Winter Hack Bike

i rode in shortsleeves yesterday-- today: snow. winter is coming. :(

Re: commuting thread - I don't commute, so I would be tarred and feathered if I posted there.

Not sure you would, but then again you might not find some of the threads very interesting...

I've just ordered myself a winter bike from Ribble. Woo-hoo!

Hmmmmm. I haven't heard anything from them since I made the order a week ago. This thread on Bike Radar http://www.bikeradar.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=12651747 doesn't sound very promising. It sounds like I could end up waiting more than a month. :-(

That's annoying! What were you expecting in time terms?

Well, I'm pretty sure the bike I ordered from wiggle last year turned up within two or three days, so I was hoping for more of the same. On the ribble website they said that they were experiencing very high demand and it could take 21-28 days, but judging from that thread it could be nearer 6 weeks (with little possibility of getting any response from them by phone or e-mail in the meantime).

Sorry about that, as it seems to be on my recommend that you bought from them. I had not heard of such problems.

Well, as long as it turns up at some point it's not the end of the world, I suppose. The thing is, no money has been charged to my credit card, not even the £100 deposit I agreed to pay, and they don't answer the phone or reply to e-mails, so I don't even know if the bike will ever get built. And it's all your fault! I'll probably sue...

cancel the order, dispute any pending transaction with your card issuer, and move on

frustrating, but if they can't be bothered to answer inquiries, thats not acceptable (to me).

Plant X/On-One or Dolan might be worth a look before you cancel.

It's difficult to cancel something if there's no record of any payment and the business doesn't answer the phone or reply to e-mails. All I have is an automated response from 9 days ago saying that my order has been received. I can log on to the Ribble website, supposedly to track my order status, and it still just says 'received'. I assume this is how it will stay until they actually get round to assembling the bike and despatching it, which will probably be in several weeks' time once they work through their backlog.

None of the numerous complaints on that BikeRadar thread were about the bikes themselves, just about the appalling customer service. So I'm prepared to wait. But in the meantime I'd like to be able to contact them to a)find out why the deposit hasn't been paid, and b)find out when they're likely to deliver it (because I'm going to be away for a bit of late October and don't really want the bike to be returned unopened to Preston).

So, like I said, I'll probably just sue Ed.

hahaha

you can phone the credit card company, warn them of the incoming charge, and ask them to refuse it.

I've had an e-mail reply! They should be building the bike at the end of this week and delivering next week. Woo-hoo!

cancel payment anyway, just for lols

& then sue Ed

so i think my winter hack bike is gonna be my dad's old mountain bike

It turned up, by the way. Just before I went away for a week, so I haven't actually had a chance to ride it yet.

Good, I feel at least half redeemed.

Took it out for a rather frustrating 25-mile spin. Frustrating because I had to keep stopping and adjusting things - hopefully I've got everything sorted out now.