Electric Bicycle for Deliveroo

[WonderingLeaf]

Hello everyone, my first post on this forum!

I have been interested in cycling for a while but never taken it seriously.

I used to work for Deliveroo a few nights a week on my mountain bike. I am looking to get back into it with an electric bicycle to help with hills. I have had a look around at the huge variety on offer and quite like the look of this one: https://urbanebikes.com/collections/qwic/products/rd11-performance-28mph?variant=31403307302976

It has excellent range and large battery. It is far more than I was looking to spend although will get a lot of use out of the bike and can claim the cost on my Self Assessment anyway. What do people think? I asked for opinions on a facebook group and someone said "I personally wouldn't advise on something that cheap and with a hub motor" - what do they mean by this? It is NOT cheap at all.

Instead they recommended this one: https://www.e-bikeshop.co.uk/Electric-B ... 4HY8IYW5fY

Apparently I would get more for my money. The person claims to have a 2021 cube with bosch gen 4 motor which they have not had issues with.

Please could someone explain to me how and why this is bicycle is better than the one I found? What is a hub motor and how could this person claim a bike costing more than £2,000 than their suggestion is cheap or inferior?


Someone on another forum said: You can get excellent bikes with very standard good quality parts that are easy to maintain, and cheap to fix and replace parts if needed. For example: https://wooshbikes.co.uk/?gran-camino, but there are many others (Juicy, Oxygen, ...). Reliability is likely to be just as good on that as on either of those other bikes; and Woosh have excellent pre and post sales service.


Now I am very confused and don’t know what to do. Would the bike that I found myself any good for hills and for doing Deliveroo in general? I live in Kent and there are quite a lot of hills. I don’t expect to be going up them very quickly although on an average shift I could be doing anything up to 20 miles so not coming home with sore legs would be nice.

I am interested to hear from everyone thoughts. Please feel free to suggest a bike that you think would be better suited to me. Nothing less than a 70 mile range and a big battery if possible though if possible. I am looking for something quality and reliable

Thanks!

 

[flecc]

Thank you for your reply @flecc perhaps I need to manage my expectations a little better. I am not sure which one to for go now. The Stromer does look very fancy and powerful but if I can't use it legally then I am stuck.

The KibeBike that @soundwave suggested with a Bafang motor looks good. https://www.cloudsto.com/forum/kirbebike-vapour/kirbebike-vapour-full-suspension-emtb-detail.html

Which one would you choose and why? Opinions please

Either of these can be registered so will be legal if you do that and you have or get a moped driving licence and third party insurance.

I can't really judge which would be best since I have no experience of either, though both look similarly powerful, but I'd doubt a 70 mile range on either without a second battery. However the Kirkebike is shipped to you direct from China (and is out of stock anyway) so probably doesn't have a certificate of conformity, which will make registration much more difficult since you'd need to get it single vehicle approved at an approved testing station first. That's probably why they warn this:

"Please check your local laws on ebikes for where you live in the world"

The Stromer is EU sourced so comes with the certificate as standard from their dealers, which forwarded to the DVLA results in registration without any difficulties.
.

 

[soundwave]

just to give you a idea on the price of a 20ah batt, plus you need a bike it will fit on.

48v 24.5Ah (70A Continuous Discharge) Panasonic NCR18650GA Hailong Maxi – eBike Batteries

ebikebatteries.co.uk

 

[WonderingLeaf]

none of the above.
Deliveroos don't earn a fortune, so you'll need not only a reliable transport, but a cost effective transport too.
Bikes tend to lose a lot of value compared to cars at the same age.
You need you budget your transport over a year for example. Let us know how much you can spend on transport then we can give you a more objective advice.

Some of us earn more than others depending on how many hours we do and on which days. Friday, Saturday and Sunday are best as there is usually a x2.5 boost. Tonight I made £100 in about 5 hours

My average seems to be about £500 per week. This is not my main job but it definitely helps. The price of the bike is not too much of an issue because I will claim it on my Self Assessment

I tend to spend about £700 per year on train tickets but over the last 18 months or so that has been a lot lower for obvious reasons, we were not allowed to travel much.

 

[WonderingLeaf]

Either of these can be registered so will be legal if you do that and you have or get a moped driving licence and third party insurance.

