a bmx

i bought a bmx from halfords and picked it up on monday , less than a week ago , it has had fault after fault here goes

front wheel buckled , son said this on day 1 but i guess they could say misuse ?
chain guard was loose and snapped so we removed it as caused son to fall of twice
front brakes dont kick in for a good while
handlebars and fork shake when in use
handlebars fall forward when going off kerb , Oh tightene these as tight as he could and it still happening

i phoned halfords and they have told me to bring it in tomorrow so a bike technician can look at it , when i went to pick it up on monday it was meant o be built for us but it wasnt so they built it within half an hour for us so i wonder if it was maybe too much of a rushed job ?
ideally i want a whole new bike , basing it on the handles bars still falling forward after Oh tightened them so he thinks the thread is knackered
i am usually quite upfrontish about these things but im dreading going in there and being walked all over so any tips for me when i go in ? please ? xx

Tell them its not fit for purpose and is a danger and you either want a new one ir a refund. Stand your ground hun and if they are funny about it ask to speak to a manager. X

go and stay strong, make sure you get your money back - you are well within your rights.

mr.mari worked at 'bike hut' in halfords for a while and would never go back as he feels it isn't safe - especially around christmas as they are pressured into building so many bikes a day they can't test them properly.

i would advise the following:
take a notepad and pen, write your complaints down on it so you don't forget them, write the replies down, whoever you speak to ask for their FULL name and make a point of writing it down, if their answer isn't satisfactory (i would go for refund over replacement personally but the choice is yours) ask for a manager and make sure you get their full name also.......write everything down, time, people you speak to, what they say...it really stresses people out and shows that you are being absolutely serious.

hope you get it sorted, they will know they are doing a sh*t job. do not suggest for a second that the bike was 'misused' because they will latch onto that, tell them it was normal use for a child of your sons age if they ask.

(mr.mari just read the post, he says the problem with the front forks and handlebars is common with halfords bikes and is genuinly dangerous, that alone should get your refund )

thank you , i think i am goingt o push for a full refund .
i have put a deposit on another bike for other sons xmas , think i am going to cancel that too

Mari said it all.. I bought James a bike from Halfords, he took it back 3 times as the guy hadn't tightened this that and the other.. My friend has just taken her daughters bike back, bought in Sept and got a refund..

Once you have your refund check out www.bikes2udirect.com I bought Owen's bike there for Christmas last year and it was delivered with 2 days. You do have to complete the build with pedals etc. But as a company come highly recommended.

Argh, now im worried. We picked up Aimee's bike for Xmas a couple of weeks ago and they made it for us.

Its at my mums so im going to go and check it out tomorrow to make sure its ok x

me too Laura, we pick Islas up this weekend!!!! I suppose shes not going to be jumping off kerbs though......but I will still be checking it!!



I hope it goes well with your refund hun xx

How did you get on?! Or are you doing a sitting until they refund you lol

lol , i only had an hour to spare today to go into town so leaving it until tomorrow as OH is off work so we can go in together ,,,, united force and all that lol

we had that with a BMX that we bought ceejay last year for christmas it ended up throwing him off the bike but it ended up being a fault on the bike and they replaced the whole bike 6 months after buying it and it also came with a new 1 year warranty xx

well we went in and straight away asked for someone who would deal in refunds and returns , the woman said me but i wont take it with that stickers on it ( my son decorated it ) , we said thats fine we will remove them
she asked why we wanted to return it ,so we listed the faults and reminded her about how it was set up in 30 mins and i had found out it was not by a bike technician that built or safety checked it ( i found this out as when i phoned about it i spoke to the same guy who built it he said i would have to bring it in on a day a bike technician was in so he can inspect and check it ) . She left us for a few minutes , she was quite abrupt with us , she then returned and straight away asked for the card i used to pay for it so she can refund me ,, whoop whoop !
she then got really nice and said oh dont worry about the stickers im sure one of us can take time and do it , im thinking when she left her manager knew that we were entirely in the know regarding it being built so said to refund us:)
i then asked her why they needed the stickers removed , surely they were not planning on reselling it , it was clearly faulty and now had ripped handlebars, loss of chain guard and reflector down to my son falling off several times , she replied with well it will be safety assessed and if it deems safe we will resell it ! my jaw hit the floor and i reminded her we were sure the threads in handlebars were faulty and that was unfit for use
In the heat of all that i forgot to cancel my other order with them but i have only paid a deposit which i will lose anyways , so going to look for another bike elsewhere for other sons xmas.

aww im glad they refunded you no bother - i am sure she was just abrupt cos she knew you were the first of 50billion coming in over christmas