
How I Got my $3500 Camera Kit Stolen on KitSplit - danielfoster
https://medium.com/@yohahnko/how-i-got-my-3500-camera-kit-stolen-on-kitsplit-for-70-4530d0062e60
======
rkagerer
Band together with your new friend to take both parties to small claims court.

Argue the representations made on their website were misleading and induced
you into using the service. That due to the unequal bargaining power, any
ambiguities in their Terms must be resolved in your favor. Research precedent,
including anything judges have said about click-wrap vs browse-wrap agreements
in your jurisdiction.

Maybe you can find a sympathetic lawyer from a prestigious firm who's willing
to write them on your behalf on their firm's letterhead. All this might simply
scare them into settling - it's far cheaper for them than paying a lawyer to
litigate (and less toxic publicity), and eliminates the risk that if you
manage to win (small-claims is a bit more unpredictable than big-boy court) it
sets a precedent that could come back and bite their business model.

~~~
lisbethkaufman
Hi, Lisbeth Kaufman here (CoFounder and CEO of KitSplit). I feel terribly for
Yohahn and the other owner who had their gear stolen. I wanted to personally
respond to let you know that we are fixing this and making them whole- and
then some.

We are launching a new insurance product for our owners: the KitSplit Theft
Protection Owner Guarantee. It’s something we’ve been considering for a while,
and with this latest theft it’s clearly time.

The Owner Guarantee means that KitSplit owners will be covered in all
scenarios, whether damage, loss, or theft. To make good on this promise, we’re
starting by reimbursing the Yohahn and the other owner.

We are the first rental platform to offer coverage of this kind. It fills a
major insurance loophole, and it’s the right thing to do for our customers.

You are welcome to read more about the problem and how we’re fixing it here.
[https://blog.kitsplit.com/announcing-kitsplit-theft-
protecti...](https://blog.kitsplit.com/announcing-kitsplit-theft-protection-
owner-guarantee/)

~~~
keypusher
Did you start feeling terribly for them before or after you were publicly
shamed on social media?

~~~
dang
Personal attacks and the online shaming culture are not welcome on HN. Maybe
you don't owe better to the individual, but you owe better to this community
if you want to keep posting here.

If you'd please review
[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)
and use this site as intended, we'd be grateful.

~~~
ddalex
What's so personal about the very legitimate question?

~~~
dang
What makes it personal is the pronoun "you" in response to a person.

It's not a legitimate question, but plainly a rhetorical attack.

~~~
ddalex
I have trouble following your line of argument. One is not allowed to ask
questions using the pronoun "you" as in "How you are doing?"

And I don't see it as a rhetorical device, but effectively asking the question
"Why didn't you offer the right compensation prior to being publicly shamed?"
which IMHO is a very valid question for anybody dealing with the said company,
as the responses can vary from "We didn't understand the damage it would do us
and we want to contain it" to "We're seeing the errors in our approach and
we'll do better from now on".

Right now the response in somewhere in between these two, and clarification is
important.

------
iooi
So if KitSplit explicitly absolves itself from liability, what is the benefit
of that platform over Craigslist? At least with CL you wouldn't have to pay
KitSplit a fee.

Their fees certainly aren't going towards liability insurance or fraud
detection, so what are they doing with those fees?

I bet the fraud rate at KitSplit is going to go up after this post. Now you
have a list of people that will wake up at 7am to hand over $4k of gear to
you, knowing that KitSplit won't do anything and neither will law enforcement.
Just remember to cancel your credit card and you'll make a quick $2k!

In all seriousness, if KitSplit wanted to stop this just charge renters a
hefty deposit (the approximate cost of resell) and it should nip this in the
bud. Obviously, someone in their "Growth" team will point out that this will
hurt their KPIs and their VCs might not like it, so they won't do it.

~~~
Beefin
Yeah I was wondering why they don't enforce a deposit up front.

~~~
treis
The CC is likely stolen. Any deposit or replacement fee will be disputed by
the actual owner and charged back.

~~~
larkeith
This is not an excuse. A company making any effort to be legitimate should use
one of the several identity verification services available in combination
with any sort of nontrivial fraud detection, which should easily dissuade
99.9% of thieves. At 22% rental fees, the service can _easily_ afford to cover
theft that slips the net.

Given that KitSplit _doesn 't even disable the account of known thieves_, it
seems pretty clearly a case of malice (or, more accurately, greed, which in
this case has the same net effect), not incompetence.

