Hey Steve,
You make 6 really great points, which I can't argue with. The whole campaign seemed a little suspicious to me, as well . . . although I did search and found no indications or suggestions it was a scam (apart from your points above). What did strike me was that they had incorporated a lot of the thoughts and fixes I had regarding other scooters (e.g., EcoReco) into the Vomo. Price aside, it seems like a very good design. It would be a shame if the whole thing turns out to be a scam, because the design appears to be the perfect blend of function and minimalist.
I will agree that each of the points you make above does make it somewhat suspect. However, I paid with American Express and they've never failed me when there was a question of fraud. If we don't see Vomo scooters shipping out with ~45 days of my payment I will file a chargeback and [hopefully] get my money back. We'll see... On the other hand, looking carefully at the photos of racks of scooter frames, it does appear as though there is at least some form of manufacturing going on. [Edit: the other photos of the various parts and pieces also make me feel much more comfortable that this may be going forward as hoped.]
According to a Veetron press release (
http://www.pr.com/press-release/624638) the name and address of its contact is a "John Murphy, +85294548211"
Hi platbr,
I agree, the VOMO does look like the perfect scooter. They took the minor imperfections of the Ecoreco and solved for most of them. It does look like a very good design, but I’m still plenty skeptical about the price. I still can’t make the numbers add up to anything where Veetron makes any money on this. Their “too good to be true” price is still my biggest concern. That, and the anonymity of the company. I just don’t understand why a legit company wouldn’t post at least SOME information about who and what they are. That still strikes me as bizarre.
As for Amex, you’re correct that they tend to be very good about refunding on fraud. The problem is, with VOMO – and Indeigogo in general – you aren’t technically buying anything, and you aren’t guaranteed to get anything. What you’re really doing is making a contribution, with the HOPE that you get something. Both Indiegogo’s terms of service and VOMO’s campaign explicitly state this. So if it turns out that nothing is shipped, it’s hard to argue to Amex that you didn’t get what you paid for. Because again, you didn’t technically pay for anything. You instead made a contribution with no guarantee of getting a product.
If nothing ever ships I suppose you could argue with Amex that the whole thing was a fraud, but proving that would be very difficult. Veetron’s owner could simply say “Things didn’t work out like I had planned”, and take off with the money. How is anyone going to actually PROVE that the whole thing was a fraud, without investing massive amounts of time and money? They can’t. And that’s the beauty of scams like this: it’s almost too easy to pull off without fear of any real consequences. This is why, as I said in my first post, it’s important to know who you’re dealing with. That person or company’s reputation is really all you have to go on.
As for the photos, I have two comments. First, those photos don’t suggest to me that anything is going to be shipping in August. There is still a lot of work to do on those parts. And when/if the scooters do ship, they still have to go through customs both in the origination and destination countries. And that’s after a two-week boat ride. So if these scooters haven’t shipped by now, I doubt anyone will see one until late September at the earliest.
Second, we are PRESUMING those parts are actually Vomo scooter parts. Really, they could be photos of any of a number of other scooters. The guy behind this could have simply snapped a bunch of photos when he toured the factory, only to strategically post those photos in such a sequence to make it look like progress is being made. You might think, “That seems like an awful lot of work to scam people”. But really it’s not. Especially when you have close to ¼ million dollars at stake. I would like to see photos (that aren’t Photoshopped) of dozens of FINISHED Vomo scooters. It’s now August 25, and to the best of my knowledge nobody has seen anything except for two prototypes.
Pretty soon people are going to start asking “Where is my scooter” questions. I sorta expect the next Indiegogo update to say something like “We are a little behind schedule on the August scooters, blah blah blah…”. If this is indeed a fraud (and yes, I still think it probably is), the person behind Veetron is going to try to ride this out as long as he can, until one day he just up and disappears. Any updates will be encouraging, but they will all ultimately be part of the larger fraud.
Honestly, I’m surprised so many people have contributed to the campaign when they have no idea who the person or company is. I wonder if this just didn’t occur to these people, or if they’re simply a lot more trusting than me. I suspect they saw the scooter, thought “I need one of these!”, and didn’t do much due diligence before plunking down their money. That, and they probably believe that Indigogo is safer than it actually is. Unfortunately I think a lot of people are going to learn an expensive lesson here.
As I wrote above, I very, very much hope I’m wrong about all of this! And I say that sincerely. This is one of those rare occasions where I would LOVE to be proven wrong. It’s a cool scooter, and I would like to buy one myself. Even at $650 it would be a bargain compared to what’s currently on the market. But after adding up all the things that don’t make sense to me, as I did in my first post above, I still have a very hard time believing this campaign is legit. There are too many red flags I can’t look past.
