United Kingdom (UK) Freecycle Groups' Homepage

Changing the world one gift at a time

Freecycle in the UK

Freecycle groups are run by locally based volunteer moderators.

The first UK Freecycle group was set up in London in Oct 2003. There are now 540 groups spread across the country, with 2,490,981 members!

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Frequently Asked Questions

The most common questions received by the moderators of Freecycle groups are answered below.

How do I join a Freecycle group?

Why was my post to the group rejected by Yahoo?

Why was my post to the group rejected/deleted by the moderators?

Why am I not receiving messages from the group?

Why am I receiving so many messages?

I had lots of responses to my OFFER - now what?

I responded to an OFFER but haven't heard anything. What should I do?

Is it OK to take items and then sell them or use them for business?

Why do you have to use Yahoo?

I'm going away - how do I stop receiving emails?

How do I join a Freecycle group?

Please see our joining instructions.

Why was my post to the group rejected by Yahoo?

You must send group messages to the correct address: [Your Group]@yahoogroups.com
You must send emails from the address which you used to subscribe to the group.
You must send messages in plain text, not HTML.

If you are sure you are doing all of these, contact us and explain the problem - include a copy of any rejection message you have had.

Why was my post to the group rejected/deleted by the moderators?

We put the reasons in the rejection message sent to the message author, but in general, the most common reasons are:

Your post is missing information in the subject line (OFFER/TAKEN/WANTED/RECEIVED, item's, location)
You posted an off-topic message (please use Café groups (where available) for discussions, notices, questions, etc.
Your item is not relevant to Freecycle's purpose of "reducing waste" (e.g. animals, coupons, asking to borrow items - post these to the Café instead)
Your post involves money (including postage) or an exchange - Freecycle transactions must be free.
Your post included a full address or phone number - these should only be given privately to other members.
You posted a RECEIVED message about an item you received from someone else's OFFER.
You posted a TAKEN message about an item you received from someone else's OFFER.
You re-posted the same OFFER message within two weeks.

Remember you can always check the Using Freecycle files (here or in the Files section of the relevant group) for full instructions on how to use Freecycle.

Why am I not receiving messages from the group?

There are several possibilities:

You have set your membership to Special Notices or No Mail. Log in to the group and choose 'Edit Membership' to select Individual Emails or Digest.
Messages to you have been bouncing back, e.g. if your mailbox is full (check with the moderators to see if this is the case).
Messages are being classified as spam by your ISP or email provider. Check whether you can "whitelist"* the address of your Freecycle group to force them to allow group messages through; also try adding the address to your addressbook, which may have the same effect (this is true for Yahoo mail).

* http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitelist

If you believe you have checked all these possibilities and still not solved the problem, email the moderators.

Why am I receiving so many messages?

If you feel the number of messages is overwhelming, there are three things you can do to make them easier to manage:

Set your group membership (via the 'Edit Membership' link - see above) to Special Notices (so you get emailed important messages from the moderators, but nothing else) and read your group online via its home page (you need to be logged in to Yahoo to read the messages).
Set your group membership to Digest and just get one or two (long) messages a day containing several emails each.
Use your email program to filter the emails into a separate folder away from your Inbox - all group emails contain [[Your Group]] in the Subject line so this should be easy to do. Check your email program's Help file for "Filters" or "Rules", or ask on the Café group (if available).

I had lots of responses to my OFFER - now what?

It is entirely up to you who gets your item, and you do not have to justify your choice to either the moderators or the unsuccessful respondents. You could go for the first respondent, or the one who lives closest, or perhaps someone who gives a good reason for wanting the item. Or you could pick someone at random! Whatever you choose, remember to post a TAKEN message when the item has gone. You do not have to email all the people who didn't get it, but it would be polite to do so - remember you can send one email to multiple recipients. See your group's Using Freecycle file for full details of how to manage an OFFER.

I responded to an OFFER but haven't heard anything. What should I do?

Please don't repeatedly email people about an item. If you have not had a personal reply, then unfortunately all you can do is to assume it's gone to someone else. Occasionally it can take a while to find a convenient time for the item to be physically passed on, so a TAKEN message may not appear straight away.

Is it OK to take items and then sell them or use them for business?

Freecycle's one overriding aim is to keep stuff out of landfill - we don't really mind where it goes as long as someone is making use of it. It is therefore OK for people to take items for commercial use, but it is not OK for someone to deceive other members about their intentions for an item. It is assumed that items are wanted for personal use, and that if someone has other intentions they should make them clear when responding to an OFFER. This lets the Offerer make an informed choice about where they want their items to go.

If you have doubts, please contact your group's moderator and we will investigate, but we will only take action if someone has not been honest about their intentions for an item.

Why do you have to use Yahoo?

We know a small number of people have problems joining or using Yahoo, and we are sympathetic - we will try to help as much as we can. However, every legitimate Freecycle group worldwide uses Yahoo, and we cannot use anything else if we want to stay recognised by The Freecycle Network. This may change in the future if Freecycle sets up its own servers - but for now we have to stay with Yahoo. If you are having problems with the sign-up process please contact the relevant moderator and we will do our best to help! You can join by email (see above), but you then have no access to Files, Photos, Polls, Databases, mail settings or any other web-based features.

I'm going away - how do I stop receiving emails?

From the 'Edit Membership' link on your group's home page (see above) you can choose Special Notices (we send out very few of these) - you won't get any of the other group messages.

Please note it can take a couple of days for the change to take effect - this is down to Yahoo and we can't speed it up, no matter how much we would like to!

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