Hi

My ride to work bike has creaked a bit for a while but today it just got a whole lot worse and theres a crack around the BB shell

Its 6 months old and was bought through one of the mail order companies who we were tied to with our employer

Prob is I have no faith in them
The first bike arrived with trashed packaging and was damaged,and this one had canti’s set up by a total numpty – its easy to see how the same person may easily have torqued the BB to kingdom buggery. Probably……..

Anyway before I phone them up and resign myself to 2 more days off work waiting for couriers to collect and redeliver, in addition to the 3 from the initial purchase, do I absolutely have to use them for the warranty claim?

My LBS stocks the same brand, if the manufacturer allows would they pay them to swap the components over or is warranty stuff a loss leader for the supplying dealer?

Cheers

i had a specialized warranty claim on a frame a few years ago, had bought it from a shop about 90 miles away.

Went into lbs and offered to pay the labour rate if they would send the old swing arm off + refit new one. They were happy to do this after i mentioned i’d pay the labour charge , but were a bit reluctant until i did offer.

obviously if its swapping a complete bike over then labour charge might be a lot more 😐

EDIT – just remembered the lbs at that time was one i rarely used, i have had a couple of rear shocks replaced under warranty on that same frame at another lbs i use a lot and they didnt charge me a penny. So i guess it may depend how good a customer you currently are at the shop.

Your contract is with the retailer you purchased it from, so yes you should use the supplying dealer.

I think the SOGA protects you more than the manufacturers warranty. Your contract is with the original shop you bought it from so you would have to go through them.

But if you want to take it to a local shop circumnavigating the SOGA protection then its the shop you have to ask. I don’t think the manufacturer/distributor cares as long as the bike is from a official dealer.

Its highly unlikely they’ll do it for free as you did not buy it from them. But there is no harm in asking all they can say is no.

Can’t you get it collected and delivered from your work? Surely this is better than having to take holidays?

Thanks for the replies

I absolutely wouldnt expect the LBS to do it for free

What I dont know is does the importer/manufacturer pay for the swapp-age too or is it up to the supplying dealer to just suck it up?

Cant use work, it was made very clear to us that bikes would not be tolerated in the internal post when we ordered

Cheers

The supplying dealer would have to suck it up as it is them that are responsible for sorting you out under sale of goods act. Therefore if you went to a non-supplying dealer, the manufacturer would not be under any obligation to foot the bill for them to do the work.

Its not totally unheard off for a mail order shop to pay the labour cost to a local bike shop to sort out any issues on the bike.

As long as both shops are willing to tango!