Thread on which to commend great service

vertigo16

They say when you get bad service you tell seven people and when you get good service you only tell three.

Well today I had some really great help and I wanted to tell as many people as I could. I had been having some trouble with my rear derailleur not shifting after some bad weather the other day, and I put the bike up on my stand and played around with it (I normally do a lot of the simpler stuff myself). Needless to say I think I made it worse, and after riding to and from work in a single gear I took it into Decathlon in Surrey Quays/Canada Water late this evening.

Despite the fact I arrived when he was clearing up, the chap there was very friendly, took a look at it and talked me through what he was doing to sort it out. (I was actually glad it wasn't completely straightforward and he had to struggle with it a bit, or otherwise I would have felt a bit of a fool!) He went above and beyond in his help, checked out both derailleurs, finally got it to work having tried a few different and fiddly things, and after all that he didn't charge me.

I was so grateful - it's been a tight month and I was irritated to have to spend unexpected money, especially when it was the sort of thing I would normally do myself. The fact he showed me what he was doing was really appreciated too, as it's the best chance to learn for the future.

I have always found this guy really helpful (tall, French, brown hair), and will purposefully be making any more purchases at the same place (if nothing else it's a bloody good shop!).

Glad to see that in the world of outrageous markups being added to bikes just for the name on their sticker, there is still the chance to get some really good value and quality help.

djhermer

I stopped believing you when I read 'helpful' and 'french' in the same sentence.

sancho_panza

djhermer wrote:

I stopped believing you when I read 'helpful' and 'french' in the same sentence.

daft nonsense

ever been to a bike shop in France - and, err, tried to speak French? Or French speaking Switzerland?

Bikes shops here are part of the cycling community, as some are in the UK; we might bemoan the paucity of internet bike shops in the Swiss fortress but it does have its upsides.

Anonymous

Great to hear about good service. I always say its who you speak to rather than where you go, so I guess Decathlon should not be overly praised, rather this dark haired French guy.
Never been to a UK Decathlon though but I know they do a lot of good things and look forward to visiting one.

As to him being French, again, you cannot tar a whole nation with the same brush.
That said my experience/image of French people is that they are generally rude. Mr Rude is French for a reason ;-)

Not always a bad thing (Mr Rude is my fave Mr man) but when a senior staff member at customer services at the pompidou centre starts shouting at you in front of the manager for raising a valid point, I think its fair to assume thats a bit of a national trait.

bernithebiker

Decathlon are the Tesco of the sports world, with many enormous stores in France selling everything from shotgun ammunition to dog food to kayaks.

However, I bought a Tacx Flow trainer from them last week (their price matched that of the internet), and the guy in the bike section, though very pleasant was woefully lacking in knowledge.

Q 1. Does it come with a HR belt? Yes! (Wrong)
Q 2. OK, so can I use it with my Garmin belt? Yes! (Wrong, not ANT+ compatible)
Q 3 OK, so what belts can I use? Er, Any? (Wrong, supposedly, only Polar T31 works)
Q 4 OK, so how do I get an HR reading then? (Goes off to check with his mate), comes back and says 'er, you don't need a belt, it works out your HR automatically. Me: Really? You sure? How does it do that? Him: Not sure, it's a clever gadget.

Anyway, long story short, I bought a 20 Euro Decathlon watch and HR strap on the way out. Bizarrely, this does in fact work with the Flow, whilst (according to forums) most others do not.

richard_farrant

I have had good service from Decathlon in Reading, took my bike in there coz I couldn't get the gears right, the guy at the service dept took my bike in straight away despite the queue of other bikes to be serviced and spent a good twenty min trying to get it right. In the end he couldn't fix it but I gave him 10/10 for customer service (to me anyway, I think he was just fed up with BSO's from kids...)

djhermer

Sancho Panza wrote:

djhermer wrote:

I stopped believing you when I read 'helpful' and 'french' in the same sentence.

daft nonsense

ever been to a bike shop in France - and, err, tried to speak French? Or French speaking Switzerland?

Bikes shops here are part of the cycling community, as some are in the UK; we might bemoan the paucity of internet bike shops in the Swiss fortress but it does have its upsides.

