The bouncing cheque
Never sign over your motorbike until a cheque has cleared. If a buyer wants your bike and you agree to take payment by cheque, ensure that the cheque has been received and has cleared before the buyer comes to collect the bike. The buyer might protests and claim you’ll run-off with his money, but if you’re selling the bike from the bike’s registered address, the chance of you doing a runner are minimal, so the buyer shouldn’t have a problem with it.
The last minute address change
A buyer may sound legitimate and on the day they’re due to come and see the bike, they might call you and claim they’re struggling to get to your address. They might ask to meet you at a train station, petrol station or another location that ‘appears’ safe. However, some bikers have had their bikes stolen from these locations. An example of this is the ‘buyer’ arrives at the new location in advance, they see you arrive and keep you waiting – perhaps you nip inside to grab a coffee or use the toilet and it’s then that they have an opportunity to lift your bike into their van.
The log book (V5) forgers
Some people posing as buyers will ask to see your V5, perhaps they want a scan or if they visit you in person, they might ask if they can take a photo. Be cautious. Thieves look to clone motorbikes in order to sell them.
What happens in a thief steals a motorbike or buys one they know is stolen. They then find a similar motorbike and get in touch with the seller. They’ll look to copy the bike’s registration plate and back this up with a ‘logbook’ which is actually a copy of your log book.
They’ll then try and sell the bike to an unassuming buyer and disappear. The result is, the buyer is riding around on a bike that’s pretending to be yours. They’ll struggle to register it in their name and in the meantime they might run up tickets and fines that come your way as the genuine keeper.
The stakeout
Selling your nice motorbike? Someone might want it but not want to pay for it.
Thieves have been known to visit your address posing as a seller, just to scope out where you keep your motorcycle or scooter and what your security is like.
They might have eyes on stealing your pride and joy, so be careful during the vetting process – ask the buyer for their landline number when you’re on the phone to them, arranging a viewing. If they only give you a mobile, you might reasonably be suspicious. If they email you, have a look at the email address – is it using a name or a random email? Sure, it takes 5 minutes to register a legitimate looking email address but it’s still worth checking.
This is a hard issue to deal with but it goes without saying – never put your full address in your advert, never give your full address out to anyone without getting some information from them first.
Sites like eBay and Gumtree make it really simple for a scammer to narrow down bikes by postcode, enabling them to build up data on where valuable bikes are being kept.
You’re well within your rights to ask for the buyer’s email and tell them you’ll email them all the info they need. Then after the call, you can email them asking to see their driving licence – they should be able to supply this without hesitation. It won’t be bullet-proof but this alone should ward off any chancers.
The test ride swap
We all know you should never allow anyone to test ride your motorcycle without putting the full asking price in cash in your hand first so you might think you’ll never fall victim to this scam.
However, in the heat of the moment it’s easy to let your guard down.
The test ride scam can hit you in various ways, two common examples below:
- The buyer might not have cash but will offer to leave their bike as a deposit. The bike they leave might appear to be fairly valuable but it may also be stolen. The result is, the thief has swapped a stolen bike for a more valuable stolen bike. One nil to the thief.
- The thief ‘doesn’t have all the money’ with them but they’re happy to leave £500 and ‘their wallet’ behind. The wallet might not contain any of their personal info and the £500 is nothing compared to to £7,000 motorbike you just gave them the keys to.
Third-party agents
You get a call from someone claiming to be a car broker – they can send over the details of a buyer who’s interested in your exact bike. However, they charge a fee, just a small one and you’ll need to pay upfront. They’ll send you an email directing you to a money transfer website where you can make the payment.
We don’t need to tell you that if you make the payment, you’ll never hear from the ‘interested buyer’ and you’ll never hear from the original caller either.
International scams
International scams are more common. Sometimes fraudsters pose as buyers who are buying up bikes in bulk to fill a container. They’re ‘picking another bike up from a seller near to you’ in the next day or so and they’d like to know if you will sell yours to them, unseen. It sounds too good to be true.
The seller will promise to pay you in full but will negotiate with you and ask you to pay the van driver who’s coming to pick up the bike as if they pay two transactions it will be expensive for them.
You wire the money to the van driver, knowing the full payment is on its way and guess what? That’s the last time you’ll see that money and obviously, you’ll never see the van driver..
The unreliable motorbike
You sell your bike to a really nice buyer, who counts the cash out in front of you. The deal goes through smoothly – sorted. You wonder why you ever worried about being scammed in the first place.
However, you never wrote a receipt.
The buyer knows this and tries to contact you days, weeks or months later, complaining of all sorts of issues on the bike. Issues you just know can’t be true. You might be able to put them in their place but it’s not unheard of for buyers to pressure the seller into giving them a partial refund or agreeing to replace ‘worn’ parts or cover servicing costs.
They might get abusive on the phone, threaten to take you to court or threaten you physically. It’s all grief you don’t need.
Write a receipt stating your bike was ‘sold as seen, no warranty given or imlpied’ with the full price paid, date and name of both parties then, get both parties to sign it. Take a photo of the seller next to their new pride and joy and you’ll be in a much more secure position to stop any chancers trying it on.
The buyer and their expert mate
It has been known for a buyer to turn up with their mate, who happens to be an expert – perhaps they’re a motorcycle mechanic. The buyer wants the bike but their ‘expert’ mate walks around it, picking up all the faults and telling you both about the amount of work needed to get the motorbike into a reliable condition.
Both the ‘buyer’ and their ‘mate’ are just looking to pressure you to knock you down on price. They might end up with you agreeing to the bits on the bike that are ‘loose’, ‘corroded’ or not original and in the heat of the moment, they strong-arm you into selling your bike for far less than it’s worth.
Stand firm.
Top tips to avoid being scammed
- Accurately describe your motorbike, so there’s no room for scammers and chancers to beat you down on price.
- Don’t leave your bike on the drive on the day of sale to mark out your house for the buyer – you’re asking for it to be stolen
- Be very skeptical of anyone who wants to buy the bike without seeing it
- Wait for any money to clear before parting with your motorbike or scooter
- Check out the email address you’re corresponding with and don’t trust any email receipts for money transfers – instead make sure the money is in your bank account first.
- Check out the buyer’s details in Google – can you find their name, number and address?
- Don’t let a buyer test ride a bike without the full asking price as a deposit. The motorbike needs to come back to you in exactly the condition it left.
