A bloke who bought a bike in a bid to lose weight was left "crying" when he spoke to the shop manager and was told he was too fat to ride it away.

21-stone Sebastien Barsetti spent months saving up before choosing one from the Giant website and paying for it online.

But when he contacted the company’s outlet nearest his home in Halifax, Nova Scotia, to arrange a pickup he was told he couldn’t collect the bike he’d paid for.

Barry Misener, the owner of Giant’s Halifax branch, said he had refused to hand over the bike on safety grounds.

“I told him the maximum rider weight is 300 pounds. I said, ‘You cannot ride the bike safely,'” Misener explained.

“Honestly, I spent my afternoon hiding and crying because I was really upset about it and it really affected my self-esteem,” Barsetti told Global News Canada.

He said that he had told the bike shop his height and weight when he was arranging the pickup and then “they told me they wouldn’t sell it to me because of my weight. Because I was a little over the max weight.”

“I knew I was over the max weight a little bit," said Barsetti, "but I wasn’t even intending on using it until I was under. Also, I wonder, would they weigh everybody going into the store?” he added.

For his part, Misener says that he told Barsetti that he could pick up the bicycle he could but first he would have to sign a waiver.

“So, he fully understood that the bike is not safe to ride. It’s not designed to support his weight, it would void the warranty. And at that point he hung up on me,” he said.

In the end Barsetti was given a refund. Steve Devantier, the marketing supervisor with Giant Group Canada.said Misener had made the right decision.

“As much as it is a very slim possibility," he said, "using a bicycle outside of its design limits can lead to catastrophic failure.

“We would rather disappoint a consumer by clearly stating those design parameters than put them at risk of a worst-case scenario.”

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