jargo432

I'm trying something new on this build. (this winter I'm building an Ogre) Last year on my DT I wanted to buy some of my parts from chainreactioncycles in the UK and had trouble paying for my order. My debit card wouldn't allow international orders. I ended up paying a lot more for some of my parts here in America. This year I'm going to find a way to buy from them. I've placed an order and come Monday I'll be taking a trip to my bank to see what I have to do to transfer funds to them. The only other option I've thought of is getting a prepaid visa card, putting the amount needed on it, and using that to pay. Everything seems to be at least 30% less and the shipping is free on orders over $99. They also claim it should only take about a week to get my order.

Has anyone here bought parts from overseas? If so any advise would be greatly appreciated. Thank You.

saddlesores

get a credit card. one that doesn't charge a fee for intl orders.

if not possible, see about xfer funds via paypal.



oh....if you're gonna save heap big wampum,
how 'bout a wire transfer?

Tourist in MSN

I have bought parts from Wiggle, ProBikeKit, Bike24, SJS, Evans, Planet X, and XXCycle. I think that covers Germany, UK and France.

My credit cards charge 3 percent currency exchange fee, my debit card charges 1 percent. Some cards charge zero for currency transactions, but I am not going to open an new account just for that.

If it was going to be a big order, I always called my credit card company first to make sure it would not trigger a fraud alert.

I had a problem once, my credit card company suspected fraud so they shut down my account, I called them and they said that their computer does not check to see if I recently called to say I was placing an order overseas. So, even though I called them before I placed the order, they still did not add two plus two to get four. (Idiots.) Getting that order placed was a hassle, but that was the only time I had a problem. That order was over a thousand $USD, so I had a few conversations with the fraud dept to get it to go through.

Call the phone number on the back of your debit card and ask why it won't work. If it is Visa or Mastercard, it should work.

It is my understanding that Shimano no longer sells pedals and some other components to a USA distributor, so if you want the M324 or A530 pedals you might have to buy overseas. But some stores still have them in stock. Last time I bought pedals, I got them from the UK at about half what I would pay here. My Rohloff hub was about a thousand USD shipped from Germany, it would have cost at least 30 percent more here because the distribution channel is a bit too profit oriented here.

I also bought my Ortliebs and one of my Tubus racks overseas, but the websites that sold me my Ortliebs no longer exports them to the USA.

bwgride

I recently bought from SJS Cycles Online Bike Shop for Touring, Mountain & Road Bikes and Specialised Bicycle Parts and from https://www.bike-discount.de.

The UK order took about a week to arrive, the German order about a month to arrive. If you can wait, the bike-discount site offers some of the best prices available. I've read that if your order is less than about $200, it does not trigger custom fees. Maybe several separate orders less than $200 are needed to protect against this if you have a costly order. I did not have to pay any additional fees with either of my orders and both were less than $200.

With both companies I ordered items that have huge price increases when sold in the US. Even with international shipping the prices from bike-discount were still better.

P.S. With both I used Paypal, but opted to use the credit card payment method.

jargo432

Well, I opened a paypal account and linked it to my bank. Then I went back an replaced the order and used paypal to pay for it. So far it looks like it worked. This will make my build a lot more fun. Thanks for the advise.

36Oly_Rider

I think all you will have to do is have your bank authorize the card for international orders. A lot of places keep it domestic, but if you're a traveller, they can put the card for international use too. I've had issues with BoA on this and they would freeze my account (with no notification). I told them to contact me first if they suspect suspicious activity and place my card for international use because of my travels. Eventually, I just changed banks because BoA likes to control the customers and really doesn't care of the customers wants/needs (but thats been 7 or 8 years ago now...)No problem with my new bank...I've made orders from England and Germany okay...

imi

Chain Reaction Cycles is my go to in the UK.
SJS stock older/more unusual parts I have found as well.
Worth comparing prices with Wiggle too.

Great service (even on returns) with all these fwiw

Biketouringhobo

Cool Bike Parts and Accessories from the Coast of Maine since 1976