A softly spoken father-of-two, Bilal spends his days driving around London and beyond in a van full of stolen bikes.
Every so often, he leaps out with his special hi-tech scanner and starts waving it at buildings, windows, garden sheds and front doors – always searching, searching, for a Bluetooth signal from deep inside.
He wears a black tracksuit, black parka, a small body camera bobbing at his chest and a laminated badge on a lanyard around his thick neck, with his name and title – Recovery Agent.
Because 25-year-old Bilal Ali is not stealing bikes, he is retrieving them – from tower blocks, traveller camps, family homes, lock-ups, communal bike sheds, and sometimes just the side of the road where they’ve been chained up and left.
Mostly, but not exclusively, his quarry is electric bikes – worth at least £1,000 and often far, far more. And he couldn’t be busier.
To give a bit of context, every year more than 150,000 bikes are stolen in the UK.
Less than half are reported to the police, who make arrests and bring charges in just two per cent of thefts – regardless of whether the bike has an onboard GPS tracker or not.
Bilal is not a police officer. Nor is he armed – though he is 6ft 1in, very broad-shouldered and once had his own security company. Instead, he is the top agent for the UK’s first bicycle recovery service, which has an 80 per cent success rate in reuniting bikes with their owners.
Jane Fryer with bicycle recovery agent Bilal Ali in Harlesden, London to follow the track of a stolen E bike
Viny’s pride and joy was snatched in broad daylight from the Electric Bicycle Company in Neasden, two-and-a-half miles from Harlesden
And he usually does it, he assures me, without even raising his voice. ‘I’m very unconfrontational – I don’t like to get into people’s faces,’ he says. ‘It’s all about diplomacy. I help them spin a story where they pretend to be the victim. I just want the bike. Almost always they hand it over – and sometimes even say: ‘Thank you.’ ‘
Really? They just hand it over, good as gold – a stolen bike, often worth thousands of pounds – with no aggro?
Yes, he says firmly. And invites me to tag along on a grey afternoon in Harlesden, north London as he hunts down a £2,000 black Wisper electric bike, which belongs to a chap called Viny Bodhani and was his new favourite thing.
‘I’d only had it a couple of months,’ says Viny, 45, who works in finance. ‘It was expensive, but I bought it as part of a bike-to-work scheme and it was all part of a new year, cycle to work, get fit campaign.’ Or it was, until last Friday.
Usually when a bike is stolen, it’s just gone.
We’ve all been there, looking sadly at an empty bike rack and scratching our heads. Our expensive D-lock sawn through with an angle grinder.
But Viny’s pride and joy was snatched in broad daylight from the Electric Bicycle Company in Neasden, two-and-a-half miles from Harlesden, where it was being serviced, leaving Sean the manager racing off after it in hot pursuit.
And so, unusually for a bike theft, Bilal has all the evidence.
CCTV footage captured the moment that the bike was stolen from the shop
Mostly, but not exclusively, Bilal’s quarry is electric bikes – worth at least £1,000 and often far, far more (stock image)
Some cyclists have tracked down their own stolen because they feel the police are not acting quickly enough (stock image)
A photo of the bike in the shop – sleek and smooth in matt black. From the shop’s CCTV, a video of the thief – a grey-haired chap in his late 50s or early 60s, in a hat, specs and blue anorak, chatting with Sean. Even a photo from outside showing him, seconds later, pedalling off down the road.
As any British bike owner knows, in the normal course of events, that would be the last time Viny clapped eyes on his beloved bike.
‘Let’s be honest, if you get your bike nicked, you don’t expect to ever see it again,’ he says.
He’s quite right.
Usually, the police are far too busy to be interested.
This time though, they did send a car out in pursuit, but they drew a blank and gave Viny a crime number (to claim on the insurance).
But then, on Monday morning, Viny suddenly remembered his cover included a retrieval service by a company called BackPedal.co. Which means that mechanics had installed a discreet GPS tracker on the bike for which he was paying a monthly fee of around £6.99.
But also, crucially – and this is what allows Bilal to do his job – a separate Bluetooth beacon, like a teeny self-powered lighthouse the size of a £2 coin, pinging out radio waves every second. So he called the emergency hotline and was told an agent was on his way.
‘I didn’t expect they’d actually send someone to get it back!’ he says. ‘Within the hour!’
Every year more than 150,000 bikes are stolen in the UK. Less than half are reported to the police (stock image)
Cycle bays at St Albans City Station have be suspended due to a spate of bike thefts
Which is where Bilal and I come in – standing by the road in Harlesden with the GPS tracker from Viny’s bike marking the spot in front of us.
Or at least this was the spot where it last flashed 24 hours ago – and not a peep has been detected since. It could be underground, which will make it harder for the GPS to send its signal,’ says Bilal. ‘Or the thief could have found it and chopped it out. It should update every hour.’
Suddenly it all feels a bit daunting on a cold, grey day.
Some of the flats are really run down – with broken plant pots, stained mattresses on the balcony and smashed-up furniture. As the sickly whiff of cannabis floats on the air, it feels a bit foolhardy to be wandering around the stairwells here, looking for a stolen bike.
So before we get started, Bilal starts with a few does and don’ts of bike retrieval. Stay calm. Be patient. ‘Bike recovery is a marathon not a sprint.’ Never use threatening behaviour or language.
Be courteous. Think on your feet. In traveller camps, make a beeline for the older members who are more reasonable. Don’t take unnecessary risks.
