Fix Your Bike Scheme - Have You Been Able to Apply?
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https://www.gov.uk/guidance/fix-your-bike-voucher-scheme-apply-for-a-voucher
The Fix your Bike Voucher Scheme allows members of the public to receive a voucher worth up to £50 towards the cost of repairing a bicycle.
Have you been able to get one? The site loads now, but I saw in the news they've run out - which is obvious if there were only 500 000 available
The trouble is , its free . Thousands of people will have applied who don't even own a bike -probably thinking they can sell the voucher .
Remember when the Covid home testing kits were available "for free" a couple of months back , Genuine people who needed them couldn't get one for weeks as the website crashed then none available .
Guess how many of the initial batches were returned ? 22% !
We should never give things out for free , even Doctors appointments . There should be a £5 or £10 deposit required , fully refunded when you actually use the free item .
Yes freebies attract everyone and anyone, and so many people will abuse the privilege. I guess it was a half baked plan - they should’ve just said if people repaired their bikes, they could submit their receipts to receive £60 rebate towards it. But I would imagine the admin issues the government would have with that
Golfforall You are so right especially about GP appointments. If you don't turn up without good reason, it should be a minimum of a £25 charge.
I managed to book my bike in for a service and repair my brake caliper has fell off, but the repair is coming out of my pocket because I couldn't get the voucher. I have missed riding my bike, and just a side note my bike is named after the actor who plays Burt in Mary Poppins, but due to censors I can't write the name
They are giving only giving away 500k vouchers to which 50% of the people wont use it or even need it so you are competing for 250k vouchers out of approx 67 million people in the uk.
I didn't know about it, but now it is too late. Oh well, it's not as if it was of benefit to me anyway
They are releasing them in tranches so as not to swamp the cycle shops . Think they'll find that only half will actually be used (people apply for freebies just because they are free !) so maybe another tranche in a couple of weeks .
Wish some of the parents round here would use them to get lights on their kids bikes ! As always at this time of year as the nights draw in a bit kids are cycling in dark lanes at 2100 when it is getting dark with no lights ! A tragic accident waiting to happen sadly .
If only bikes were the only problem on the road. We have a lot of scooters now and they don’t make any noise, and lots of users have decided to wear clothes that make them difficult to be seen
Should have allowed everyone to register for it who is interested and then delegate batches of vouchers per area so the bike shops are not over-run and everyone interested has an equal chance. They could have had 2 weeks of registration at people's leisure before then allowing a computer to randomly pick people. I don't see the complication in running such a scheme. The only thing that would be unfair I guess is if you are in area where many people have applied you have a reduced chance of getting a voucher unless there are a lot of bike shops in that area. I must admit I thought it was going to be run something like that as they bike shops registered first and I thought they would then use that data to delegate how many vouchers per area.
That's far too sensible an approach ! Can just imagine the magnet fishers of Liverpool and Manchester on the banks of the canals trying to retrieve bikes they dumped in there a year or two back !
I agree with the principle of the scheme , just that its half baked as usual .
I have 2 bikes , a road bike and an E Bike both of which I can strip down and rebuild in a couple of hours , so not after a voucher myself but have to ask how they manage to make such a hash of it ?
It would’ve been better, but I guess the administration of distributing such a scheme is costly to manage, so they have done it as simply as possible
Golfforall I don't think those magnet fishermen would benefit as those bikes would need far more than £50 work. My approach was I have a working bike and a knackered saddle, stick that on the bike and then I can have a £40 saddle for free and they will likely charge me £10 for fittiing it. Alternatively another working bike but I stick on some old knackered tyres and get some free tyres out of it. I don't want them fiddling with my gears and charging me £25 of the voucher for the privilege. I think I might have some knackered pedals somewhere I could stick on a bike etc.
The scheme I guess is setup to maximise labour charges and I wonder if that wouldn't have been better. If they said £50 of free labour but no actual money for the cost of the parts people like me wouldn't attempt to use the scheme at all and this would maximise the benefit to our economy as it would be only paying for people's wages, supporting the shops and their employees rather than paying for importing bicycle accessories and spares. It is meant to help people who can't do their own servicing and repair. Some bikes might only need new cables, new bearings and new brake pads so that could be a restored bike into a great working condition with £50 of labour and perhaps only £10-15 of parts.
The scheme would then stop freeloaders like myself from participating who feel they are entitled to government handouts and like free stuff.
BonzoBanana It was part of my childhood to fix my bike/s . Mend punctures at the side of the road etc . Must admit can't be bothered these days , just carry a couple of pre slimed spare inner tubes, wheel off, change tube, wheel on , pump up job done in 5 mins - Life's too short to faf around mending punctures !
I suspect many of the modern generation just chuck the bike in the garage/ shed at the first puncture (too difficult) and forget about it . Probably who the scheme is designed for ? Take the bike down the cycle shop/Halfords get a new tube fitted and away you go (until the next puncture ! ).
Most low to mid range bikes (and their components ) are made in the Far East and Bike shops can't get enough new ones to sell . Perhaps the idea is to get folks on bikes when there are few affordable ones available to buy new ?
Golfforall Also some people seem to go with those awful cheap heavy dual suspension bikes that looked cool in the shop, they have abysmal suspension on both wheels, the bikes use low end freewheels that wobble and they have a 3x7 low quality gear setup. Even for good mechanics those bikes are hard to keep road worthy. The seals on the front suspension perish quickly for example and allow rain inside the lowers. So many of those bikes are just garage Queen's except of course they are horrible monstrosities rather than some wonderful sports car that is rarely taken out. Sadly many of those bikes don't even get space in the garage they are left outside in the garden. Saying that when I was a kid we had Choppers, they were rubbish bikes but looked cool I suppose junky dual suspension bikes are the modern version of those except the Chopper had super reliable 3 speed hub gearing that was pretty much all weather but the brakes were far worse than modern bikes even nasty cheap ones.
Golfforall On a typical 3x7 setup many of the gears are repeated and others you don't use because the chain line would be at extreme angles, probably on a 21 speed bike 4 shouldn't be used and 3 or 4 are repeated. So its not as many gears as you think plus you have to think about what gears you need to select. I'll admit I'm too stupid to work it out and prefer simple 1x setups without a front derailleur. I don't want to be thinking about the chain line when a HGV is only 1 metre away passing me at 60mph.
I think it would have been better to have a maximum of £100 per household instead of 2 x £50 voucher we have 5 bikes
I'm going to keep my eye on this as my bike has a flat tyre and it got damaged by the movers when I moved house and I'd like to get it fixed up. I would use my £50 voucher if I manage to get one.
Is it the actual tyre that’s damaged or the inner tube? If it’s the latter, you could get that changed cheaply, easily and quickly. I bought my inner tube online and just did it myself
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