A Harley Rider is Born!

[Da-Bubble]

Ok I have to share a funny story with everyone. In case you can't figure out the hint in my profile, I am a licensed agent for State Farm Insurance. I have to share about a recent unique client I have acquired....

This young man that has been coming into my office off and on for 6 months, finally takes out a policy on a big nice F-150 a couple of weeks ago. When I say young I mean about 19 yrs old fresh outta high school. Well I get a call this Saturday from this kid wanting to file a claim. Now this is a bad sign since his policy has barely issued and he's already reporting a loss but it get's worse. He's calling me from the local Harley dealership where he's just become the proud owner of a 2008 Sportster 1200. The problem is the genious has never....I repeat NEVER been on a bike before! So guess what....he gets on his new Harley, fires it up, lets out the clutch and proceeds to lay it over....but wait there's more! In the process of going down, he takes out another brand new 2008 HD still owned by the dealership and a 1955 HD Panhead owned by a not too happy biker. Now this kid is a little goat-roper (that's cowboy for you dang foreigners) that probably weighs 120lbs soaking wet. Needles to say when he was on the phone with me he had to send the salesman outside to get the other owners information so he wouldn't get his ass kicked!

When I was on the phone with him I asked him if he'd ever ridden before and he said no. I said, "You know you're a dumbass right?" to which he replied "yeah". Now I'm pretty sure my comment goes against State Farm customer service standards, but I was so appalled that I couldn't refrain!

I just had to laugh at the stupidity of the whole situation and thought I'd share it with everyone.

See ya,
Scott

[prometheus578]

"I saw that once..."

We told him to take the safety course and pick up his bike the next week.
We told him a lot of things.
I rolled the bike outside and then closed the big door... shaking my head.
Five minutes later... he walks in the little door.
Brand new Triumph... he got ten feet and dumped it.
Oh, and this will warm your heart, Da-Bubble... he hadn't insured it yet.

[dpotter58]

Yep

I bougt a parts bike from a yard over in Virginia and there was a brand new zip splat laying there with no front end and less than a mile on the odometer. Some kid bought it, fired it up in the parking lot, took off and hit a curb so hard he broke the front end right off...

[planedick]

Policy

Well, did you sell him a policy for the bike before he crashed it? Or did you tell him "tough s**t"?

[DJinNH]

We use to watch this "Richie Rich" guy in the Bahamas who owned a 65' Hatteras sportfish boat.

He had a captain working for him but he liked to dock the boat himself. CRASH!

The poor captain would be out there repairing the damage while the owner went off to play golf.

Just because you can own something doesn't mean you can run it.

Don

[prometheus578]

Sold a guy a crotch rocket and by the end of the week it was back in for a crash estimate.
"I got hit from behind at a stop light."
It was evident from the scratched/abraded plastic and metal that he was impressing his buddies by doing wheelies and flipped it over on himself.

[Paintman]

Dummies on new bikes

When i was working for honda we had a guy come in and pay cash for a new gold wing said hes been riding for yrs. he picked up his stuff got on his bike and went full bore into a row of brand new bikes outside lOL gotta love people like that.

[Da-Bubble]

Re: Policy

Originally posted by planedick
Well, did you sell him a policy for the bike before he crashed it? Or did you tell him "tough s**t"?

Well that's where I messed up. You see, when you have an existing auto policy you are extended full coverage for 5 days after the purchase of a new car. So when he called, even though I didn't want to, I told him he had coverage because of his existing policy. Yesterday I got a call from claims asking if I'd told him that and I said yes. They said that that policy does not extend to motorcycles since it's a different type of policy and you must have a license to operate them. I felt bad for telling him that but claims said no matter what I'd told him he would not have had coverage. Since he did not call and ask me first if he were covered, he did not "depend on my statement to his detriment". In other words, if he'd called me first and I told him wrong we would have covered it. But because he called and reported the claim at the same time as reporting the vehicle purchase there was no coverage in force.

I chose to let claims break the news to him since that's their job. I'm sure he will try to fight it. On one hand I feel bad, but on the other hand I don't because he's such an idiot. I hope the owner of the '55 doesn't kill the kid when he hears that news.

[Dsxs11]

I saw something like this a few years back. I was in the dealer picking up my new Ducati.
Another salesman had closed a deal on a ninja paperwork done bike pulled around, proud new owner decked out in leathers and matching helmet.
He ripped it out of the parking lot onto a busy 8 lane front wheel in the air hits the back of a car then into oncoming traffic. Then dead 75 feet from the dealer.

[Guy_b_g]

When I lived in Hinesville GA, I used to be a corner worker for WERA (Western Eastern Racing Association) at the local track (Roabling Road racetrack).

There was a guy named McGrath (not Jeremy) who raced and worked for the Savannah Kawasaki dealership just down the road from Hunter Army Airfield. There was a Ranger Battalion there.

He (McGrath) used to tell me stories about the adrenalin junkies from the Rangers that'd come in and have to have the fastest bike in the shop. He'd try to convince them to get something smaller to start out on, but they almost never would listen. He said about 1 in 3 wouldn't even make it out of the parking lot without a collision with some immoveable object.

Young or old...you better be thinking ahead when you light the wick on a modern sportbike (things are gonna happen FAST). In the words of a bike magazine writer in a literbike review "does not suffer fools, and will hammer the unwary into the ground like a cheap nail."

I remember well the awsome feeling of freedom and power my fist ride on my first bike (a 125cc Rickman) gave me...for about 3 seconds before I dumped it!

Imagine what goes thru the head of a newbie on a 160hp sportbike (who could be doing 60 in 3 seconds when he dumps it!).

Interesting thing about the guy Mcgrath, he loved to race and was the local terror in the superbike class, but he refused to own a streetbike or ride on the street..."too damn dangerous!" speaking of racing... "here at least we have an ambulance handy, there's plenty of runoff with no hard objects, and everyone's going the same direction"

You have to love street riding, and at the same time be aware that what we do IS fraught with risk, and accept it.

Guy

[AlanB]

Hi Guys,

During my last two years of school, ('79/80) I worked part-time in a local Yam dealer. The big thing was the RD250/400s..... we sold tons of 'em, mainly to the under 20 age group.

To give the kids some chance of surviving, we used to tell 'em that we wouldn't touch warranty work on bikes which were not run in for 1000 miles, and told 'em that because it was a small community, we would hear of the bikes being misused...... The plan was that if they stayed off the throttle for the first month or so, they would learn to fall off less!

However, the plan was not perfect. One week we had three bikes sitting side by side in the workshop, all with the front-end folded right back. Mileages were 1000.4, 1000.7 and 1001.3......LOL LOL.

We only had a small parts store, so one weekend I went to the city for something for my bike..... The parts counter had a 20-minute queue. kid at the front bought a set of cafe-racer bars (ace bars?... Clubman bars?.... dunno how that translates?) as I joined the back of the line.

He fitted them outside the shop, and drove off at great speed, nose down between the clocks. He had re-joined the back of the line to buy a front wheel, tyre and guard before I got to the counter......LOL!

AlanB