Freegle

squeaky

Contessa wrote: »

How long does it take to join a local group? My application is still "pending" after about 2 weeks and I've loads of stuff that could be of use to others!

Hiya,

One of the things that people sometimes miss when joining Yahoo Groups (which is where Freegle groups are hosted) is that their form "does its own thing".

What they do by DEFAULT is to give you a YAHOO EMAIL ADDRESS based on the username that you chose and then send the confirmation email to THAT addresss.

So even if you are using myself@hotmail.com for instance

And you sign on with Yahoo Groups as freeglingcontessa - they'll send the email to:-

freeglingcontessa@YAHOO.com

So you'd need to check your YAHOO mailbox, not your personal one to see it.


There is, however an option on that signing up page to NOT use the Yahoo address and to use your own.

Although it's a bit out of date, and needs a tweak (just pretend that freecycle is written as Freegle :-) ) the following link may be of help:-

http://www.squeaky.adsl24.co.uk/FAQ/joining_freecycle.html#yahooid


HTH :-)

flippin36

I was accepted straight away on Freecycle (now called Recycle).

I'm another one who doesn't give to charity shop as much as I used to, and absolutely LOVE my Recycle group. The reason for not giving to charity shops is that I have tired of making the trip with really good items only to be sent back home with them as they have been overwhelmed with donations. I have had bags of excellent designer/high end highstreet clothes that I have given away on Recycle because my local charity shop were so rude when I offered them. Their eyes rolled as though to say "not a another bag of cr*p".

I gave my bags of clothes to a needy family. Now I have no idea whether they gave me a made up sob story or not, but they were really polite and over the moon with what I had given them which is more than I got from my local charity shop. It was quick and easy.

Halva

Freecycle hasn't renamed itself. If you belong to a group called Recycle, it's likely that they're not a part of the Freecycle network. There are a lot of groups across the UK that aren't affiliated to Freecycle. Some operate under the Freegle banner, some go it alone.

They're all working towards the same common purpose though.

Flippin36, I've also had that reaction at some charity shops. In one I got so irate that I took my bag of stuff back and took it elsewhere. Happily, we have around 4 charity shops in our village centre and another was happy to take the items.

I have heard that some charity shops send their clothes that don't sell to developing countries. And a lot of clothes that go in recycling banks end up there too. I once read an interesting article about a journalist that followed the path of one blouse from the recycling bank out to Zambia.

Anyway, I'll stop rambling!

Byngdesign

Contessa wrote: »

How long does it take to join a local group? My application is still "pending" after about 2 weeks and I've loads of stuff that could be of use to others!

Have you checked the joining conditions? They vary widely between groups. It's possible that the group you've applied to is one which sends out an email with a request that you reply to it.

That's not being picky - it's for a very good reason. Many applicants sign up for a shiny new Yahoo ID. Part of the process is an equally new Yahoo webmail address which never gets looked at. There's not much point in joining a group if you're not going to see anything from it, so replying to an email is a good way of checking that you're actually getting emails.

Be careful about joining Freecycle groups hosted on My Freecycle. Things will improve with time, but a large percentage of UK groups are currently being barely moderated from the US. They're so under-resourced that anyone can join and harvest members emails for spamming.

Freecycle groups hosted on Yahoo are generally OK in this respect, and the number of locally run groups on My Freecycle is creeping up, but painfully slowly.

lostinrates

flippin36 wrote: »

I'm another one who doesn't give to charity shop as much as I used to,.

I love shopping in charity shops, only...they have got SO expensive. When I wa a teenager my friends and I could get quirky things and make individual outfits from our pocket money saved for a few weeks, on Monday I was looking through a basket of silk scarves, priace mainly at £30. I could buy one from a street market for less, and my teenage nieces can dress in cheap, ungreen and unethical clothes from cheaper highstreet chains than they can from charity shops.

flippin36

lostinrates wrote: »

I love shopping in charity shops, only...they have got SO expensive. When I wa a teenager my friends and I could get quirky things and make individual outfits from our pocket money saved for a few weeks, on Monday I was looking through a basket of silk scarves, priace mainly at £30. I could buy one from a street market for less, and my teenage nieces can dress in cheap, ungreen and unethical clothes from cheaper highstreet chains than they can from charity shops.

Completely agree with you. I used to love charity shops say 10 years ago. But like you say its either too expensive or its full of Primark /matalan clothes that are more expensive than buying them new. I think Charity shops will really have to rethink their donation and pricing system out if they are to compete with Freecycle, Ebay and the like.