~~~
londons_explore
> A company making any effort to be legitimate should use one of the several
> identity verification services available in combination with any sort of
> nontrivial fraud detection, which should easily dissuade 99.9% of thieves.

Not so. Thieves aren't stupid. They try a few times to figure out the system,
then steal the identity of someone else (who is legit and passes fraud and
credit checks) to do the actual theft.

The portability of the gear, combined with it's high resale value, means
rentals will never work for an online business.

~~~
larkeith
While this is certainly true for a few thieves, at least for other high-fraud
industries, it's a case of running away from a bear - you just have to be
harder to defraud then the other guy (in this case, other online
marketplaces). Additionally, it's both more difficult to obtain an identity
(particularly if locality is required to pass fraud checks) (whereas stolen
CCs can easily be purchased in bulk) and not necessarily sufficient - for
example, if the fraudster's contact number is verified against their identity,
it again increases the threshold.

If the thieves have access to a local, legit person's CC, identity, and phone,
then yes, you can't really stop them from stealing.

------
natrik
Still no compensation offer from the CEO/Co-founder Lisbeth Kaufman

[https://medium.com/p/4530d0062e60/responses/show](https://medium.com/p/4530d0062e60/responses/show)

[https://medium.com/@lisbethkaufman_82625/im-one-of-the-
cofou...](https://medium.com/@lisbethkaufman_82625/im-one-of-the-cofounders-
of-kitsplit-and-i-wanted-to-respond-to-this-personally-29aded237f7e)

She also claims their assessment of people signing up to KitSplit is
_effective at blocking 99.99% of bad actors and stopping millions of dollars
of theft on the platform_ , almost surely an exaggeration.

~~~
rhino369
>She also claims their assessment of people signing up to KitSplit is
effective at blocking 99.99% of bad actors and stopping millions of dollars of
theft on the platform, almost surely an exaggeration.

If this is true, they should easily be able to afford to self insure against
theft by charging 10 cents per thousand dollars of gear rented.

Odd that they don't do that huh.

~~~
usefulcat
That would be true if .01% of all rentals resulted in fraud, but that's not
what that sentence says. It could be the case that such "bad actors" represent
a disproportionately large share of all rentals.

Which makes sense--if you're planning on stealing the equipment, you'd
probably expect to have your account banned so you'd probably try to steal as
much as possible while the account is still considered legitimate. As in this
case where the author alleges that the same person also stole someone else's
gear on the same day.

~~~
danShumway
> It could be the case that such "bad actors" represent a disproportionately
> large share of all rentals.

If it's not representative of the actual risk KitSplit will face, then it's
also not representative of the actual risk users will face. And if it's not
representative of user risk, then it's deceptive for KitSplit to bring it up
as a way to defuse the situation or suggest that consumers shouldn't be
worried.

------
danShumway
Second time an article like this has surfaced in less than a year[0].

KitSplit claims that these scenarios are extremely rare. If that was the case,
I have no idea why they wouldn't include voluntary parting insurance in their
service. Is the bad press worth the occasional payout they'd need to do?

Why would I or anyone else ever use KitSplit after hearing a story like this?
Peace-of-mind is literally the most important feature of a service like this.
It is _the only thing_ that separates them from your local [insert-location-
here] Facebook rental group that just exchanges cash under the table.

[0]: [https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-k...](https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-kit-for-95-and-had-it-legally-stolen/) (HN discussion:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918))

~~~
gus_massa
Just to be clear, it's a similar case, not the same case.

It would be nice to compare the unpixellated photos of the thieves.

------
ArchReaper
This is pretty bad on KitSplit's part. How can they even advertise that the
owner is covered by a full deposit if the owner doesn't get compensated with
it upon theft?

That's blatant misleading advertising, hope this blows up on them.

~~~
jjoonathan
Even worse, it sounds like this is a standard practice in the insurance
industry.

Insurance always carries a steep moral hazard in the form of the temptation to
sell deceptive peace of mind, fooling their client into thinking they have
purchased insurance covering a scenario which the company has no intent of
actually covering. Few people will ever actually discover the deception, so
it's reliably profitable. I had not heard of the "voluntary parting is not
theft" schtick before today and in the absence of a prominent warning about
this distinction I would consider such an insurance sale fraudulent. Further,
I'd want a large punitive multiplier on the fines to account for the fact that
most of the time the deception will go undiscovered.

