Rental Bike Scam?

[mrkapom]

Hello

Im an expat living in Chiang Mai. My rental motorbike was recently stolen, and the situation seems a bit shady.... I may be being scammed, and I'm not sure how to best proceed. Any advice is appreciated.

Here's the story:

I rented a pair of motorbikes in Chiang Mai while a friend was visiting so we could take a trip out of town. We arrived back on Friday night after the store was closed, and my friend planned to take a bus to another town on Saturday morning. He was staying quite close to the bike rental shop and my house is way across town, so we decided to park my bike right in front of the shop so that my friend could just show up with his bike in the morning, return them both, get his passport and go. When he arrived, my bike was gone and the store said they hadn't seen it. I went and met them at the shop, we looked around the neighborhood, and it was definitely gone. I switched my passport for my friend's so he could leave, and now the store owner wants 30,000 baht. It was a Honda Wave 125 with an electric starter, certainly not new, but not really old, either. The odometer said 60,000 km, but it was broken, so who knows what the true number was.

The store owner initially said he would go to the police, and that it didn't matter if I went or not because I wasn't the owner of the bike, and therefore couldn't report it as stolen, so I didn't go. Today, I went to the store to pick up a copy of the police report. He didn't have one, because, according to him, he went to a private investigator, who would try to locate the bike. He hadn't reported it to the regular police yet. When I asked why he wouldn't have reported it to the regular police as well, he kept answering indirectly, then would say that he would report it in a few days when I pressed him about it. I asked him 3 times and never got a straight answer as to why he hasn't told the police yet. I thought this was suspicious, and it seemed especially odd because yesterday he made a big deal about how he had to report it to the police to clear himself of any responsibility in case the people who stole it tried to use the bike to transport drugs or commit some other crime, yet has not yet reported it. He also claimed to have paid the private investigator 3000 baht already, although he didn't ask me to compensate him for that.

It is definitely possible that the bike was legitimately stolen, and the store owner is acting reasonably, and I'm just unfamiliar with the Thai way of dealing with this (like witht he private investigator, not officially filing a report yet, etc). I've rented from this shop several times, and they've always been friendly and professional. I've even recommended it to friends and visitors.

However, this whole situation seems sketchy to me. I don't understand why he hasn't reported the theft yet. How would reporting to the police prevent a private investigator from doing his job? Didn't the shop owner say he wanted to ensure that he was not held responsible if the thieves used the bike for criminal activity? It doesn't make sense.

The bike was parked right in front of the store, they could have easily seen it when they opened, taken it, and then claimed it was stolen. I'm worried if we wait for several days before reporting it, they could easily dismantle it, and it would be gone and untraceable (which is likely happening right now, regardless of who stole it). If the real police never get involved, the shop owner could just take it to his other shop in another city and keep actively renting it out (they have two locations). It could all be a set up. When I went in today, the guy seemed surprised and nervous to see me, and kept asking me when I was going to leave the country, in spite of my having rented the bike using only Thai and explaining that I live and work here more than once. He kept answering my questions indirectly, telling me stories about other customers who have had their bikes stolen or other non-sequitur things instead of clearly telling me what I was asking about. I might just be reading too much into his behavior, there might be language or communication issues (although he speaks good English), but taken all together it seems suspicious to me.

I'm considering going to the police myself, but I'm not really sure what I would say. What could I tell them? Can I report the stolen bike myself? Is there some other reason the shop owner may have not reported it that I'm just not aware of? Am I being scammed? If I am, what can I do about it?

Thank you for your help.

[dogpoo]

Pay and walk away, you will never win but you may be able to haggle with what he wants, at the end of the day it's his bike which you rented, it has supposedly been stolen, can you prove it was not, can you prove it was the shop owner who stole it, the police will have no interest in finding it, put it down to experience and don't rent again!! My opinion!

[Briggsy]

Go to the police. He is holding your passport illegally.

Report it to the embassy.

Offer 3,000 Baht if you want to.

[pilm]

1. Contact your embassy immediately, as the property of their government is being held by a Thai who refuses to return it.

2. Contact the police.

[mrkapom]

Thank you all for the advice so far.

I have heard this stuff about the passport before, that it's illegal for them to be holding my passport. However, if my bike was truly stolen and the shop owner is doing nothing wrong, I don't want to screw him over and force him to give me my passport with no compensation. It's good to know there is that option, though, and I suppose I could voluntarily compensate him if i thought I should. I'm not totally sure that he's scamming me... What does it sound like to you?

As far as going to the police, what can I report? The stolen bike? A sketchy shop owner?

[Neilly]

However, if my bike was truly stolen and the shop owner is doing nothing wrong

If he was doing nothing wrong he wouldn't be holding your passport for a start, and in my opinion he would have reported it to the police

[guzzi850m2]

Don't you have a rental contract you can show the police?

