The karate may be ok but the attitude is despicable
Have my kid here and in many ways the Karate teachers seem engaged. There are many dojos from them in London.
Nonetheless, the entire organisation is geared towards squeezing money out of parents. You start with a sign-up fee (allegedly one-time, but see below). Then you need to purchase a membership booklet. Every few years they change the design of the booklet, or the name of the dojo/club, at which point you need to buy a new booklet. There is an additional annual membership fee, and of course term fees every three months. All of this is in the double digits, except the quarterly term fees: These are three digits.
But it doesn't stop there: Kids are encouraged to earn "badges" for achievements such as regular attendance, high-kick, etc. These badges are of course paid for separately. The kicker: One badge is for "referring a friend", ie., getting a friend to sign up, and I don't make this up: After referring a friend, you still have to pay for the badge!
To progress, you have to attend end-of-term gradings, which of course cost extra. Oh, but you can only attend grading if you also pay in advance for the following term. If you pass grading and advance to the next grade, you get either a little colour snipped added to your belt, or a half-colour belt, or a full-colour belt. In that order. Of course these are paid for separately every time.
They do organise tournaments. These are of course paid separately.
Various accessories such as shin pads, staves, hand protectors, helmets etc. are mandatory to be purchased yet easily half of these items are used once or twice and then never again.
If you want to pause a term, you have to pay a reduced term fee anyway, or you will be stricken from the books. In that case, when you rejoin, you have to pay sign-up fee, booklet, and so on again.
Did I mention? I have not received a single receipt for any of the payments, which are of course in cash.