I used to be a big fan of the cycle hire scheme in London and defended it against criticism several times (see here , here and here).

However, now I’m really getting frustrated.

One week ago, I was trying to hire a bike with my key. However, I only got red lights and was unable to release any bike. Because I wanted to find out if there is something wrong with my key I called the call center. They were busy and I ended up in the overflow call center. Those poor guys there don’t have direct access to the cycle hire system. I gave them my key number, my mobile number and my email address and they promised to come back to me.

Guess what, I never heard anything again.  Today, however, when I had a look at my bank account I realized that TfL nevertheless charged me one pound for the access period.

I tried to log in on the internet but that did not work either. The website always asks me to reset my password but does not accept a new one.  (This is a known issue which I had before.)

I called them again and again only reached the overflow call center. Again, they wrote down my details and promised to call me back. Well, let’s see.

Stuff happens, of course. However, thanks to the Boris Bike forum I know that this is not an isolated case.  Calls recorded by the overflow call center are frequently lost, they don’t call you bank and the website is constantly making trouble.

This is really a shame. The cycle hire scheme has been running since August 2010.

These are not teething problems anymore. This starts to look like incompetence!