Guy leaves bike shop 1-star review for helping him for free

Brad Dickson • Managing Editor

May 9, 2023 12:00 PM EDT

This is precisely the type of thing you encounter while working in a bike shop. Of all the customer service roles you could ever work, working in a bike shop will confront you with some uniquely bewilderingly entitled experiences. The idea of "you haven't done enough for me for free" will somehow recur time and time again as 1-star reviews bombard you for going out of your way to help someone who doesn't understand how much they don't understand about their bike.

Bonus points here for being blamed for something unrelated that has gone wrong with their bike that you never even touched.

For some reason, everyone expects you to do everything for them for free; this comes from the fact that you generally need to go above and beyond for people in ways you don't in other forms of retail to help them with things that are not obvious about their biking experience.

It comes with this age-old expectation people come in with that bike shops owe you everything. People are utterly incapable of thinking or doing anything for themselves as soon as they cross the threshold of a bike shop's doors. Simultaneously, bikes are still a machine—though a simple one, so there's a lot that can go wrong very quickly—and it's common for people to wildly overestimate their knowledge of them. Their "I know what I'm doing" attitude, particularly among those of a certain age, will backfire time and time again... Every bolt stripped on their frame, fork installed backward, or even just a "broken" drive train where each limit screw was turned in completely the wrong direction.

I could ramble endlessly about this one; this is just the tip of a continental iceberg. But go through the reviews of any bike shop, and you'll see what I mean. There's a reason why every grizzled bike shop veteran can't abide this behavior any longer… They've been burned by it one too many times.

Keep reading to see the review and reactions below. I've included my own translation of what's happening here after the review to help those who are reading the post. Next, see this Karen, who left a 1-star review when a tornado delayed her food delivery.

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I'll translate what's going on here for you:
An entitled guy goes to a bike shop to get CO2 canisters (used for emergency tire inflation in the case of a flat.) These canisters install into a little bike pump via either a clamping piercing mechanism or a screwing mechanism. He is shown where they are by a worker, then blindly grabs a couple of the wrong ones himself. So he goes back to the shop with the wrong canisters and brings his problem (a tire that won't seat) with him.
Now, depending on the tire and rim that you're trying to seat it onto—this can be an ordeal, even for an experienced mechanic who knows all the tricks. Even getting the tire on the rim can be excruciating when you have a tight combination. Sometimes though, once you get the tire onto the rim, you can't get the tire to inflate fast enough to push the bead onto the rim, which seems to be what was happening here.
So, this guy brings his tire into the shop, hoping to force the shop into doing it for free. (He probably also bought the wrong tire online.) He then helps himself to their equipment (don't do this unless you know that it's ok at this particular shop.) He is struggling (probably not even doing it correctly) when an employee comes over to do it for him. They miraculously do it with ease; now, the entitled guy's ego is bruised, and he takes further offense to the worker's insinuation that he has just done him a favor. How dare he!
At the end of the review, the reviewer goes on to list an insane list of things he feels a bike shop should do for him for free. The most egregious of these is wrapping bar tape, which is an extremely time-consuming service that takes a lot of skilled technique and know-how. Not even every mechanic is a master at wrapping bar tape.
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