I strongly suspect our legal system would disagree, and I'd consider that an
even bigger problem.

~~~
speeder
Completely unrelated but... I had a issue with lightning instead.

We were paying some rather expensive home insurance, one time a thief broke
inside, and they did all they could to avoid paying us, ended paying the bare
mininum they could, barely covering the stolen goods costs.

Still at the time it didn't looked like bad faith, just fraud checking...

But then this time lightning hit our house, the insurance response was that
unless we can prove it was a direct strike against the house, it would count
as "electrical fault" that is not covered, because it would be blamed on the
electric company instead...

So we argued that yes, the lightning DID hit our house directly (because well,
it did, the path the electricity did was very obvious, with the endpoint being
the pointy metal end of the structure that holds our gate upright), they just
flat out refused to come check, because the likelihood of this happening was
so low that they were sure it was a waste of their time to check, and that we
should bother the electricity company...

The electricity company in turn, said they detected zero fluctuations on the
grid, and would not send a technician to check, that it wasn't their fault.

So that day I learned that "lightning coverage" only cover a strike on the
hourse itself... a strike on the lamp-post right outside for example, doesn't
count, even if it blows up everything inside your house, becase the "fault"
then is the electric company.

~~~
dclowd9901
Is there not law on the books that cover... gosh what's it called. When
something causes something else to happen in a direct way? I know in some
places, there's laws that say, "If Person A slams on their brakes for no
reason, and Person B has to slam on their brakes causing Person C to go off
road and hit a pole, person A could be at fault"?

~~~
lgeorget
I'm not a lawyer but I think it's the basis of civil law (I speak for France
specifically but it's kind of a general principle): any damage must be
repaired by the one who caused it, by action or lack thereof, voluntarily or
not.

Then of course, the difficult part is deciding who is at fault.

------
theturtletalks
The platform charged a 22% fee to allow this renting of equipment? Why charge
a fee if you're not actually going to cover the buyer or seller when your
marketplace messes up?

Also, just because you sign an illegal contract doesn't make that contract
valid. Many companies will try to tell you "well you accepted our terms when
signing up." Well those terms are not on legal grounds.

~~~
moate
>>Why charge a fee if you're not actually going to cover the buyer or seller
when your marketplace messes up?

I think we all know the answer here.

So many sites are just "hapless middle men who facilitate contact between
individuals who want to engage in <activity>" when someone commits
fraud/theft/terroristic threats/<crime> on their platform.

~~~
theturtletalks
I know what KitSplit will tell you. We provide value by connecting people and
allowing payments. Gee, I can give someone my number and accept cash on
Craigslist too. If I'm paying 22% of the transaction to you, there'd better be
some assurances.

~~~
nikanj
Oh no, not at all. Now that this story is on the front page of HN, KitSplit
will tell you it was all a big misunderstanding. They will pay for all of your
stolen gear, send you a T-shirt, and donate to a kitten orphanage.

The next person who gets their kit stolen is still fucked though, unless they
too manage to make it to the front page.

------
Jeremy1026
So basically, if I get a Fake ID (or just do some simple photoshop) I can
become a verified buyer on KitSplit. Add in a prepaid Visa card and I can
"buy" any camera/drone I want for $100?

Tech companies need to start to accept some liability for the problems they
are causing.

Edit: I have a verified fake name. Now I'm waiting to see if they accept my
photoshopped ID images.

Edit 2: I now also have a verified Government ID. Here is a screenshot of my
totally legit verified profile.
[https://i.imgur.com/dr61qN5.png](https://i.imgur.com/dr61qN5.png)

~~~
op12op12
But how did you get past their current "40-point risk assessment that includes
both machine learning and human review" /s

[https://medium.com/@lisbethkaufman_82625/im-one-of-the-
cofou...](https://medium.com/@lisbethkaufman_82625/im-one-of-the-cofounders-
of-kitsplit-and-i-wanted-to-respond-to-this-personally-29aded237f7e)

~~~
Jeremy1026
With a really poorly done photoshop of my ID to change my name and DOB to my
fake information, duh. How else would you defeat such stringent review
processes?

------
metabagel
Twisted road offers person-to-person motorcycle rental.

Their stolen bike FAQ says:

==========

What happens if the bike is stolen?

