Eleven months for a two-week job, bike returned incomplete, refund unpaid...
I booked The Hackney Peddler on 30 June 2025 for a powder-coat respray and new decals on my 1980s Peugeot road bike. The job was understood to take around two weeks. My bike was returned eleven months later, in mid-May 2026, missing its headset — which I have since sourced and fitted at my own cost.
Over those eleven months:
Emails frequently went unanswered for weeks at a time, and on two occasions for several months.
The original cranks were lost in the workshop during the job and had to be replaced.
I resorted to chasing via email, repeated phone calls, and even social media simply to get a basic update.
In the final week before the bike was returned, ten of my phone calls went unanswered. On the two occasions an assistant did answer, he was unable to physically locate my bike at the workshop.
A £100 refund was offered, unprompted, as compensation for the delay on 7 April 2026. Three weeks after the bike's return, that refund has still not been paid.
To be fair, the owner cited a shop relocation and working short-staffed, and these were acknowledged in writing. But none of that adequately explains keeping a customer's bicycle for nearly a year, losing components in the workshop, returning the bike incomplete, or failing to honour a compensation offer he had volunteered himself.
I had hoped to resolve this directly. After ample opportunity to do so, I am leaving this review so others can make a more informed decision than I was able to.
Reply from The Hackney Peddler
Hi Tom,
You're entitled to your opinion and I accept that the project took far longer than either of us expected. However, your review focuses almost entirely on the time taken and overlooks much of the additional work that became necessary to return the bicycle in a safe and rideable condition while preserving as much of its originality as possible.
What started as a powder coat and decal job became a much bigger restoration. Midway through the project we discovered the fork was severely bent from a prior accident and that the dropouts were beginning to separate from the fork blades. We could have ignored that and simply completed the cosmetic work, but that would have meant returning a bicycle with a fork we no longer considered safe to ride.
Several replacement options were explored before the decision was made to rebuild and preserve the original fork using as many of the original components as possible, as we knew the bicycle held sentimental value to you.
The substantial fork rebuild, upgraded replacement components and delivery back to you were all provided at our expense.
As has always been my approach, updates were generally provided when there was meaningful progress to report, rather than repeated messages simply confirming that a bicycle was still awaiting parts, repairs or paint.
I understand your frustration with the timescale. What I do not accept is the suggestion that this remained a straightforward powder coat and decal job throughout. The reality became considerably more involved once the condition of the fork was uncovered and the project evolved well beyond its original scope.
Alex