Ready to Grumble

Not the most scintillating blip today ("no change there, then", you may say, but that would be terribly unkind!)

I had a bit of bother with the London bike hire scheme today, and I took this photo as evidence that the bike I'd hired was happily nestling in its docking station.

I've used the scheme several times already, and find it useful, but it felt today as though I'd uncovered a fatal flaw.

I set off at lunch time to go to a concert a LSO St Luke's north of the Barbican Centre. I picked up a bike near Finsbury Square and cycled to a docking station off Old St. I went to drop off the bike, but the docking point made a loud whirring noise and refused to lock. Tried a few more docking points - same result each time. Then I phoned the number on my membership key, and spoke to a very nice man who could only suggest I try a few more docking points. So I did - no difference. Eventually he advised me to take the bike to a different docking station - in other words, a docking station somewhere other than my intended destination! If it didn't dock there, I would have to phone again and they would send a truck to pick up the bike - this could take up to an hour.

So because of a fault with their system, I'm now fully responsible for their bike until they get around to collecting it from me. I admit that I can't immediately think of another way of doing it, but it's potentially bl**dy inconvenient.

As it happens, I was able to dock the bike at the second location - as shown! Missed the concert though.

There. Grumble over!