Juiced = zero support

[skunkman]

I purchased 2 juiced ripcurrents. Granted I love them. They are a blast. One battery mount broke after 2 uses. Called juice. Can’t talk to a human. Left 2 messages 2 weeks ago. No reply. I was able to glue the broken part and can secure the battery with electrical tape. Otherwise I would have a nonfunctional bike. Unacceptable. Just an FYI.

 

[TMH]

Well, like every other e-bike manufacturer/seller these days Juiced Bikes is inundated with customer service inquiries due to doubling or tripling of sales in a short period of time and haven't been able to keep up with them. Many or all are hiring additional folks. Quoted from a recent Electrek article, "[Rad Bikes] Founder Mike Radenbaugh explained in a call with Electrek several months ago in the early days of the pandemic: “We’re already hiring like crazy, our customer support team is up to about 40 or 50 right now, I’m not even sure. It’s hard to keep track. We should be up to around 70 in the next month or so.”"

Juiced Bikes is no different, and recent communications from their founder specified that they knew they had a customer service issue and were working to resolve it. Juiced Bikes has actually been double or triple slammed lately due first to COVID shutting down their engineering and production as they were trying to complete the Scorpion/HyperScorpion project, the massive increase in their e-bike sales, and then quality or design issues relating to the HyperScorpion.

I was an early pre-order purchaser of the HyperScorpion, and my bike was one of the ones with 'issues' (total loss of power to motor after having ridden it about 10 miles).

No, I was never able to speak with anyone by phone at Juiced Bikes. Yes, at times it did take 'too long' for customer support to respond to my service ticket. Yes, I even got responses directly from Tora Harris to my service ticket, as even he was pitching in at times to deal with Juiced's customer service/support issues.

Ultimately things got resolved. Fairly early in the process Juiced determined that they needed to just send me a replacement bike. Unfortunately none were available for a few weeks. Ultimately they did become available and Juiced wanted me to pack up my non-functional bike and return it to them (on their dime) so that they could then ship out the replacement. Unfortunately after the bike initially worked properly, I had recycled the carton and packing materials.

Much to my surprise Juiced Bikes then shipped me the replacement bike and said 'box up and return the old one in the new box.' This was a very interesting process, 'undressing' the protective materials off the new bike and dressing them back onto the non-functioning bike while performing a synchronized disassembly and assembly of 2 bikes.

The new Hyper works great so far. I certainly do hope that Juiced figured out the root cause(s) of the failures and was able to address them. The entire process (from date of opening service ticket to having a functional bike) took just shy of 2 months. At least half of that was related to obtaining the next production batch of Hypers from China. Patience and perseverance on my part was a necessity to getting the situation ultimately resolved.

My case is very different from others, and I understand that. My wife and I have multiple e-bikes and we ride daily. We could afford to wait for the process to happen and still ride every day. If my HyperScorpion had been my first or only e-bike, it would have been incredibly difficult for me to have been very patient at all.

Is it a good situation? We all agree that it is not, very much including the manufacturer/sellers. But it is a situation they have found themselves in pretty much 'overnight', and it is not one which they can immediately correct. Hiring and training effective people takes time, especially during a period where many, many thousands of new people are only now discovering e-bikes, and require various levels of support (whether due to issues, or just the "how do I ..." questions with a product which is unfamiliar to them). I don't believe that it will be possible to resolve customer support issues regarding e-bikes very quickly. This applies across the board to all manufacturers/sellers.

 

[Bruce Arnold]

Well, like every other e-bike manufacturer/seller these days Juiced Bikes is inundated with customer service inquiries due to doubling or tripling of sales in a short period of time and haven't been able to keep up with them. Many or all are hiring additional folks. Quoted from a recent Electrek article, "[Rad Bikes] Founder Mike Radenbaugh explained in a call with Electrek several months ago in the early days of the pandemic: “We’re already hiring like crazy, our customer support team is up to about 40 or 50 right now, I’m not even sure. It’s hard to keep track. We should be up to around 70 in the next month or so.”"

Juiced Bikes is no different, and recent communications from their founder specified that they knew they had a customer service issue and were working to resolve it. Juiced Bikes has actually been double or triple slammed lately due first to COVID shutting down their engineering and production as they were trying to complete the Scorpion/HyperScorpion project, the massive increase in their e-bike sales, and then quality or design issues relating to the HyperScorpion.

I was an early pre-order purchaser of the HyperScorpion, and my bike was one of the ones with 'issues' (total loss of power to motor after having ridden it about 10 miles).

No, I was never able to speak with anyone by phone at Juiced Bikes. Yes, at times it did take 'too long' for customer support to respond to my service ticket. Yes, I even got responses directly from Tora Harris to my service ticket, as even he was pitching in at times to deal with Juiced's customer service/support issues.

Ultimately things got resolved. Fairly early in the process Juiced determined that they needed to just send me a replacement bike. Unfortunately none were available for a few weeks. Ultimately they did become available and Juiced wanted me to pack up my non-functional bike and return it to them (on their dime) so that they could then ship out the replacement. Unfortunately after the bike initially worked properly, I had recycled the carton and packing materials.

Much to my surprise Juiced Bikes then shipped me the replacement bike and said 'box up and return the old one in the new box.' This was a very interesting process, 'undressing' the protective materials off the new bike and dressing them back onto the non-functioning bike while performing a synchronized disassembly and assembly of 2 bikes.

The new Hyper works great so far. I certainly do hope that Juiced figured out the root cause(s) of the failures and was able to address them. The entire process (from date of opening service ticket to having a functional bike) took just shy of 2 months. At least half of that was related to obtaining the next production batch of Hypers from China. Patience and perseverance on my part was a necessity to getting the situation ultimately resolved.

