Days after the YouTuber Baiju N Nair exposed the Skoda Slavia scam, many have again started talking about how ‘Ducaman’ got scammed by VST Ducati, the famed manufacturer’s Bengaluru and Chennai dealer. Unsurprisingly enough, Baiju has now covered the Ducaman issue in a new video. In the video, Joe, also known as the Ducaman, explains how he got scammed by the dealer and how the brand has been dealing with it so far.
Joe has been a fan of the celebrated Italian superbike brand for years. He has over the years, owned a few of their models like the 959 Panigale and the Desert Sled. He started the YouTube channel ‘The Ducaman‘ when he still owned the 959. At some point in time, he wanted to trade-off his Scrambler Desert Sled for a Panigale V4.
Hailing from Kerala and working in Bengaluru at that time, Joe first went to EVM Ducati Kochi to enquire about the superbike. He had by then sold the Desert Sled. Ducati Kochi, however, did not have enough inventory to fulfill this order back then- says the video.
He thus, turned to VST Ducati- the dealer for both Bengaluru and Chennai regions. The dealer confirmed available stock and also offered a significant price cut citing that the bike to be an yester year model. The Panigale V4 Standard which had an ex-showroom price of 26. 5 lakh was being offered for around 18 lakh. You’d find this to be fishy unless you are someone blindly in love with the motorcycle and an extreme aspirant like Joe.
He agreed to grab the deal and made the payment, and was further assured by many that there shouldn’t be a reason to worry about as the purchase was being made through a Ducati dealership, and not a third party. Considering the payment breakdown- 8 lakhs were paid in down payment (fetched by the sale of the Desert Sled) and the remaining 10 lakh came from a personal loan (the interest of which is still being paid by the man). He even received an email confirmation of the receipt of pay.
Soon, the dealership gave Joe a tour and PDI opportunity of the motorcycle, when he clicked pictures of the same. VST reportedly told him later that the particular batch had some issues and the same were causing a delay in delivery.
They said that they could give him a V4S (with Ohlins suspension and multiple other upgrades) for 21 lakh rupees ( a Rs 3 lakh premium over the previous bike’s price). The fresh price of the vehicle back then was more than 30 lakh. (In 2024, a new V4S costs around 40 lakh!)
So why the cut? The dealer told him that the vehicle had a slightly disappointing history as it had issues with its ECU and BBS (Black Box) from the factory which Ducati chose to replace free of cost before delivery. Plus they wanted to appreciate his love for the brand.
The Ducaman later did a delivery video featuring his new buy but could never take it home. The dealer demanded more time before they could commence the actual delivery, as registration would take more time to complete.
In May 2023, he was informed by the dealer that the registration was completed and the Ducaman rushed to the dealer in no time. He was however, informed that the vehicle developed some electrical issues the previous day and could not be delivered.
They further assured him to do a replacement in a few days. They even showed him the replacement. He did the PDI of the replacement bike as well- and this happens after around 1 year. All the while, he has also been paying around 50,000 rupees in interest of the personal loan.
In a few weeks time, Ducaman was informed by one of his friends that Sri Rakesh, the head of operations, was sacked for performing high-stake scams. After collecting payment from customers like Joe, Rakesh sold the inventory to other people. He was accused of selling 21 Ducati motorcycles without the knowledge of the company.
This essentially means that the only sum that Ducati India (read VST Ducati) received from him was the additional 3 lakh that he paid for upgrading to V4S.
The Ducaman tried to reach out to the manufacturer, but had no noticeable response. He then took the issue to social media. His video explaining the scam went viral, but all it could do was to get Ducati call his content as ‘Malicious content’. They called both parties for an amicable settlement. Things did not get sorted and Joe soon filed a lawsuit against the dealer and the brand, which is ongoing as we speak…
More About The Ducati Scam
Sri Rakesh was booked by the cops for scamming customers of around 5.1 crores, in December 2023. 10 superbikes were seized in the process. He was accused of selling Ducati motorcycles without the know-how of the brand and scamming buyers of their money.
He performed these off-the-record sales in the period between June 2019 and September 2023, by offering lucrative discounts and benefits to buyers and collecting funds from them via the bank account of a company named ‘Office Speciality Supplies’. This was later found unrelated to VST and Sons and unofficially operated by Rakesh through associates. This incident could also be seen as proof of rising superbike smuggling and automotive frauds in cities like Bengaluru. We have talked about this in detail in a previous article.