If a motorcycle that you rented through Twisted Road is stolen, please
immediately file a police report and cooperate fully with law enforcement,
Twisted Road, the motorcycle owner, and any other authorities related to the
investigation. If you are the owner, please immediately contact a Twisted Road
representative and follow his or her instructions. Owners should be prepared
to file a police report if instructed to do so. You will be able to provide
law enforcement with the driver’s license of the rider, the plates, and other
important information needed to locate and return your bike.

If you are concerned about having your bike stolen while it is being rented,
we encourage you to place a GPS tracker on your motorcycle before each rental.

==========

Basically, you are responsible if your motorcycle is stolen.

~~~
rtkwe
Which is really dumb. If you're whole company is based around being a middle
man between renters and owners your answer to the inevitable issue of theft by
renters had better be better than a giant shrug and "we'll keep trying to
charge this fraudster (who's definitely either using a stolen card or whole
identity)."

~~~
robocat
How do they protect themselves from thieves intending to steal from their
insurance? I.e. thief "lends" bike to themselves (fake account) and falsely
claims it was stolen? Clearly some risk (needs real identity, insurance
fraud), but clearly some gain too.

The only solution is to put up a bond of approximately the street value of a
similar stolen motorbike.

~~~
detaro
Is that different than somebody insuring their own car at an insurance company
and then pretending it was stolen?

~~~
chii
Insurance companies do a really good job if checking legitimate identities and
for fraud when it comes time to pay out.

------
daveslash
Am I the only one who is irritated with the typos, misspellings, and
grammatical errors in the KitSplit screenshots he shared? Things like _" When
renters rent your gear, they're also required to use a credit card which and
we use to secure payment processor that includes fraud protection services."
\-- note the _"which and we"*. There are several of these. It just strikes me
as a hobbled together startup; that would be a red flag to me. That said, I
know it's unreasonable to expect users to comb through all of the
documentation looking for such things.... Although un-hopeful, I do hope this
guy gets his gear/money back.

~~~
benatkin
No, I'm annoyed by it as well. To me it makes it harder not to think of
KitSplit as acting in bad faith. When the company that's supposed to deal with
bad actors is itself a bad actor, how likely are they to deal with bad actors
effectively?

------
bocklund
The odd thing to me is how this is considered _voluntary parting_. Presumably
you could show that, through KitSplit, the renter and owner entered into a
legal contract. Maybe this is the true problem with the gig economy.

If I rented a car/phone/computer/camera directly from any legitimate company,
you can bet that the police and lawyers wouldn't consider that <legitimate
company> voluntarily parted with their property.

~~~
ikeboy
Who has been arrested for failing to return a rental?

~~~
ptyyy
[https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/man-arrested-for-not-
retur...](https://www.wsoctv.com/news/local/man-arrested-for-not-returning-
freddy-got-fingered-vhs-from-2002/177186020)

~~~
astronautjones
a classic of the genre

------
d1zzy
When I moved to the US years ago, one of the big differences I noticed (coming
from Eastern Europe) was the implicit "trust" people and businesses have of
"strangers", people and businesses they have never met before. Where I came
from there's an implicit distrust and you have to earn your trust. Now, I
thought, this implicit trust is actually great, it definitely makes so many
things much easier (don't have to carry or show my ID for so many things where
back in Eastern Europe you'd be required to, don't have to show up in person
for almost anything, even driving license is sent over mail, etc), people take
you at face value, it makes many things friction free. I generally much prefer
it over the default distrust culture.

As to the security of such an approach, I always wondered what happens with
bad players. Without much investigation I simply assumed that:

1\. most people are likely good players

2\. those few bad players would get caught by an actually functioning police
force and the punishment would be so severe nobody wants to risk it

Naive I know :) I don't know about #1 but #2 is starting to become clear to me
it's simply not true. Just look at KitSplit, plenty of bad actors and when
that happens nobody seems to be caught. I'm starting to think that people
trust strangers implicitly as a matter of comfort (it's more stressful to
distrust everyone for sure) and culture (they grew up in it) rather than
because they have rational reasons to do so (ex. the law is enforced and
violations of said trust are severely punished).

~~~
dsfyu404ed
>implicit "trust" people and businesses have of "strangers", people and
businesses they have never met before.

The US is a pretty big and diverse place. Where I'm from it's expected that
everyone screws everyone as hard as possible in any business transaction and
if you don't do your due diligence then you consent to whatever screwing you
receive.

For example you call ten plumbers and all ten of them will give you a "screw
you" price then you call up your cousin who calls his in-law who's a GC who
gives you a plumber's contact info and a name to drop and then you get a
reasonable price that the plumber would offer when they're not trying to screw
the other party. Then you use this info to negotiate the other guys down to
reasonable prices. And that's just one example.

The state can generally be trusted to not take advantage of you but you still
have to be careful. They'll play plenty of tricks that push the limits of
plausible deniability in order to get their money.

Even retail transactions are suspect. About the only places I can trust to not
rip me off 50% of the time are the big national chains.

It's not quite as bad as some other parts of the world but you can't enter
into any business transaction without doing your due diligence. If you do
you'll get burned pretty often.

Even in random day to day interactions with other people you don't trust
people unless you know them or there's some alignment of interests that keeps
them from screwing you.

And no, I don't come from some "backwards" rural area. I'm speaking about a
relatively well off part of the northeast.

