BHPian Amek recently shared this with other enthusiasts: Hello Bhpians, this is my second post here, on the forum, and it’s kind of an unfortunate post, which I’m writing so that it may help other bikers in this forum who may face a similar issue in the future. I was gifted a beautiful Carnival Red Scrambler 400x on my birthday by my parents after asking them for a bike. I chose this bike after going on a casual test ride and being impressed by the sheer performance that both the bikes (Speed 400 and Scrambler 400x) offered and eventually settled on the Scrambler, as it complemented my tall personality (6’0 or 182 cm) perfectly. The bike was test ridden and purchased at RETRO TRIUMPH Himayathnagar, and there’s nothing to complain about regarding the purchase experience; indeed, it was really a good experience. Here are few images of the bike: randomly picked out from one of the photoshoots of the bike. just after completion of the first service. I’ve ridden many bikes before, but all those were from the commuter segment or less than 200 cc, and the biggest bike (by cc) I’d ridden properly till that point was my friend’s Bullet 350 and a few multi-cylinder bikes here and there (if they count). So, I was still an amateur 19-year-old coming to the field who chose such a powerful machine for our roads so early on in their biking career. As the reviews suggest here and online, the bike is simply lovely to ride both on and off road, but I, still being a young college-goer, predominantly used this bike to commute to my college, which is roughly a 30km round trip, but it itself is an adventure, as the route is, to simply put it, in a pretty suboptimal stage with pothole-filled roads and too much traffic to handle, and I guess it itself is an obstacle course with special effects of dust flying here and there. Just one day, after the start of a new semester on 7th March 2025, I was just casually cruising down the under-construction road on my way to college. The road was under construction, but it was wide enough, so I was cruising at around 45-55 km/h in 5th gear. I was wearing no gear because it was the beginning of a hot summer, and I was under the impression that who would wear bulky riding gear in the city, but I didn’t know at the time that it would bite me back pretty hard. I encountered one of our college buses in front of me and was getting ready to overtake it. I dropped a gear and gave the bike some beans and successfully overtook the bus, or that’s what I thought at that moment. Just after overtaking, while I was coming back into my position in front of the bus, there was a huge rock roughly 15-20 cm in diameter in the middle of the road waiting for a victim, and unfortunately, I was the victim here and was in such a position that I couldn’t react properly as it happened so quickly, and I just overtook a bus on such powerful machinery. I unfortunately rode my bike over that rock, which made my bike’s front end unstable, and the handle shook uncontrollably, and I, being an inexperienced rider, couldn’t save myself and fell down from the bike. Fortunately, the bystanders rushed to help me up, and I thank the bus driver for stopping at the right time, as the distance between me falling and the bus was around 15m. Apparently, the crash looked pretty ugly because I rolled over 2-3 times before coming to a stop, as I was told by my good friend who was travelling in the bus in front of which I fell. I ended up with a big road rash on my right knee, a smaller one on my right palm, and a sprained right toe. The bike didn’t want to be left out – it fell on its right side too. It had a scuffed-up exhaust and engine guard, a bent handlebar, a bent brake lever, and a broken knuckle guard. It’s like we both took a hit on the same side, just to keep things even. I went to a primary health centre nearby, got first aid, straightened the handlebar as best as I could using a nearby tree’s help and rode back home with a scuffed body, bike and a lesson to never ignore your riding gear at all times. The only good thing that day was at least I didn’t get to attend college. Now comes the main part: I want to give everyone reading this post a heads-up that all the insurance work was taken care of by my dad, as I was busy recovering and was caught up with my college stuff. So, it’s not only my experience being mentioned, but it includes my dad’s experience as well. I was not in a position to take my bike to the service centre, and none in my family, including my dad, could ride the bike, as they were simply not tall enough or weren’t in proper shape to handle such a tall and hefty bike. So, it was stowed away as I recovered. Once I made a full recovery and was ready to ride the bike again, we contacted the service centre, and they gave us a toll-free number of our insurance provider. The bike was insured with ICICI LOMBARD insurance. We promptly called the toll-free number given and informed them about the crash and let them know that we wanted to claim. We were quickly assigned a claims manager and were told by him to hand over the bike at the service centre within 24 hours. I was surprised by this fact, as this was both my dad’s and my first time claiming insurance for a bike. I would love others to give more insight on this. As directed