gym and fitness memberships, to vitamins and supplements, we often make purchases with our long-term health in mind. That’s why it’s so important to have reliable information to help us make good consumer wellness decisions.

Fitness Memberships

In Nova Scotia, consumers have certain rights when they sign up for health and fitness memberships. Pre-paid contracts for gym, dance, diet, sport, and other health-related memberships include the following rights:

• you’re allowed a 5-day cooling-off period after buying a membership; within that time you may cancel in writing without any costs.
• contracts can be no longer than 1 year, and renewal and cancellation conditions must be clear,
• written contract requirements must be clearly met and laid out,
• initiation fees can be no greater than twice the total annual membership fee, and
• you must be given the option to pay monthly, and this option can only cost up to 25% more than a lump sum payment

Before you join a gym or sign a membership contract, take time to learn about your consumer rights on the Nova Scotia Consumer Protection website. Make sure to read and understand all contract terms before signing!

NOTE: Clubs or leagues run by non-profits, member-owned bodies, the Province or a municipality are exempt from these rules.

Marketing and Food Trends

Social media trends and advertisements impact how we think about our health and make decisions.

Food marketing is advertising that promotes the sale of certain food products. Some forms of advertising, like sponsored posts on social media, can be difficult to recognize. This marketing creates diet trends or makes certain food products seem healthier than they really are. Being aware of food marketing and diet trends is a skill that can help you make food choices that fit your health goals, budget and lifestyle, rather than choices influenced by advertising.

You can learn more about diets and food trends and food marketing from Health Canada, and about food labelling standards from the Canadian Food Inspection Agency.

Direct Selling

Direct sellers are are people who initiate the sale of goods or services at a location away from a usual place of business. They include door-to-door salespeople, telemarketers and people who sell items at home-based parties. Direct Sellers may sell wellness products like cosmetics, or vitamins and supplements.

Direct sellers must be licensed and follow the rules set out in the Direct Sellers’ Regulation Act and Regulations. You can search for licensed sellers Nova Scotia’s Open Data portal to make sure the business is properly licensed.

You do not need to decide to buy right away. If you want time to think about it, you can ask the seller to return at another time. Think twice if you feel pressured to act immediately.

Direct sellers may offer a free product, test, or inspection of your home as a means of introduction. These offers should be free of charge and carry no terms or conditions.

By law, direct sellers must provide contracts for sales over $100. You have the right to a 10-day cooling-off period where you can cancel the sale for any reason. If you buy from a licensed direct seller that goes out of business before delivering your goods or services, you may be able to get a refund.

To learn more about your rights when buying from direct sellers, visit the Nova Scotia Consumer Protection website.

Wellness Scams

Scammers use wellness scams like claims of miracle cures, fake online pharmacies, and weight loss scams to take advantage of our desire to be healthy. Often these scams will claim some kind of secret effectiveness or knowledge that medical professionals don’t want you to know about.

In miracle cure scams, the scammer promotes a product or service as alternative medicine, making it seem like a quick and easy treatment for a serious medical condition or a cure-all to improve overall health. Some of these cures may seem to be endorsed by celebrities or testimonials of people claiming to have been cured. If you are interested in a new medical treatment or product, you should speak to your healthcare provider.

Fake online pharmacies are fraudulent websites or social media pages that offer medications at very low prices. People who need expensive or hard-to-find drugs might try these sites. But these fake medicines might not work and could be dangerous. You can use this guide created by Health Canada to find safe online pharmacies.

Weight loss scams promise dramatic results with very little time or effort. The scammers might promote unusual diets; revolutionary exercises; or products like pills, patches, or creams. Scammers may use fake testimonials or AI generated advertisements to advertise these methods. At best these methods will be ineffective, but at worst they could put your health at risk.

Final Thoughts

Our personal health and wellness is so important, and consumers need to have good information to make the best choices for both their physical and financial health.

Consumers can empower themselves by learning about their consumer rights, reading and understanding contracts before they sign and by being vigilant against wellness scams.