Freecycle Reviews 

Useless. Listed item and it never got past moderated.

Tried to post an item for free 3 days ago and was scammed as a different window opened when I had entered my credit card details... I tried to go back but too late money was nearly taken out of my account, luckily my CC company was on the ball, obviously Freecycle is not!!! This is a security risk. Unlikely whether I'll try again Freecycle must sort out its security. That is not acceptable.

Tried to register and was conned on the page to give card details and now taking £59.99 out of my account. MSCLBILL.COM
STAY AWAY

So far, so good! Listed a few items that I wanted to get rid of yesterday and it was all taken away today!

Environmentally friendly way of decluttering. I will recommend the site to all my friends and family.

Nobody ever replies to messages after posting stuff. Great idea but complete waste of my time.

Have given 3 items away I think.

All recipients turned up and collected the items when they said.

I will keep on using - shame about the bad experiences some people have. Personally, I don't care if someone later sells what I offer later on Ebay. I was going to bin it anyway!

Poor software. Really needs an overhaul for the following reasons;

1) You cannot change a post which you mark 'Taken' back to 'Offer', eg if the person coming to collect the item does not show up/doesn't want it. (Reposting takes time - why not allow post to be relabelled?).

2) FreeCycle closes down your ability to communicate with recipients after 7 or 8 days - and if not taken, then you have to repost.

3) Picture functionality very poor. a) can only post three pics - just not enough. (Other selling sites allow 8 or so). b) slow and clunky uploading, sometimes fails to load some of the selected pictures which have to be uploaded again. And sometimes just sits there with the timer wizzing round forever.

Overall FreeCycle is a good idea, but slow and difficult to use.

Another problem is the number of time wasters out there - just mess you about - eg yesterday I waited in for a collection and the guy never came.

Does anyone ever reply to the ads or turn up when collecting?

There are registered charities who upcycle & collect in most boroughs. Got to be better than sitting around waiting for endless no shows.

Unfortunately free seems to translate into lack of manners.

Also if you list something, is it too much bother to reply, even if it's to tell somebody it's already gone?

Sometimes it's easier to take things to the recycling centre.

I have managed to donate many quality items over the years, and met many respectable people, however just recently, Freecycle has been taken over by time wasters! Arranged to come and never arrived, with not even the courtesy to let you know.
A great idea in principal, ruined by I d i o t s.
Everything is going straight to the tip from now on, don’t waste your time!

Absolute waste of time, energy and oxygen! Waited around all day for a "100% will collect" collection and surprise surprise a no show! Full of chav scum who want something for nothing with zero respect for people, the planet, other people's time, money or any human decency! If you're not going to collect just be an adult and say! Don't bother with freecycle.org. Great idea but poor execution! Should be allowed to leave feedback so timewasters (most of them!) can be weeded out!

Waste of space.

Time wasters, time wasters,also a few manners like please, thank you, and sorry wouldn’t go a miss when your giving things away.

Full of timewasters. Three replies to my post. The first one never showed up to collect. No explanation given. Contacted the second one, no reply.

Well, I have used Freecycle previously and very successfully. This tim e I've had a couple of successes, but now seem to have attracted the nutters, or is it Freecycle themselves playing silly buggers.
I have had the same 'person' message me, each time the message is exactly the same, word for word, when I answer I get no respone, until that same 'person' messages me for the next offer I post, with exactly the same worded message.

It is totally impossible to contact a local moderator, or even delete my profile.
After posting this I will pass this on to the UK media, this sinister operation needs to be taken to task.

Overall, an excellent site, though I do have a couple of gripes/suggestions. Consistency between mods seems a bit lacking; same item, description c&p between groups, yet one was accepted, the other not. Made no sense, but got rid of the item OK. Also, and I know this has been mentioned before, but PLEASE can we have a means of rating givers/receivers, eBay style, ie a simple positive or negative, as giver and receiver, with a comment. Surely this would help givers see who was genuine, who were the much complained about time-wasters, and who were over frequent receivers (i.e. probably taking to sell on). Overall though, happy enough, and will continue to use the site as and when I need to. Thanks :-)

I posted two short simple offers yesterday. About 36 hours later my posts are still 'awaiting approval'.
Why does this take so long?

Lots of time wasters. Some seem to disappear when they get your address which makes me paranoid! Why not rate users same as Ebay do, then you could give to the more reliable ones?

I have had good experiences in the past. But recently I was ignored when I tried several times to contact my local moderators after a scary experience. I was giving away some paving materials. Many people replied, but I offered it to the first person, as I felt I should. He texted and showed up promptly. But he also tried to completely control the pickup, and made me extremely uncomfortable. He was verbally abusive and very creepy. He told me that he was friends with the moderators, and basically knew more than I did. And I got no reply to any of my complaints to the moderators. No response at all. I am much more wary now, and hesitate to use freecycle. I recommend that you do not have someone pick up from your home if at all possible. Vet the person if you can, and have someone with you at any pickup. My experience was traumatic.

Follow-up. I did eventually hear from the moderators at Freecycle. They said they had had Internet issues and that was why they hadn’t returned my messages. It is still unclear if any action was taken on my behalf.

I used to be part of freecycle.org for the St Catharines, Ontario (Canada) group. My account got deleted without being notified ahead of time or even told why.

A few years later (this week) I rejoined to try and give away a desk and drawers that I had got from someone locally. I then tried posting an ad for the free desk and had copied over my ad from another free ad site. My post about the free desk was not approved TWICE without any admin stating why.

Then on the third time, it got deleted again and an admin wrote why it had not been approved, something about not having a phone number in the ad or even referring to one(!!). Since I had copied my ad from another site, I had forgotten to take out the reference to calling which is why it was deleted. It took 3 days for me to be told why. Not very good. I have deleted my account with freecycle as it is not what it used to be.

I made a post asking for any digital camera and this person told me they had one and we could meet. I said sure but somewhere where there’s people and then sent me their number. I checked her picture on whatsapp (around 60 years old woman) and decide to check if it’s AI generated or not, and it was 99.9% generated. The way she was talking and how she looked didn’t match either. The person was also being quite insistent on meeting… why are you insisting if you’re giving it away? I’m not meeting up with this person but be careful with this!!

Full of people that engage you in endless chat and then disappear. I haven't cleared anything on this site for over a year despite offering good quality items for recycling. I would have been messed around by at least 10 people in that time saying they will turn up and never do. Came home early for someone to collect an armchair. Never turned up. Never responded. Absolute total waste of time. Just throw stuff out. Far easier.