~~~
reneherse
I grew up in Connecticut, and as I was reading this I had a feeling you were
describing the Northeast!

I've lived and done business in New England, N. California, the Midwest and
Southeast, and the attitude you described is widespread. (Though by no means
practiced by everyone.)

The Southeast in fact has been the worst IME, because underhanded practices
come along with a big helping of Southern "niceness", and often a lower level
of competence.

------
lisbethkaufman
Hi, Lisbeth Kaufman here (CoFounder and CEO of KitSplit). This is a shitty
situation, I feel terribly for Yohahn and the other owner who had their gear
stolen. I wanted to personally respond to let you all know that we are fixing
this and making them whole- and then some.

Since we launched in 2015, tens of thousands of filmmakers and creators have
safely rented gear to and from each other on KitSplit with incredibly positive
experiences.

Recently, however, someone stole $3,500 cameras from two of our owners. To put
it mildly, this was an awful experience for the owners. One of them wrote
about it on the internet, as you know. At first, we reacted by basically
telling him “sorry, you knew the risks (or should have). It’s all in our terms
of service!” And technically speaking, it’s true. Traditional gear rental
insurance that we (and all rental platforms) offer doesn’t cover theft by the
renter.

But traditional gear rental insurance is inadequate. And so is our policy.

We’ve been pondering this problem for a while. With this recent theft, it is
clearly time to solve this problem.

So we’ve decided to create a new insurance product for our owners: the
KitSplit Theft Protection Owner Guarantee.

The Owner Guarantee means that KitSplit owners will be covered in all
scenarios, whether damage, loss, or theft. To make good on this promise, we’re
starting by reimbursing the two owners who’s gear was recently stolen.

We are the first rental platform to offer coverage of this kind. It fills a
major insurance loophole, and it’s the right thing to do for our customers.

You are welcome to read more about the problem and how we are fixing it here.
[https://blog.kitsplit.com/announcing-kitsplit-theft-
protecti...](https://blog.kitsplit.com/announcing-kitsplit-theft-protection-
owner-guarantee/)

~~~
dx7tnt
Thanks for the information. Next time I want someone to split with my kit,
I'll definitely check out your service. One thing - how do you keep a straight
face when using bone-headed marketese like "voluntary parting" when writing
your T&C's and communicating with the customers who fall for it?

~~~
dang
Personal attacks are not ok on HN. New users with expertise or knowledge about
a topic are welcome here. If existing users harass them and hound them away,
does that benefit this community? No it does not.

This comment was so far beyond the pale (plus you posted so many unsubstantive
comments elsewhere today) that we've banned this account. If you don't want to
be banned, we'll happily reinstate you; just email hn@ycombinator.com and give
us reason to believe that you'll follow the rules in the future.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

~~~
dx7tnt
Why did the community upvote it then? Haven't you heard of irony?

~~~
dang
Alas, the community regularly upvotes snark, rage, and indignation. HN can't
live by upvotes alone. The guidelines are there to correct what the voting
system can't.

[https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html)

------
sytelus
I'm immensely just surprised someone would give away their $3500 to a stranger
to make a rent of $70. Even if the theft was covered, I would worry about the
potential abuse of such sensitive gear. I would worry about the person leaving
things in sun or dropping on floor or get water on it and so on. It is insane
to me that people want to do this.