I long time ago stopped giving anybody my passport when renting anything, they can have a copy no problems.

Yes it all sounds very fishy, and your "friend" owning the rental shop, well well.

Anywhere in the world where money is involved, friends or even family are sometimes suddenly not friends anymore.

Tell you rental shop "buddy" that you will contact your embassy and then the police and do exactly that if he don't back up.

A lost passport is not the end of the world and you off-course have some copies of it including you latest Thai visa, yes?

[moe666]

I guess my question is why would you leave a bike parked on the road at night, you do have some responsibility in this as it was in your procession. But go to the police and report it as stolen, someone need to.

[mrkapom]

Yes, I think I'm going to have to report it to the police myself. I also don't know why he wouldn't have done that. Not sure what they'll be able to do for me, though.

Parking it where we did was probably not the best idea, although you see bikes parked at night all the time... it didn't seem terribly dangerous. And yes, if the bike really was stolen, I absolutely have responsibility in this, and would want to replace it. The question is whether this shop owner is trying to scam me or not.

My friend was not the bike shop owner... not sure where you got that idea. I have copies, etc., but I'd really rather just get my passport back. My visa is for a year, and required many a trip to immigration, city hall, etc. Don't want to have to replace it.

[wantan]

Maybe the shop owner is right and you can not report a bike as stolen because you are not the owner? Try it, then we know more.

The embassy will not be very interested in your "lost" passport. Better don't think they will help you getting it back. You may can get a new passport somehow. But thats a hassle for sure. And you will have to report what happens to your old passport. They will not accept that "a rental shop doesn't want give it back" i guess. Try it, then we know more.

This is thailand and the story may isn't so fishy as it sounds. It can be that the shop owner is trying some "special way" to get the bike back. And this sometimes works pretty well. Wait a little longer, then we know more.

But 30,000 Baht for a Wave with more than 60,000km on the clock is too much imo. Try to lower it.

Please give some feedback once the story is finished. Often people don't report how it ended. Thats not nice

[dogpoo]

Yes, I think I'm going to have to report it to the police myself. I also don't know why he wouldn't have done that. Not sure what they'll be able to do for me, though.

Parking it where we did was probably not the best idea, although you see bikes parked at night all the time... it didn't seem terribly dangerous. And yes, if the bike really was stolen, I absolutely have responsibility in this, and would want to replace it. The question is whether this shop owner is trying to scam me or not.

My friend was not the bike shop owner... not sure where you got that idea. I have copies, etc., but I'd really rather just get my passport back. My visa is for a year, and required many a trip to immigration, city hall, etc. Don't want to have to replace it.

You can not prove the bike has or has not been stolen, you can not prove the bike was stolen by the shop owner, what do you expect the police to do? The best you can hope for is that the police will negotiate a settlement fee for the lost bike, it was your choice to hand over your passport even though it is against the law for it to be held by anyone else, that is down to you, negotiate a settlement with the shop owner and walk away!!

[cornishcarlos]

Does he not have insurance against this eventuality ??

I think he is scamming you... Go to the police and report it, then offer him 10k as compensation. If he accepts 10k you know you have been scammed but at least you will get your passport back with the least hassle. I have a Wave with 60k on the clock and I bought it for 20k baht with 40k on the clock.

Never give your passport to a rental shop, but I guess you know that already..

Good luck and let us know the outcome..

[thrilled]

Ya won't make that mistake again.It's A free bike for someone. Can sell the parts if nothing else.1st thing when something happens is see the police

[macknife]

Ask him for your passport back, if he says no, go to the police. Not to report the bike stolen but to tell them what has happened and that he has your passport illegally. Tell the guy you are going to do this first. As you say, the bike may have been stolen but it sounds dodgy to me. There are many bikes left on the street at night, why would thieves target a wave?

It really comes down to what you believe, if you think he is lying then don't pay him anything. You live here so you have time, get a new passport and don't go to his shop again. Yes it's hassle to get a new one but it's much cheaper than the alternative. If you feel responsible then negotiate a fee. I'd say that bike is worth 15000-20000B max. Does he know where you live? If so, it might be better to pay up. If he doesn't, then forget him.

If you rented a car or bike in your own country and it was stolen would you expect to pay for it? No would be the answer. So why pay here? I realise he has your passport, so that is your dilemma. So either get a new one or pay him.

[wooloomooloo]

Did you cover the specifics of possible damage and/or theft when you hired the bikes, mrkapom.

As cornishcarlos states, surely the rental company is insured against such loss. Why would you be liable?

I would settle the excess, but would pay no more than that for a genuine claim.

[PoolHustler]

I would tell him you want to go to the police station with him and make a report, if the bike was stolen this is the first thing he should do.