‘Sometimes there’s a bit of pushing and shoving, but nothing worse. Once I was playing tug of war with a bike in Dalston Market and suddenly thought, ‘What am I doing, I’ve got two tiny children – it’s only a bike!’ and walked away.’
But most of all, it’s about doing the dance with whoever has the stolen bike. As he puts it: ‘Painting the outline of a picture and letting them fill in the canvas with whatever story they want.’ Helping them out of their guilty corner.
‘I’m not the police. I’m not interested in getting them into trouble. I am not going to report anyone. I just want the bike back.’
First though, we have to find it. There are dozens of flats here and Bilal will not knock on a door until he is certain the bike is behind it.
And that’s where the brilliance of the BackPedal hardware comes into play, narrowing the location down to just five metres within a building – through walls, windows, insulation, steel girders. (Apparently, the only way to properly hide it would be to put it in a steel box or swaddle it in tin foil.)
Thieves are using a variety of tools and methods to steal people prized bikes (stock image)
Bike theft ‘hot spot’ signs appeared in London back in 2021 after the Liberal Democrats declared that bike theft had been ‘effectively decriminalised’
In the Netherlands, bike retrieval is a big thing and many insurers refuse to cover bikes over a certain value if owners do not pay for a service like Bilal’s.
But here, BackPedal – set up in 2021 by Richard White and James Dunn – is the first of its kind and is expanding like mad.
They already have more than 3,500 bikes on their books and a remarkably addictive Instagram account, showing films of retrievals. Richard tells me that they want to scale up the business to cover the whole country and smash bike crime – doing what the police cannot.
‘No disrespect to the police, but you wouldn’t ask a GP to do surgery. We know how to find them. We know how to do this. We’re experts. We’re much more agile,’ Richard says. ‘Who’s going to answer the door to the police when they’ve got stolen goods in their sitting room?’
So they employ former security staff and enforcement officers. Some former police. No women yet, but Richard insists there is no bar.
It’s a slow business. After an hour, we’ve done the outside of the block – peering through murky windows, looking in front yards, checking out the underground car park – and no joy.
Now we need access to the locked communal stairwells. ‘Always buzz a flat near the top – they can never be bothered to come down and check who it is,’ says Bilal.
So he does – number 17 – and explains in his lovely calm voice that he’s here to retrieve a stolen bike, and we’re buzzed straight in.
We start at the bottom. Bilal moving lightly in his trainers. Taking everything in. Store rooms scattered with rubbish, a mattress, drugs paraphernalia and pots and pans.
Out into the backyard and then up the stairwell. Scanning everything with his magic machine and looking for the giveaway scuffing on doors caused by handlebars. But nothing.
Some flats have piles of rubbish outside and reek of drugs. Others are smarter, with cheery doormats and children’s scooters outside.
‘We can’t discount any – family members are often harbouring stolen goods,’ he says.
Outside one flat is a single, shiny bike wheel and Bilal goes very alert. But a quick check and it’s not ours.
After another hour or so, I feel like throwing the towel in. This is clearly not my vocation. But Bilal remains utterly focused.
‘I’m obsessed with bikes. It drives my wife mad. I’m always looking out for them. I can spot a stolen bike a mile off.’
Thousands of bikes are reported as stolen each year, figures have shown (stock image)
Usually when a bike is stolen, it’s gone, but new technology means bikes can be tracked using inbuilt GPS trackers (stock image)
As we move, on and on, from flat to flat, up first one stairwell, then the second, he tells me about the one bike that has eluded him.
‘It’s been cat and mouse for nine months. Every now and then it pops up when it’s charged. But the signal’s weak and I’m always 24 hours behind. It’s not the most valuable bike, but it’s become personal. One day…’
And when he does get one, what does it feel like?
‘Very satisfying! I’m chasing down thieves. I’m taking stolen goods back to their owners.’
But maybe not today. After nearly three hours, we have just one last flat to check on the fifth floor of the second building, where the corridor bristles with private security cameras and the door warns: ‘Welcome To The Batcave.’
Suddenly, the scanner starts flashing. This is our flat. Behind this door is Viny’s bike. Bilal knocks.
The sound of footsteps, and a man opens the door.
Not the thief from the CCTV, but another chap, middle-aged, nicely dressed in designer gear, looking rather nervy.
And this is how it goes.
‘Hi – quick question, have you bought an electric bike recently?’ asks Bilal in his soft voice.
‘Yes, two days ago,’ is the reply.
‘I think it was stolen – if you bring it to the door, I can confirm whether it was.’
‘Oh man. Oh man, I paid £150 for it!’
And then, after a bit of crashing about inside, he remerges, noticeably sweaty, and wheels out Viny’s bike. ‘I’m not in any trouble, am I?’ he begs. ‘Seriously, it’s stolen?’
‘That’s the one, bro,’ says Bilal sympathetically, as he shows him the photos of the bike and the thief. ‘But don’t worry. I’m not the police or anything like that – it happens all the time.’
With that, the man hands the pristine £2,000 Wisper over. He even says: ‘Thank you, Sir.’
And there we are. Mission accomplished. Barely five hours after Viny called the helpline, his bike is back, ready to return to the repair shop where hopefully they won’t lose it again.
No one will be arrested. No one will be prosecuted. No one even loses even their temper and Bilal gets his commission bonus.
‘I’m not interested in who stole it – my job is to return the bike,’ he says.
And with that, he and his trusty scanner roar off to Tottenham, ready to hunt down another before supper.