by the manager, I rode my bike to the service centre (RETRO TRIUMPH Himayathnagar). When I went to the service centre, there was no one on the help desk, and I couldn’t find anyone in my sight as well. After a few calls, a person approached me and told me that they were all in the service bay looking at another bike. He brought out a form and jotted down all the details of me and the bike. He then proceeded to look for damages on the bike and wrote them down on the same form. Then he said I could leave, and I proceeded to leave the service centre with a sad face. Bike at the service centre with a damaged right side. Here comes the bizarre part. The bike was handed over on a Saturday, and the next 3-4 days were continuous holidays, with Ugadi (Telugu New Year) and Ramzan all coming together at once. We were promised that once the inspection takes place and parts which needed to be replaced are finalised by the service centre, the repair work would start. But it being a holiday week with few bank holidays, the inspection took place 4-5 days after the bike was initially handed over.I did not understand the point of asking us to bring the bike as soon as the call was made just for it to sit in the service centre without any action when it was in perfectly rideable condition. After all this, the pre-repair inspection had been completed, and the claim was approved (80% only, as the claim was made a few weeks after the crash). A parts list was finalised by the service centre, and we were informed that the front right fork needs to be replaced, as it had been bent in the crash, and we asked them to go ahead with the repair job. Then comes the juicy part: the bike was dropped off at the service centre on 29th March, and I received the bike on 3rd May. The service centre held onto my bike for approximately 30 days, with the bike getting dropped off and handed over to me after repairs. Once the insurance was approved, which was around 1 week after the bike was dropped off at the service centre, the people at Triumph quickly gathered parts which they had available and ordered the parts which were not available. The technician said they will start working on the bike as soon as all the parts are available. Since they did not have a few items with them in stock, the bike was just left stranded without any work for around 2 weeks. It went to a point where my dad visited the service centre in person to know about the updates on the repair job. Then there was another issue with the technician, as the one assigned to us was taking 10 days’ leave and told us he would share the details of the other assigned technician in 24 hours but failed to do so. We called the service centre explaining our grievance, and they promptly gave us the contact details of the new technician. When we confronted the new technician about the delay in repair, he told us the reason for the delay was the handlebar not being available and that it was ordered and assured us that the repairs will start once the part is received. A few days after the aforementioned confrontation, we called up the technician for updates and were informed that the repair was underway. At this point they have had the bike for around 25 days. On 30th April we got a call from our technician informing us that all the repairs on the bike have been done and only the engine guard was not available and they have ordered it, but it was backordered and they were not sure if it would get delivered or not. Our tech asked us a couple of days so that he can try to source the part from other sources. We reluctantly agreed, and unfortunately, he was not able to procure the part. Since it was just a minor scratch, we did not go ahead with the replacement of the engine guard, as we just wanted my bike back as soon as possible. As the 1st of May was a holiday, and it took one more day for the insurance to complete a post-repair inspection, and on the 3rd of May I finally received my bike back. All the right side excluding the panels of the bike were replaced, including the brake lever, knuckle guard, brake pedal, both footpegs, and the exhaust with brand new ones. The repair work was up to standard, and there were no complaints regarding it, but I still feel like the handlebar is slightly off even though the bike tracks pretty well. The total bill was around 27k, out of which around 6.5k was taken out of my dad’s pocket. I’ve included the screenshots of the invoice below so that others can refer to it. To conclude, we had a really rocky experience as a whole, with the wait times being very long and the bike just sitting around without any repair work. But this rocky experience did not end that way, as the quality of repairs was up to standard and without too many niggles. I was just glad I got my bike back just how she was when I brought it, without any scuffs and broken parts. I hope everyone who has read till the end found this experience valuable, and if for any reason you will have to deal with the same or a similar system, you know what to expect instead of being clueless like me. I just want everyone to ride safe and wear riding gear at all times and not be like Amek77. Cheers to everyone, and happy riding to all……. –Amek Signing off– Check out BHPian comments for more insights and information.
