Matt

Sorry to hear you got scammed by them @MariéK, but thank you for reporting it. Out of interest, what payment method did they have you use?

They also lifted all of their about us copy from BuyCycle and forgot to replace this reference.

Please try logging out via the home page and then back in. If that doesn't work then clearing your browser cache & cookies should do the trick.

ConradS, you do raise some valid points here. To begin with let me clarify my earlier statement. A seller not wanting to use Bike Hub Pay outright is not necessarily a cause for alarm and certainly doesn't mean they're a scammer. As I mentioned earlier, we know there are many long-time users who have a string of good reviews and are savvy with respect to payments, etc. For this reason it is optional. What might cause some alarm is where a seller accepts a Bike Hub Pay offer, only to then attempt to push the transaction offline. The reasons for that might well be legitimate, but even then it's a poor experience for buyer & seller - rather disable to Bike Hub Pay option altogether. Bike Hub Pay solves for two primary risks: The seller's risk of a fraudulent payment (despite it being a simple one to solve in waiting for an EFT to clear, we still see people being caught here) The buyer's risk of receiving nothing after making payment, i.e. outright scam (this is the most common issue we see) Once we are over those two hurdles we've ruled out the plainly bad actors, but then the more nuanced risks like you highlight do come into play. e.g. Buyer receives something that's not as described/advertised Shipment is lost or damaged in transit Unscrupulous buyer fraudulently claims item received was damaged #1 is something we've seen the most of, but to-date any disputes of this nature have been amicably settled, either via a return and refund or a part-refund. Of 1060 deals agreed to date we've had 22 refunds/part-refunds due to this. #2 is a risk that's ideally solved through insurance. Unfortunately most couriers don't offer insurance on second hand goods or insurance they do offer has relatively low value limits and can be prohibitively expensive. Of 1060 deals agreed to date we've had 2 instances of items being lost/destroyed in transit. We are exploring options here to address this and offer better protection in this regard. #3 is not an issue we've yet encountered, but a risk we'd noted when we first conceptualised Bike Hub Pay. In a case like this where we encounter an unresolvable dispute the matter would be referred to the relevant court. Bike Hub would hold the funds pending the outcome of any legal proceedings or a settlement between the parties. In our view, this alone is a suitable deterrent, but of course if it were to occur it is not a scenario a seller would want to find themselves in where money is tied up for a long period. What we have seen in many peer-to-peer marketplaces abroad is a hybrid approach to their payments and buyer/seller protection: New sellers are subject to an escrow style deal or delayed payouts until such time as they've completed a suitable number of deals and established a reputation. Established sellers work on a more e-commerce style model, where they receive payouts within a few days of the transaction (regardless of delivery status). Effectively the marketplace itself is then taking on the risk of non-performance on the part of the established or vetted seller and they typically offer buyer protection (i.e. refund guarantees) up to a set value. We are exploring options around this to improve the appeal for established sellers, while still reducing risk for a buyer.

To be clear, we're not looking to start a courier company... we're tech folks who like bikes. The logistics stuff we'll leave to the pros. What we are looking at is how we can streamline the shipping aspect of a deal through integration with courier partners. Currently it's a bit of a pain point in terms of who pays, which service to use, getting quotes, etc. etc. For smaller items it's fairly simple. There are many flat fee services like Postnet2Postnet or Aramex Dropbox that could be offered as standard options. For bikes it's a little more complex, but our ideal scenario is that a quote can be generated on the fly based on the buyer/seller locations & a booking made directly via Bike Hub.

If you're in contact with anyone investigating they should report to / request info from Facebook too, if this hasn't been done already. From some comments here it seems people found the site via a Facebook ad. Facebook will know who (user account) paid for the ad and the credit card used. Could well be fake info and a stolen card and Meta might not actually reply, but worth a shot.

Unfortunately not, but there should be plenty available during the event to make up for it.

Not sure how much sarcasm was injected here, but as @Nick has expressed there are just too many red flags on this one and we're happy to take the risk of calling this a scam outright. Don't be too trusting of a "guy on the phone". 99% of the scams reported on Bike Hub are for a deal that's a little too good to be true, but the seller (a newbie on Bike Hub), "sounded like a lekker oke on the phone". Social engineering is all part of their game now.

