how to fire clients

[Trirunner]

Hi,

I have a client who I want to fire. He does try hard, and I have seen a huge change in him. However, he does not respect my time. He sends me proably about 10 emails a day and calls me several times a day as well when we are not working out. He expects me to write out workouts for him to do when we are not working out together. I have tryed telling him that my rates have increased, and he said he will pay the increased rates, I have also told him I needed to change all the times around and that I can't meet him at his house anymore. He told me ok, and said he would meet me at the gym that's 5 minutes from my house. It is nice that he is willing to do all of these extra things in order to keep the relationship, I don't want to keep it going. When I bring up the email issue, or just don't respond to the email, it continues. And honestly, another issue is I just don't like him as a human being. Please any advise would be appreciated. I don't know what to do wihtout being outright rude to him.

[Lisa~]

I can sympathize! Been there, done that!

You've got to decide what you can and can't live with. If you've come to the decision that you just want to sever all ties with him, then you've just got to say so. He probably will be offended, but say it as professionally and unemotionally as you can. Just say that the client/trainer relationship is not working out for you and you will not be able to continue to train him. Period. You don't have to really say anything else by way of explanation.

Don't say anything he can "fix," like the situation is not meeting your expectations. Then he can attempt to meet your expectations. You've tried the avoidance method. Now you've just got to say it. You will not be able to train him anymore, you've made your decision. Don't say anything bad about him either. Just don't.