As you are aware there are lots of bike retailers on the internet/mail order from magazines and, saddly, not all are as good as they make out to be...perhaps a few reports of one Mr Dave Hinde come to mind?...
Anyway, to save potentially hours trawling though lists and lists of nuts and bolts, bar ends and forks, I was wondering how easy it would be to set up a chart/tally similar to the 'Gear' section of this site, where products are rated, but for companies that people use for their bikes and bits?
with it set up in a way that allows users to give their opinions on a few areas such as what was bought, available stock/choice, delivery time, customer service...or even problems encountered? thus resulting in a score if you will. some might score highly on the available stock but lag a bit on delivery time for example but some shops specialise in free-riding or downhill where others are more general and are indicated as such in the options to choose from.
I just think it would help weed-out the cowboys who take our money, make lame excuses as to where our bought goods are then fail to deliver the right items when they eventually do...um, dave?
anyone else recon this would be good?

it would be a good idea, but remember this, if you get crap service you'll scream and shout from the rooftops about it whereas if you get treated well you'll rarely tell a lot of people.

Picture this:

One arsey customer with a grudge writes a bad review.

Bear in mind that BM needs to attract advertising revenue from these same shops.

And like Cooky says, good service leaves the customer with a nice quiet warm feeling. Bad service leaves the customer with a desire to tell the world never to shop there because they are in the employ of Satan.

I agree it could be open to abuse, but the same could be said for the gear reviews. Marin sponsors this site despite there (probably) being bad reviews of their bikes on here.

I do a great deal of shopping on the net and I get both good and bad service from all the retailers I have used. It would be unfair to rant and rave about bad service when the week before, and indeed the week after, I got perfectly acceptable service from the same place.

The idea has some merit as it would certainly help highlight the retailers that are consistently bad. But I think the existing fora accomplish this already.

ok fair enough. I still come here first to check stuff out before I buy anyway :o)

All you need to know is that Chain Reaction are very good and Dave Hinde is very bad. The others are all somewhere in between. Simple!

i've had several decent wheels from Mr Hinde
all still running fine thanks

well you're, like tigger, you're the only one

Wiggle 10 good at dealing with issues
CRC 10 Not had any issues yet
Dave Hinde 0 Issue unresolved
Bikedock 10 Not had any issues yet

Used wiggle lots and have resolved any problems I have had. Mainly to do with faulty gear not their shop. Top Service. Happy with the other 2 x10s but not had any issues in which to "test" their service. Please see previous threads re DH

This is a good idea people could click on OK service if 10,000 oks and 2 bad ratings they were just unlucky

I wish this had been going before I used DH

The way I see it is this (And I'm ex bike trade, as well as knowing the chaps who have to make money out of this little malarkey called Bikemagic, so hopefully it'll make sense!)

If you get good service, tell people
If you get bad service, tell people.

That way, those shops that are good get praised and those that are bad should be able to learn from their errors.

Tips to follow-

When making praise, explain why

When criticising, explain why.

Simple really.

I agree, it is hard for a company that needs to generate ad revenue from dealers, but then surely it's also, on the flip side, really good for those shops that get the praise on here?

then surely something similar to the 'gear' section would work - as people leave good AND bad reports on things like frames/tyres/whatever and the review will state these and it leaves for the rest of us to make up our minds for example; 'these tyres only good for road riding, hit mud and you're buggered'
so for a shop perhaps; 'good walk-in service at the shop but mail order slightly lacking, still good though' ...perhaps?
it could work. there are good points for and against having shop rating system I guess, just depends who has the final say I suppose...

CycleSurgery are very bad ummmmkay.

No they're not.

See, it's started already.

Bought all the bits to make a new hardtail this year from Merlin including one of their Rock Lobster frames. Great price, great service, very happy customer.

Bought Hope XCs with 317s from Merlin last year, not particularly happy with the hubs, feel like they are lubed by Maple syrup, not Merlins fault, but have had to true the 317s a few times, I am 14 stone and like to throw it about a bit, probably my own fault.

These companies are after all just the middle man pedalling (no pun intended) other manufacturers wear. If they screw up the delivery or loose your order or make an arse of your payment details then yes they are at fault.

Personally I've had no problems with Merlin and Chain Reaction.