I can't really judge which would be best since I have no experience of either, though both look similarly powerful, but I'd doubt a 70 mile range on either without a second battery. However the Kirkebike is shipped to you direct from China (and is out of stock anyway) so probably doesn't have a certificate of conformity, which will make registration much more difficult since you'd need to get it single vehicle approved at an approved testing station first. That's probably why they warn this:

"Please check your local laws on ebikes for where you live in the world"

The Stromer is EU sourced so comes with the certificate as standard from their dealers, which forwarded to the DVLA results in registration without any difficulties.
.

That is great to hear, thank you for that. The importance to me is being able to go uphill easily. I think I will gave to accept that I’m not going to get same range from a pedelec as I would from a small car or moped.

The Stromer is a lot more expensive but seems to have more features too. Are the sorts of premium bikes good value for money in the long run?

 

[Scruffydroid]

It gets a bit more complicated when importing E-Bikes from China...

The Kirby vapour is an example, where you need to consider whether the following applies.

Trade remedies notices: anti-dumping duty on electric bicycles from China

Trade remedies notices published by the Secretary of State for International Trade relating to the anti-dumping duty on electric bicycles from China.

www.gov.uk

Caveat emptor

(Just as a matter of interest, I purchased an Andy Kirby 1500w kit in. November 2020. I had to pay £42.83 in duties. Bear in mind that it was not a complete bike, just a motor/wheel/controller). The battery was shipped separately and no duty was charged.

The kit was actually shipped from CHANGZHOU NCYCLEBIKE CO.,LTD

 

[cyclebuddy]

The price of the bike is not too much of an issue because I will claim it on my Self Assessment

From what you've said, HMRC won't allow you to claim the whole purchase cost. To do that you'd need to prove that the bike is used wholly and exclusively to conduct your trade - you'd not be allowed to use the bike for any personal mileage AT ALL.

That might be (IS) very difficult to prove, especially if it's your only form of transport. As you've said:

...but I do not drive and will be interested in maybe using the bicycle to travel long-ish distances (20 to 40 miles) to visit friends and run errands of my own when not working for Deliveroo.

IIRC, all you can claim is 20p per mile, and you need to keep track of your "working" mileage (as you do if using a personal car for work).

And you can't even claim the mileage for travelling elsewhere to start your shift - that's classed as personal mileage:

Had I travelled to another town on the bike before starting my shift, those would probably be a lot higher...

At 20p per mile, you'll need to cycle 20,000 delivery miles to recover the cost of a £4000 e-bike.

You maybe want to check this with your own accountant/book-keeper before spending so much on an e-bike.

 

[Scruffydroid]

You can claim the bicycle as a deduction on your personal tax return under the provisions of an Annual Investment Allowance.

Claim capital allowances

Claim capital allowances so your business pays less tax when you buy assets - equipment, fixtures, business cars, plant and machinery, annual investment allowance, first-year allowances.

www.gov.uk

You will need to take into account any personal use, and offset this percentage.

 

[flecc]

The Stromer is a lot more expensive but seems to have more features too. Are the sorts of premium bikes good value for money in the long run?

Having no persomal experience of them I can't really say, but as ever, the law of diminishing returns comes into play. A Ford Fiesta and a Rolls Royce do exactly the same job of carrying one in comfort at all the allowed speeds anywhere on our roads. The Rolls has more refinement but the extraordinary cost of that is all out of proportion to the gain. With anything you buy, the more you pay, the less value you get.
.

 

[WonderingLeaf]

Either of these can be registered so will be legal if you do that and you have or get a moped driving licence and third party insurance.

I can't really judge which would be best since I have no experience of either, though both look similarly powerful, but I'd doubt a 70 mile range on either without a second battery. However the Kirkebike is shipped to you direct from China (and is out of stock anyway) so probably doesn't have a certificate of conformity, which will make registration much more difficult since you'd need to get it single vehicle approved at an approved testing station first. That's probably why they warn this:

"Please check your local laws on ebikes for where you live in the world"

The Stromer is EU sourced so comes with the certificate as standard from their dealers, which forwarded to the DVLA results in registration without any difficulties.
.

That is great to hear, thank you for that. The importance to me is being able to go uphill easily. I think I will gave to accept that I’m not going to get the same range from a pedelec as I would from a small car or moped.

I have some thinking to do