"I have a bad knee - can I do this class?" - the question to route, not answer
People describe knees, backs, shoulders, pregnancies and medications to whatever will listen, and a club assistant listens at eleven at night when the desk is shut. That is precisely when the instinct to be useful becomes the wrong instinct: telling someone a class is fine for their injury is a clinical judgement, and the club carries it. What the assistant can do is describe the class accurately enough that the member and their physio can decide - which is more useful than a verdict anyway.
Describe the class, never assess the body
What a class involves - impact level, whether there is jumping, overhead loading, floor work, how long, how hot the room is, whether modifications are routinely offered - are facts about the club's own timetable. An assistant stating them precisely lets a member with a knee problem or a physiotherapist's instruction make their own decision. Saying "that should be fine for a knee" replaces their decision with the club's, and the club is not qualified to make it.
Clearance belongs to a clinician, and saying so is not a brush-off
The correct response to an injury description is to decline the assessment explicitly, describe the class in concrete terms, and say that clearance is a question for their doctor or physiotherapist - then offer something the club can actually do, like a session with a trainer who programmes around injuries, or the gentler class on Tuesday. A refusal with a route attached keeps the member; a bare "please consult a professional" loses them.
Record what the member said, and make sure a human sees it
An injury mentioned to a chatbot at eleven at night is information the club now holds, and it should reach the trainer before the member arrives - not sit in a transcript nobody opens. Decide before launch where that note goes and who reads it. This is also a data question: health information about a named person has a different handling obligation from a timetable enquiry, and the retention rule should be set deliberately rather than inherited.
Pregnancy is the case most configurations get wrong
It comes up constantly, members often ask anonymously before telling anyone, and the temptation to reassure is strongest because the honest answer feels unhelpful. The club's own policy - which classes are restricted, which trainers are qualified, what documentation is needed - is publishable and precise. Whether a particular pregnancy permits a particular class is not, in any trimester, a question software answers.
Frequently asked questions
Can a club chatbot say whether a class is safe with an injury?
Is describing the class actually more useful than answering?
How should it refuse without losing the member?
What happens to what the member disclosed?
What about pregnancy?
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