If you end up paying for the bike tell him you want the green registration book as it is no longer of any use to him if the bike has gone.

[dogpoo]

I would tell him you want to go to the police station with him and make a report, if the bike was stolen this is the first thing he should do.

If you end up paying for the bike tell him you want the green registration book as it is no longer of any use to him if the bike has gone.

It is quite obvious to anyone that the bike has gone and with it the green book, it is probably in issanmiddleofnowhereville enjoying a new life, all the suggestions so far are helpful but not realistic, it is impossible for the op to prove anything, the police will not be interested, just like the Jet Ski scams all that will happen is the op along with the police will haggle a final settlement for the lost bike, as for the passport the owner will destroy it and claim it was never given to him unless the op can prove otherwise, haggle, pay and walk away, yes it's a pain to conned but it happens here all the time, of course the bike could have really been stolen but how can you prove that either way!!

[wantan]

Ask him for your passport back, if he says no, go to the police. Not to report the bike stolen but to tell them what has happened and that he has your passport illegally. Tell the guy you are going to do this first. As you say, the bike may have been stolen but it sounds dodgy to me. There are many bikes left on the street at night, why would thieves target a wave?

It really comes down to what you believe, if you think he is lying then don't pay him anything. You live here so you have time, get a new passport and don't go to his shop again. Yes it's hassle to get a new one but it's much cheaper than the alternative. If you feel responsible then negotiate a fee. I'd say that bike is worth 15000-20000B max. Does he know where you live? If so, it might be better to pay up. If he doesn't, then forget him.

If you rented a car or bike in your own country and it was stolen would you expect to pay for it? No would be the answer. So why pay here? I realise he has your passport, so that is your dilemma. So either get a new one or pay him.

But we are in Thailand and AFAIK no bike rental has such insurances. No insurance company is interested in offering such service. The customer always has to pay for damage or lost. But usually there is a signed rental contract whith such statements.

[pilm]

Print out the page from your embassy's website stating how much a new passport is. I suspect somewhere around 5k baht.

Present it to him and offer him this amount.

[PoolHustler]

My point is that if the bike has been stolen ask to see the green book, nobody keeps the green book with the bike

[mrkapom]

** UPDATE **

The situation has been resolved. Here's what happened:

After my last post here, I went to see the police. I figured the theft needed to be reported one way or another, and the shop owner had seemed nervous and shifty when I initially went to ask for the police report, so my suspicions were aroused. First, I checked to make sure there were no CCTV cameras that would have caught the theft (one would have come close, but nothing ideal), then I went to the regular police station in the old city, where I had been once before and mistakenly believed to have a tourist police section. I explained the situation in Thai, and although 2 of the officers there were listening (albeit without much interest), one of them (who was just watching tv next to us) insisted that my Thai was not good enough and I needed to go to the tourist police. Fine.

So I go, but at this point it's 10 pm, and the tourist police station is closed. There is one guy there, and I explain the situation to him, he also doesn't seem very interested, and tells me that I can't do anything anyway, because the rental contract was in my friend's name, so he's responsible. It doesn't matter that my passport is the one being held by the shop (my friend is just here for vacation, so I put mine down as collateral in place of his after the bike got stolen). He can sign responsibility over to me, but he needs to do that in person. At the time, he was in Pai, due back the next day, so it was a possibility.

The next morning, I went to the tourist police again to try to talk to someone else. I talked to a more helpful gentleman, who said that in fact, the shop owner may have been doing me a favor by not reporting it to the police. I'm still a bit unclear about this, but according to him, reporting it to the police means that there has to be some legal action taken, one way or another. The police could make me pay compensation, then the owner could just keep the bike without paying me back if he were able to get a hold of it. The police also might have suspected me, the customer, because it is not unheard of for people to rent a bike and use it to commit a crime, then ditch it and try to get out of responsibility. There was also something about how the police would have to arrest anyone who was found in possession of the stolen bike, including the private investigator, but that doesn't make any sense to me, as the owner could drop the charges. In any event, by using a private investigator, one can avoid having some obligatory legal action taken, the situation could be resolved by some other means negotiated by the parties involved. I'm still a bit confused about what exactly the law is, but both the tourist policeman and the shop owner tried to explain it to me and said it may actually have been better for me, at least in this particular situation. Still not sure about all this though.

