So... My last bike was a Suzuki 1500 Intruder. Started weeping oil from the front cylinder head gasket. A little more involved than I was comfortable with; the dealer wanted $1000, so I took it to a shop that I'd been dealing with, with good results, for a few years. He quoted my $550. At the time I was doing some writing and photos for a local motorcycle mag and the publisher offered the shop a trade deal: the shop got a couple grand worth of advertising, plus a feature article, I did about $800 worth of work for the mag (but $0 out of pocket) and the shop would do the repair.
I realized that since it wasn't a cash transaction, it wouldn't be top priority and I was fine with that. Until it sat for month after month after month. Finallly I started getting firm with them and they started in on it. Told me it would be done in a week. I show up on the appointed day and it's still on the rack. The shop owner told me that the guys had gotten the timing off when they put it back together and the motor seized when they tried to start it. So... it got torn apart again and there it sat again, for months.
I finally started looking into legal remedies and went by the shop to give them an ultimatum, only to find it boarded up. A couple weeks later I rode by and saw people coming and going, so I pulled around the corner and called the shop. A woman answered so I asked for the owner. "He's not available." "What does 'not available' mean?" "It means he's not available." I told her (turned out to be the owner's estranged wife) what the circumstances were and asked what she wanted to do. She told me that they were having everyone come pick up their bikes. Since mine was in pieces, I had no means or intention of taking a basket case home. So we left it there.
I went home and started calling around and found out that the owner was in jail on $70K bond. He was involved in some really unsavory stuff that I will spare you the details about, but suffice to say he wasn't going to be looking at sunlight that wasn't striped for a good long while.
I had absolutely no qualms about adding to his problems by filing a stolen vehicle report and making a total loss insurance claim. Markel took good care of me.
