September 11, 2025 at 4:35 am

Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

by Mila Cardozo

Hands holding bike's handlebars

Freepik/Reddit

Working in retail means dealing with… interesting customer complaints.

In today’s story, a customer complained that her bike stopped when she stopped pedaling.

So the retail worker took the bike for a test drive to find the real issue. It wasn’t what he expected at all.

Let’s read the whole story.

The Bicycle

One of my jobs was assembling bicycles and repairing returns at a big box store.

Customer Service brought a bicycle return to me saying the lady complained that when she stopped pedaling, the bicycle stopped.

It had a coaster brake, the type that slows the bike by pedaling backwards.

My thought was that the freewheel assembly in the brake hub was malfunctioning, activating the brake and stopping the bike.

But it wasn’t that.

I took the bike to the parking lot and rode it around. I coasted, no problem, peddled some more and coasted, no problem.

Did it using the brake lightly, the bike continued to coast, no problem. I rode the bike back to the store entrance and coasted to a stop.

Then I thought I realized the problem, but was she really that ignorant? Did she actually think the bike was a perpetual motion machine?!

Peddle it up to speed and let it coast forever or until she wanted to stop.

It wouldn’t surprise me if she did.

She definitely didn’t know what she was buying!

Let’s see how Reddit reacted to this.

Probably.

Screenshot 1 1ee940 Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

Yikes.

Screenshot 2 1b28cf Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

Someone shares a similar story.

Screenshot 3 847dc7 Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

Maybe.

Screenshot 4 7d4659 Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

Another reader chimes in.

Screenshot 5 030d15 Customer Asked For A Refund On A Bike Because When She Stopped Pedaling, It Stopped Moving Forward

She needs a new bike with regular brakes, otherwise she’ll never get anywhere.

Hilarious.

If you liked that post, check out this post about a rude customer who got exactly what they wanted in their pizza.