Am I being petty about this?

mm94210

I’d be grateful for some views regarding my recent MTB bike purchase. After lots of test riding locally I’ve purchased a Whyte T130 CR 2020. Thing is, it has arrived with an NX shifter rather than the GX one. I was a bit miffed just out of principle that it arrived not meeting the description so I brought this up with the company I purchased it with (a Whyte retailer online) and their response was simply to change the details on the product page on their site from the GX shifter to the NX and to insinuate that it should have the NX shifter. I know that the price difference is not much between the two gear shifters but I am a little concerned that a company would do this and just act like there is no problem. I may be getting paranoid but this has made me wonder whether there may be other components that they have fitted that are different from the spec from Whyte. Any thoughts would be much appreciated.

robertpb

On the Whyte site that bike clearly comes with a GX shifter, to end up with an NX, either it was a build mix-up or someone swapped the GX at your dealer.
I'd get on to Whyte and see what they have to say.

timothyw

It seems pretty unlikely this will make any difference to the riding experience, and the likelihood is that internally (in fact, apart from the decal) they are basically the same component.

I mean, the price is pretty much identical here and the NX is actually listed with a slightly higher rrp: https://www.chainreactioncycles.com/gear-shifters?f=4294967107,4294125265&sort=pricelow

And we're talking about a component that constitutes about 1% of the value of a £3k bike.

I'd advise you to ride your bike and forget about it.

ddraver

timothyw said:

I'd advise you to ride your bike and forget about it.

Ultimately that, but given it's all of 30 seconds, an email to Whyte saying WTF might be worthwhile.

At least you'll find out who to grumble at, Whyte or the shop. And if the shop is being dodgy you'll have done a good thing.

Might get a free t-shirt or discount voucher out of it...

mm94210

Thanks for your comments so far guys. I’m more concerned that the shop have just dismissed it out of hand and that they might have changed some of the other components (such as the brakes etc). I’ve sent Whyte an email and I am hoping I can send them some images if the other components just to double check for my piece of mind.

david7m

Seems like a semi shafting, worth an email for how long it will take.
Would you have brought something else if you'd have known?

mm94210

In theory I might have yes. I was going to get the T130 S (exactly the same specs but with an alloy frame) but I figured that I’d get the carbon frame version as I really liked it when I test rode it a few weeks ago. One of my main criteria was getting as much of the GX stuff as possible without going crazy on price ( I know 3k is still a lot though). In the future all I would probably do is at some point update the cassette to the 1275 but I’m in no rush to do that at all. I’m just a bit paranoid that the brakes or other stuff might not be as in the specs and that a retailer feels they can just send something out that is not as it was described.

tom_howard

The problem you’ll have is that there will be a ‘spec is subject to change without notice’ caveat in whytes t’s&c’s so you’ll likely get nowhere unless you really kick up a stink. Personally I don’t think it’s worth the bother, ymmv.

fenix

Specs change all of the time. It's less than a tenner difference isn't it ?
They've not done it to screw you - and it will work just as well.
Move on and enjoy the new bike.

Long_Time_Lurker

What they all said. Just checked the Whyte bikes listed online with a local retailer and spotted;
Some features of the bike listed here or shown in the image may occasionally be changed by the manufacturer without prior notice

steve_sordy

I had similar with a bike I bought from Evans Cycles. The saddle had been downgraded. It was still a WTB saddle but one that was £50 cheaper on the Evans website! I rang Evans and they said that the manufacturers change the specs all the time. I said that it was their responsibility to keep the descriptions up to date and that I felt that I had been short changed. They asked me what I wanted them to do to resolve this. Fortunately I had already thought about this and asked for £50 voucher. I knew that this would be easy for the manager to agree to, for three reasons: a) Most store managers are not allowed to give refunds without some admin, or maybe approval from their manager. b) A £50 voucher does not cost the store the face value, because it is traded against something upon which they make profit. c) I was willing to bet that they had vouchers hanging about from promotions that were current at the time.
He immediately said yes so we were both happy.

The Rookie

With Steve on this, the gripe is with the retailer (the person you paid money to) and while 'specs may change without notice' you still have a right to what is advertised, however a simple 'sweetener' such as a small value voucher for the difference can leave you both happy.