:roll: I've lived in France. I speak French. That probably qualifies me to make a light hearted dig at our gallic neighbours. I'll have some of what you've taken, next time I'm about to do a MAP test

bianchimoon

Back on topic, Planet X have posted me a free long sleeve jersey by way of apology as they sold me an item that they don't have!
nice customer relations from Lucy at Planet X

darkhairedlord

I have had two issues recently that were well resolved.
1st was with Planet -X after my tyres failed to arrive. I was away for the week so wasn't sure if wifey had merely hidden them but once sure they hasd not arrived got on the phone and they checked with despatch and the delivery logs. He phoned me back within half an hour, said the delivery had not gone out, appologised and sent them out same day.
2nd was with JEJames this week when the pedals I ordered came with different cleats than advertised and offered refund or I could keep the item and they would reimburse the equivalent cost of postage (that they would incur) as credit.
Both excellent and importantly PROMPT service.

chris_bass

At the risk of starting an internet backlask, I've only got good things to say about wiggle, prompt delivery, cheap prices or price match if not, good range of products.
Also, Merlin are great from my experience.

bianchimoon

Chris Bass wrote:

At the risk of starting an internet backlask, I've only got good things to say about wiggle, prompt delivery, cheap prices or price match if not, good range of products.
Also, Merlin are great from my experience.

I tried the wiggle price match for a pair of Ultremos, email back saying this service is currently taking 5 days - pah

mamba80

John Lewis, they messed up delivery of a Lenovo lap top (but only by 2 days) and gave me £50 back on my credit card.
Merlin get thumbs down for trying to fob me off with a wear an tear deduction on a set of warrantied wheels - but came good when they re-sent me - at no charge - for a failed delivery on a set of TIME pedals, I eventually found them in the garden, where my thoughtful postie had put them... I told Merlin who said keep them

keef66

Top marks to Karcher. My pressure washer* started spitting out the high pressure hose; it wasn't clicking properly into the quick release coupling. Dropped them an email, response the same day asking if I could send them a copy of the receipt. When I found it I realised the thing was over 2 years old so wasn't overly optimistic. The next day a replacement hose arrived by courier. And it's a better one than the original!

* don't panic, it's not used on the bikes, just the paving and the greenhouse.

socistep

Wiggle and Ribble have been great to-date for me - although once I didn't get a haribo packet on a wiggle order and was very disappointed.

But I wanted to give full marks this week to Asgard, I ordered a bike storage shed from them after roof blew off the garage, I called them this week as expected delivery date was EO Feb, explained the situation and they got one out to me that day! now i've just got to get it assembled :-)

blablablacksheep

wiggle also +1, they were in bad books untill they gave me a full refund for a faulty pair of castelli body paint bib shorts.
CRC havnt been great recently, they gone downhill.
Merlin +1 also
planet x, i had issues with their sister one and one store sending me terrible tyres that were wonky to the eye :roll:
Canyon +1
and also Short rochford cycles in barnet very good service from them and a nice shop too.

pilot_pete

Wiggle on the whole have been great, but a warranty issue became a real pain in the backside as you can't call them, only email. To cut a long story short it took well over a month to get a faulty freehub replaced under warranty. Throughout the process certain individuals kept trying to fob me off with blatant lies (first one was that the engineers are inspecting it as we speak, to a response a week later saying it was still to be looked at by the mechanic).

It took threat of legal action and the sending of a copy of the Sale of Goods Act and Distance Selling Regulations for them to finally start playing ball. Oh, and a copy of an email that was ready to be fired off to Bill Duehring (CEO Felt Bicycles)

Eventually the freehub was replaced and they offered me £15 of vouchers as compo. At that point I nearly drove down to the South Coast to assault someone in person! They accepted my kind offer that £100 in vouchers would probably cover less than half the cost of my time. So, I think they are great at sales and less great at the after sales unless it just consists of returns or swapping sizes. Oh and one winter later the freehub was playing up again. I couldn't face the hassle of trying to claim again so got my local wheel builder to rebuild the wheel with a Hope Pro 2. Perfect. I wrote this all up as feedback on their site. Surprise, surprise they never allowed it to be published. So, if you are reading reviews about gear as a consumer, bear in mind they will only publish the favourable ones...

Had great experiences with both the Cyclestore in Congleton and Royles in Wilmslow recently. Cyclestore changed my BB bearings. I dropped the bike off at 9am and had a phone call at 10:30 saying it was all done. Fantastic.

Royles ordered me a Rotor Flow crank, Aero rings and BB at 3pm from the importer Velotech when I dropped my TT bike off. They reckoned probably 2 days and it would be fitted and ready to go. However, next lunchtime I got a call, all was done, in less than 24hrs. Fantastic, especially as that included delivery of the parts. Oh, and £50 off RRP to boot for return custom.

PP

nunowoolmez

When I bought my Roubaix from the Covent Garden Specialized concept store they threw in a free pair of Look Carbon Keos, free S Works stem as an upgrade, changed the saddle from a Toupe to a Romin at no charge, & gave me a half price Zertz seat post. They pretty much fitted me up on it there & then at no extra cost too & went to great lengths to get it right. Outstanding!

Old_Timer

On the good side of the ledger, Ribble has always been helpful and prompt for the orders I placed from this side of the pond. Kudos to the OP for putting a positive posting up.

Bill