My case is very different from others, and I understand that. My wife and I have multiple e-bikes and we ride daily. We could afford to wait for the process to happen and still ride every day. If my HyperScorpion had been my first or only e-bike, it would have been incredibly difficult for me to have been very patient at all.

Is it a good situation? We all agree that it is not, very much including the manufacturer/sellers. But it is a situation they have found themselves in pretty much 'overnight', and it is not one which they can immediately correct. Hiring and training effective people takes time, especially during a period where many, many thousands of new people are only now discovering e-bikes, and require various levels of support (whether due to issues, or just the "how do I ..." questions with a product which is unfamiliar to them). I don't believe that it will be possible to resolve customer support issues regarding e-bikes very quickly. This applies across the board to all manufacturers/sellers.

I'm glad Juiced got your problem sorted and that you weren't sidelined while you were waiting. I have guarded optimism that they will get on top of their chronic customer service problem, fueled largely by unremitting expansion without corresponding growth in the service dept. Maybe they really will get sales and service in a better balance. Also QC, so there's less need for service.

 

[Lantley]

I don't mean to throw salt on the wound. But for me buying direct always comes with a huge customer service risk.
Once I decided to buy an Ebike. I was immediately committed buying local.
I feared what would happen if/when something went awry.
I chose to by local from a brick and mortar store in order to have peace of mind when it came to customer service and service after the sale.
I can go to the shop and speak to a actual live person if I have any issues.
I also purchased a brand that has a nationwide dealer network.
E bikes are fairly expensive, a broken E bike is fairly worthless.
Yes I think I paid a premium to ensure good service after the sale but for me it was worth vs. some savings and poor customer support.
There is value to buying local vs. buying on line.
Some feel they can't afford to pay for that value vs. the savings the internet provides. On the other hand I will pay to avoid internet customer support, Email headaches.
I trust things will work out in the end, but the aggravation in the mean time is hard to deal with.

 

[Tawn Midkiff]

Well, like every other e-bike manufacturer/seller these days Juiced Bikes is inundated with customer service inquiries due to doubling or tripling of sales in a short period of time and haven't been able to keep up with them. Many or all are hiring additional folks. Quoted from a recent Electrek article, "[Rad Bikes] Founder Mike Radenbaugh explained in a call with Electrek several months ago in the early days of the pandemic: “We’re already hiring like crazy, our customer support team is up to about 40 or 50 right now, I’m not even sure. It’s hard to keep track. We should be up to around 70 in the next month or so.”"

Juiced Bikes is no different, and recent communications from their founder specified that they knew they had a customer service issue and were working to resolve it. Juiced Bikes has actually been double or triple slammed lately due first to COVID shutting down their engineering and production as they were trying to complete the Scorpion/HyperScorpion project, the massive increase in their e-bike sales, and then quality or design issues relating to the HyperScorpion.

I was an early pre-order purchaser of the HyperScorpion, and my bike was one of the ones with 'issues' (total loss of power to motor after having ridden it about 10 miles).

No, I was never able to speak with anyone by phone at Juiced Bikes. Yes, at times it did take 'too long' for customer support to respond to my service ticket. Yes, I even got responses directly from Tora Harris to my service ticket, as even he was pitching in at times to deal with Juiced's customer service/support issues.

Ultimately things got resolved. Fairly early in the process Juiced determined that they needed to just send me a replacement bike. Unfortunately none were available for a few weeks. Ultimately they did become available and Juiced wanted me to pack up my non-functional bike and return it to them (on their dime) so that they could then ship out the replacement. Unfortunately after the bike initially worked properly, I had recycled the carton and packing materials.

Much to my surprise Juiced Bikes then shipped me the replacement bike and said 'box up and return the old one in the new box.' This was a very interesting process, 'undressing' the protective materials off the new bike and dressing them back onto the non-functioning bike while performing a synchronized disassembly and assembly of 2 bikes.

The new Hyper works great so far. I certainly do hope that Juiced figured out the root cause(s) of the failures and was able to address them. The entire process (from date of opening service ticket to having a functional bike) took just shy of 2 months. At least half of that was related to obtaining the next production batch of Hypers from China. Patience and perseverance on my part was a necessity to getting the situation ultimately resolved.

My case is very different from others, and I understand that. My wife and I have multiple e-bikes and we ride daily. We could afford to wait for the process to happen and still ride every day. If my HyperScorpion had been my first or only e-bike, it would have been incredibly difficult for me to have been very patient at all.

Is it a good situation? We all agree that it is not, very much including the manufacturer/sellers. But it is a situation they have found themselves in pretty much 'overnight', and it is not one which they can immediately correct. Hiring and training effective people takes time, especially during a period where many, many thousands of new people are only now discovering e-bikes, and require various levels of support (whether due to issues, or just the "how do I ..." questions with a product which is unfamiliar to them). I don't believe that it will be possible to resolve customer support issues regarding e-bikes very quickly. This applies across the board to all manufacturers/sellers.

This sounds exactly like what has happened with my Ripcurrent. It rode like a beaut' for the first 10 miles and then the PAS will cut off when I hit a stride of 15MPH and not work again until it rests. All test show it to be in good working order. I have only had the bike for 2-weeks and have not had the best customer service...no voice contact at all. I sure hope this won't take 2 months to work out as this is my main way to commute to work...so sad as I really like the bike when it works....for that initial 5 minutes....drives me a bit crazy. But it is good to hear that I am not dealing with a company that does not care and is just taking my money. I hope they make this right.