This does raise some alarm bells for us and not the first we've heard of sellers doing this. We made the call early on to keep Bike Hub Pay optional as we know there are many buyers & sellers with long standing good reputations. However, if it's enabled on your advert you should be willing to entertain offers submitted using Bike Hub Pay and transact using this method. The fee is just 3%, but clearly some room for us to nudge up to 5% 😉 Next to 0% fees, sure it may seem expensive, but it's a small ask when you consider that Bike Hub helps to find a buyer, ensure they are comfortable to do the deal and then facilitates the payment. We are weary of people using the "Pay enabled" badge as a trust signal in itself, but as you suggest, they would have likely steered the transaction offline hence a seller pushing for this should be treated with caution.

An entry exchange deal can be facilitated very neatly using the "In-person" option (where no shipping is required). We are due to include a custom "Entries" workflow for deals which follows the same flow, but the language / instructions along the way will of course differ for an event entry vs. physical goods. Most entry substitutions require action from the seller to authorise it with the event / entry company which is where the risk comes in for the buyer. Using Bike Hub Pay the parties would agree on the deal, buyer pays us, seller completes the transfer admin, buyer accepts deal once transfer confirmed, Bike Hub pays the seller. NB: Only suitable for events where substitution is allowed PS - glad to hear the good feedback, thanks

Those are actually 3D printed prototypes. cSixx also do design consulting work for some international bike brands.

Good question, and something we'll include going forward. Here are some quick snapshots. You guessed it, the Western Cape takes the "lead" on this stat. 😣

That would be a fun Strava integration project

We're conscious that a number of factors will skew that top line listings value of R 723 million. As you mention, some ads combine items and use a placeholder price (e.g. R123) which under reports value, while other users repeat ads which over reports. Strictly speaking neither is a behaviour we allow or encourage but both would have a relatively small impact on this number. Actual sales enabled by Bike Hub is the more meaningful figure and the user-reported figure for 2021 was R246 million. While significant, we know this is well under the actual figure since 60% of ads posted are either deleted (instead of marked sold) or left to expire without feedback on sold status.

We can look at a long service award in future editions. We're talking Hub account age and not actual age, right? 😉 But for 2021 you're the 3rd most prolific poster* *Of the members who registered in 2004

It's likely something awry with your cookies for Bike Hub or in general. Clearing them out on the device should do the trick.

Are you perhaps running an ad blocker? We've often seen ad blockers blocking elements on our site related to classified ads which could be the case here.

Thanks for reporting this. Please could I ask each of you to share some additional detail that should help is in finding the problem... and fixing it!? 1. Does this occur only on the Classifieds pages or in Forums too? Classifieds: Does it work here - https://bikehub.co.za Forums: Does it work here - https://forum.bikehub.co.za 2. Are you able to access this page without errors? https://bikehub.co.za/notifications 3. Does this only happen on a particular device/browser or on all devices? Please share either in this thread, DM me or via help@bikehub.co.za

We've found the cause of this issue with the persistent message and should have the fix up early this week. Apologies for the annoyance.

Are you attempting to upload a video in the forums or on a classified ad? Forums: a video upload should work, if it doesn't please share screenshots of the error message with us via help@bikehub.co.za Classifieds: video uploads are not supported.

Good suggestion, thanks! I've added it to the to-do queue. Edit: @Danger Dassieare there other "Frame spares" you have in mind aside from hangers? We're mindful of creating category sprawl with too many fragmented sub categories and hangers fit neatly in the Rear Derailleurs category as-is (similar to what most leading online stores do).

Hi Grav, Could you give an example of what you’re wanting to search for and the expected results? Currently you can include multiple search terms which will be matched to the title field. Each term must appear in the title but in no specific order. e.g. “Specialized Epic” will match ”specialized epic pro” or “specialized s-works epic” https://bikehub.co.za/classifieds/all-ads?s=Specialized+epic

This should be resolved now ????

Thanks for helping on the Delete / Mark sold query. We're looking into the repeated notification problem and hope to have it resolved asap.

Thanks for the suggestion, it's definitely Admittedly, catering to the sub-disciplines and niches is something we've grappled with a bit and in its current form isn't sufficient. The current structure has some very general 'riding' sections to cover all disciplines. And then specific sections for the more niche areas. It's a bit of a legacy set up as we'd added forums here and there over the years and not really ideal in 2021. Ideally we'd want to have a structure that uses tagging or a similar categorisation to allow easy grouping by discipline / interest group. e.g. a single Routes & Trails forum with the ability to tag a topic as 'bike packing' or 'road' or 'mountain bike'. That way we don't need a separate Gear, Tech, Riding, Events, etc. forum for each discipline. But by the same token I do appreciate the need for each area of interest to have a "home" to easily filter and organise everything.