"You do anything to get the sale - whatever it takes to get that signature on the dotted line," said Kathryn Brennan, a former Bally assistant manager in Brooklyn who has a sexual-harassment suit pending against the company.

More than a dozen former Bally employees, including several managers, contacted The Post earlier this month after reading a two-day exposé that included scores of customer complaints that the nation's largest fitness chain uses deceptive sales tactics and strong-arm debt-collection methods.

The state attorney general's office is investigating the complaints.

"I went in there with a good heart and left feeling disgusted with myself," said a former Long Island salesperson, who asked not to be named. "I felt horrible for lying, for not caring any more."

The recent ex-staffers described a pressure-cooker work environment in which upper management enforced demanding sales quotas for each gym.

The company rewarded top-selling managers with bonuses and perks, but those who fell short were demoted, transferred to less desirable gyms or fired, they said.

The ex-employees cited a litany of abusive practices they said they were taught, encouraged or sanctioned to use by their supervisors to "get the gross."

Bally did not respond to The Post's request for comment about their allegations, which include:

* Bait and switch. While Bally's TV ads promoted a $19 down, $19-a-month membership deal, salespeople say they were trained to talk customers into more expensive plans with bigger commissions.

The ads are "basically to get them in the door, and from there, they're suckered into buying something they really don't want," said Azurde Meyer, a former Long Island saleswoman.

* Heavy pressure. "You get them in the office, and you pound these people to death. You don't let them go," said Annmarie Demasi, another former Long Island saleswoman who has filed a sex-harassment complaint against the company.

One unwritten rule, several former employees said, was not to let potential customers leave until they had joined. If salespeople could not clinch a sale, they had to call in the manager for a "TO" - takeover - they said.

Salespeople also were told "buyers are liars," meaning they should not believe customers who said they would join later or didn't have credit cards or cash with them to make a down payment.

Some Bally-issued sales scripts, obtained by The Post, instruct staffers in how to talk reluctant customers into signing on the spot. One script demonstrates how a woman can be persuaded not to wait to talk it over with her husband.

* Lies. Many salespeople dupe customers into believing it's "no problem" to cancel Bally's three-year retail installment contract, which is a legally binding, high-interest loan, ex-employees said.

In fact, it's extremely difficult to cancel. Even members with valid reasons such as illness or relocation have reported hellish runarounds.

"You make it sound so simple," Meyer said. "You never answer their questions, but you make it seem like they can cancel at any time."

Salespeople said they had an incentive to fib: Bally takes back commissions for customers who cancel or stop paying within six months.

And, they complained, Bally did not return the income tax withheld on those commissions.

Some salespeople, they reported, didn't turn over contracts to customers, or removed sections that spelled out cancellation procedures - including the three-day period allowed for members to back out.

"Without those papers, the person can't read the agreement, can't cancel, and is stuck paying," Brennan said.

College students are frequently bamboozled, ex-staffers said.

"Those poor things came in wanting a three-month membership and left with a 36-month contract," Demasi said. "The manager would tell them, ‘You can get out of it, don't worry.'"

In fact, many students are unable to get off the hook.

Other ex-staffers said non-English-speaking customers are pushed to sign contracts they cannot read.

* Falsifying documents. Former employees from gyms across the region described how marriage certificates are whited out, doctored and photocopied so that friends could masquerade as married couples and buy family memberships rather than more expensive individual memberships.

Also, they said, birth certificates and driver's licenses are falsified or fabricated so youths can be listed as at least 18 and old enough to sign a contract.

One former Bally administrative assistant on Long Island, whose job was to process paperwork, said she frequently spotted fake IDs.

"When I brought it to people's attention, they just said ‘send it in,'" she said.

She and others said Bally managers also forge customers' names on contracts, credit-card slips, and checks to set up electronic fund transfers.

Brennan, in a complaint to the U.S. Equal Opportunity Employment Commission, said she was "coerced to perform activities, some possibly illegal, to obtain sales for my managers."

In Bally's reply to the commission, lawyer Earl Acquaviva said the company "vehemently denies" Brennan's charges. He said it appeared she "intentionally defrauded" the company to "increase her commissions."

But Brennan's lawyer, Robert Danzi, contended that the falsification of documents is widespread.

"Bally has elaborate written policies to prohibit all that, but it's in their financial self-interest to turn a blind eye. When you see the pattern, you can't help but conclude there is a tacit acceptance of this conduct by upper management."