So here’s the latest update on the bikes being stolen ordeal. Yesterday Milt & I took all the paper work over to Phil, our State Farm agent, so he could witness our signatures on the thief claims. Had to hand over our keys which is a real bummer of a feeling and not one that I particularly enjoyed.

At first Phil was very non-commital about how SF would or would not be handling the claims. He didn’t know how much they’d offer, what the claim agent’s work load was like, how fast they’d sort this whole mess out, etc. Basically he didn’t seem to know a whole lot of anything.

Obviously the conversation is not getting anywhere, although it’s very civil. At which point Milt says ‘we know a lawyer who’s part of the Ducati community and handles insurance claims all the time’. Well folks, you’ve never seen an insurance agent run faster to backtrack. Suddenly the mere threat of a lawyer getting involved seemed to change the whole dynamic. Phil quickly points out that he thinks that the claims agent shouldn’t have a really hard time taking care of this and “making us whole again”. Further more he tells us that instead of bring in a lawyer if the inital offer is low, to let him talk to the claims adjuster first on our behalf. He then repeatedly suggests through out the rest of the conversation that bringing in a lawyer might not be in our best interests and he’d be more than happy to help look out for us in the SF system.

Now in all honesty this sounds like a lot of BS to me since it was the mere mention of bringing in a lawyer that got him on his heels in the first place. And I also know that what Phil thinks is a really insignificant compared to what the claims adjusters offer, but yesterday was the first day that seemed like a start in the right direction.

In direct opposition to SF and it’s bureaucracy, the police seem to be completely on top of their game. The Sherif’s office left a message today wanting to make sure that I knew where the remnants of my bike were being stored and to make sure that I knew that they had it. I have no doubt that they have as much paperwork going around their offices as SF, but it’s nice that somebody is acting like this might matter to me…