At this point, the policeman suggested I call the owner again to see if he had reported it to the police yet. I called him, and he said that he had good news, that the bike had been recovered by the private investigator, and that I could come down and get my passport. Okay, great. So i go in, the bike is there, missing the license plate, both mirrors, the basket, and one of the front side panels. There was also some damage to the key system, which the owner said had to be replaced (although I didn't actually see this damage). In the end I paid 6000 Baht to get my passport back, 4000 for damages and replacement parts, 2000 for investigator fees. This was a bit confusing.... 4000 seemed high for the amount of damage, and before he had told me he paid the investigator 3000 already, so I don't know why it was only 2000 for that... but at this point this was by far the best option. As many posters said, I had no proof of anything, so there was very little that the police or legal system could do for me. I was (am) still not totally sure if i could trust the shop owner or not, but this idea that he may have actually been trying to help me, and the fact that i could end it all for 20% of what I had feared, made me just pay and walk away.

I am an honest person, and since I very rarely lie at all, I generally take people at their word, even though I'm well aware that in general people lie all the time. I just prefer to live with a mindset that I can mostly trust people. With this situation, I'm still not sure what really happened. I would like to believe the shop owner, because mostly that shop has been fine for me and they've been friendly, and it's possible that he was being honest the whole time, had a good reason to not report it to the police, and charged me fairly in the end. I'm about 75% sure that's what happened.

But some things still bug me... he definitely seemed nervous when I came and asked for the report, especially when he realized that I was not leaving the country any time soon and would be here to follow this case up. The bike was recovered remarkably quickly, supposedly just in some field near a shack outside the city somewhere (you know, the one where people leave stolen bikes!?!), and the investigator fee did not match what he had said originally (unless he decided to pay some of it himself for some reason).

As I was leaving with my passport, another customer was arguing him about supposed damage to the bike he was returning... The shop owner wanted a few hundred baht for some damage, and the customer was saying if he had to pay for it, he wanted the old part that the owner was replacing. I can't say for sure, but it didn't look like an honest repair. There was no damage that I could see, and if you were in fact replacing the part, then you could easily give the damaged part to the customer, which the owner was refusing to do. It didn't leave the best last impression for this guy's honesty.

In the end, I think it turned out as well as it could have for me. I had no proof of anything, no case, and had very little expectation that the police could help me at all even if they wanted to. I will not give my passport as collateral anymore. I will not leave a rental bike at the shop again, or on the street at night if I can reasonably avoid it. Either this guy was totally honest with me and I got quite lucky that the bike was found so quickly, or he got scared and decided to hedge his bets and take a lower payout. I prefer to believe the former, but am still not sure. I doubt I ever will be.

Thank you to anyone who offered advice.

[wantan]

mrkapom, thanks for taking the time to write all this down. Very interesting information. A typical thai story that happens like this every day. Confusing for non thai, so good to have someone writing such things down in detail

[Shurup]

Thanks for the update, that is very unusual that people follow through with the end of story.

[macknife]

Yes thanks for letting us know. It seems you paid a bit much for the damage, but even I would have paid that to resolve the situation.

Lesson learned to not ever rent a bike from that guy again. I'm sure there will be a few Chiang Mai members sending you PMs for details of where shop that is.

[anto]

To those knowalls who said that the Bike renter must be covered with insurance .Quess what ? ,no insurance for rental bike theft is advailable in Thailand .

[puukao]

Your gut feeling is likely correct. They definitely made money off you, and that's a shame. I'm glad you told your story, and sorry for the money "stolen" from you. No question the whole thing is shady. Of course you should not have left the bike overnight, and you learned that lesson. They took advantage of you, and I'm sure next time you will be more careful. Good thing you didn't rent a jet ski......

[mrkapom]

Yeah, the more I think about it, the more I'm sure it was a scam. They "found" that bike waaaay too quickly, in such a random place.... just in some field by a shack.... yeah, right. I still think I got my passport back relatively cheaply, I had nothing that could prove anything and the cops weren't going to bother about it too much....

[wantan]

It was an old Wave, not a Ducati. What do you think a "thief" would have done with such old crap. Guess it was taken by some neighbours kids to have a fun ride, take a few things and than throw it into the next ditch. All that stupid story for a 6000 Baht scam? Maybe, but my guess is not...

[KRS1]

I know a bar girl that tracked her own stole motorcycle down, if you grow up here you know who the thugs are.

informants are all over the place as well as voluntary deputies.

[mrkapom]

Yeah, I dunno what really happened. But everyone I've told about it seems convinced it was a scam. A lot of little details don't add up. I think the guy maybe got nervous when he realized I wasn't a tourist who was just going to pay up so I could get on my plane, and that I was gonna go to the police. Then he may have figured it was better to cut his losses and get what he could.

What would a thief have done with an old wave? Well, that's kind of the point, isn't it? You see old bikes on the street all the time, there's not much of a chance they're gonna get stolen cuz they're not worth much. But if the thief was actually the owner who was holding my passport and could get 30,000 baht out of me to replace the "missing" bike, then an old wave might indeed go missing.

I'm done with this whole thing now. Hope this story was useful to someone.