But then again folks are renting out their apartment with fully loaded
furniture and appliances to complete strangers. It is infinitely surprising to
me that scammers haven't made business out of this. AirBnB doesn't require
real background check and with just fake FB profile, pre-loaded visa card any
scammer can be in business to steal thousands of dollars of valuables. People
are effectively giving away keys to their home for just few 10s of dollars and
scammers are just passing this opportunity up. This wouldn't have made sense
to any economist and it still doesn't. How is this possible?

~~~
sangnoir
> I'm immensely just surprised someone would give away their $3500 to a
> stranger to make a rent of $70.

turo.com facilitates giving _cars_ worth tens of thousands to strangers for
less (per day). They do claim to be insured, though - but I'm not going to be
putting them to the test.

~~~
fitzroy
I almost used Turo once, but the whole thing seemed very ambiguous wrt
liability, exact condition of the vehicle, etc. I don't drive normally, so am
I even insured? The car owner's insurance likely covers lending the car out,
but probably not renting it out, and they likely aren't even aware of that.

The information asymmetry and friction with these niche p2p sharing services
just isn't worth it. You're basically learning the rules of an entirely new
industry with each one - a significant amount of mental bandwidth to discover
whether or not it will even work for what you need.

Sharegrid reached out to me once (because I was selling a camera on
Craigslist). I looked over the site for about an hour and still would have had
no idea about this "voluntary parting" issue.

~~~
robocat
> Sharegrid reached out to me once (because I was selling a camera on
> Craigslist).

Are you saying Sharegrid was suggesting you should instead keep the camera and
rent it using Sharegrid?

Quite some sales technique if so...

~~~
fitzroy
Yes, I think so. Or they just assumed someone selling a pro video camera might
be in production and have more equipment.

------
slap_shot
I can't really even explain how upset this makes me. I live in Brooklyn (where
Kristina lives, and from where KitSplit operates). What can I do to help this
situation? I'll do anything I can to help shine light on this company and
fraud that their platform is facilitating.

I'm not a fan of the call out culture, but I really want to see KitSplit take
some action and fix this problem.

~~~
danielfoster
What I found most shocking is that if KitSplit claims that less than 0.1% of
rentals result in voluntary parting, why not cover this person's losses?

Maybe covering voluntary parting would result in too many fraudulent claims.
If that's the case, they should clearly explain that theft is not covered and
perhaps offer an insurance supplement.

~~~
natrik
[https://medium.com/p/4530d0062e60/responses/show](https://medium.com/p/4530d0062e60/responses/show)

Read the CEO's comment above. She states their assessment has been _effective
at blocking 99.99% of bad actors and stopping millions of dollars of theft on
the platform_

She's almost surely exaggerating and pulling those numbers out of thin air.

~~~
ddalex
From the reply:

> I want to be clear that there are no insurance providers or rental platforms
> that we know of that do offer coverage for voluntary parting.

It takes some guts to put this in the reply when the article specifically
mentions the insurance solution of their competitor. It's like they didn't
even read the piece they're replying to.

~~~
3JPLW
That's astounding on another level, too — they encourage owners to get their
own insurance policy! And yet they aren't aware of any such providers. Insane.

> A) On our insurance page kitsplit.com/insurance We explain in underlined
> terms that “we recommend that owners need to get their own annual policy
> with voluntary parting coverage in addition to the insurance provided by the
> renter.”

> The sad reality is that insurance companies simply do not cover voluntary
> parting. As a result we are, as of now, unable to offer voluntary parting
> because there are no insurance partners who provide it.

Now I'm sure there's a difference between ensuring a business as a whole like
that and insuring yourself, but seriously?

~~~
mncolinlee
I do hate playing devil's advocate because I totally disagree with the
position of the devil in this case. Keep in mind that it's possible to be
technically correct and also completely misleading.

In this case, she's arguing that their insurance partners do not provide
voluntary parting insurance. This may be technically correct. However, the way
insurance works is you can always go to an insurer of last resort and ask for
exceptions. Lloyd's of London will cover race cars while racing or space
vessels for accidents, for example, even though those are hardly standard
policies. Nearly anything can be covered if you set the premium and
deductibles high enough. They have billing codes for some pretty bizarre
insured cases.

An entire sharing economy of companies could easily devise an insurance
product that meets these needs if they worked to make it to happen. It would
be trivial to scare consumers away from competitors that do not provide this.

~~~
3JPLW
You're missing my point. She's simultaneously saying:

* Get your own coverage

* Insurance companies don't cover it. Full stop. It's not that it's unavailable "at a reasonable price." It's "woe is us, we would if we could, but those damn insurance partners won't let us."

I know her last point isn't accurate, but that's what she's saying and she's
phrasing it that way intentionally to shift responsibility. It's abhorrent.

------
jrockway
In this case, I feel like KitSplit's "minimum viable product" is too minimum.
Of course renters are going to steal stuff. The only value you can really
provide as a middleman in this transaction is "well if they do take your
camera, we'll buy you a new one".

If the fraud rate is too high for that to be a viable business, so be it. You
should close your business or do better vetting. Otherwise this is just
Craigslist with a 22% commission, a deal nobody would take. (Do you ever see
posts on Craigslist that say "use my $3500 camera for a day for $70"? No?
That's because it's _crazy_ and nobody would ever do that. A company has the
power to have contracts and vetting; and yet KitSplit cheaped out and does
nothing. It makes me mad and I just heard about them five minutes ago.)

------
KukicAdnan
"If a renter does not return equipment, and it has not been stolen or lost,
it's called voluntary parting."

I just don't understand this line of thinking at all. You rent something out
for a specific and agreed upon period of time. The person decides to keep the
thing you rented out. And it's not theft? Also how is it not lost?

~~~
braythwayt
Well, let’s consider a not-ridiculously-fraudulent situation:

I rent a camera from you for $70 a day, ostensibly for one day. My shoot
doesn’t work out, so I keep it for three days. Did I commit theft?

Obviously, when I return it three days later, it is not theft. We can argue
whether I owe you $70, $210, or much more, but to the police, that is very
much a civil argument.

Now consider the situation between when I agreed to return it and when I
actually returned it, like the day after it was due back.

Have I stolen the camera? No, we just disagree on the terms of a transaction
where you voluntarily rented me a camera.

This “Mark” individual seemed to use fraud (photoshopping id?) to rent the
camera, and that ought to be a crime in itself. But if he rented it in his own
name, and the police showed up at his door, and he returned the camera, he
could argue that he was renting it for a year, and how much he owes is a civil
matter.

I don’t like this line of reasoning myself, but I can see why the police and
insurance companies take the line that if you voluntarily give something to
someone, it is not theft if they don’t return it, it is a dispute over the
terms and conditions of your giving them the chattel.

~~~
newman8r
Agreed, it's a good thing that police generally don't get involved in contract
disputes. There's still avenues for bringing criminal charges I assume.

~~~
evandev
Well they do when you are renting from a large company, such as a car rental
company.[0]

[0]:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20277134](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20277134)

~~~
newman8r
I think property with a title is handled differently, which makes sense. Also,
in this case, the car was simply reported as stolen and got pulled over in a
public space - it's not like they hunted down an allegedly delinquent renter.
Fortunately the rental company had to pay damages for their incompetence.

I'm actually curious as to what happens in the cases of delinquent renters -
but I assume it involves things like court orders, or perhaps they just try to
find the car and tow it away under existing repo laws, then send the account
to collections.

------
g_sch
This seems to be a general problem across the peer-to-peer rental industry. My
friend had her car stolen while renting it out on Getaround and ended up in a
similar situation.

These things seem to come and go in cycles. Airbnb and Uber faced several
similar trust & safety issues of their own before they started building in
much stronger safety and insurance protections and, crucially, convincing
their customer base to continue trusting them. Now that their hard work has
once again given people confidence in the P2P rental model, these upstarts are
swooping in with none of the protections and reaping the benefits.

~~~
turdnagel
The same kind of issues can't possibly apply to Airbnb, because no one can
steal your house and run away with it. "Voluntary Parting" is the unfortunate
case that is difficult to cover with insurance, unless Kitsplit decides to put
aside money in the bank to cover these costs themselves. And Uber doesn't
rent, so I don't think it's a 1:1 comparison here.

~~~
hackstack
To add to what others have said re: AirBNB, there have also been at least a
few cases where renters refuse to leave the property and turn a mid-term
rental into a sort of "squatting" situation, creating tremendous legal hassle
for the owner. (Though I'm not aware of any cases where the squatter has
actually managed to wrest ownership from the actual owner!)

~~~
cpach
Though not related to Airbnb, in Sweden there was a guy who couldn’t use his
own apartment for one or two years since it was occupied by fraudsters. What a
hellish situation that must be.

------
intsunny
The text on the trust page linked in the article
[https://kitsplit.com/trust](https://kitsplit.com/trust), does not
specifically protect the equipment lender:

 _> KitSplit Short Term Insurance and Damage Coverage Options:_

 _> Accidents happen, but on KitSplit you are always covered. Owners: rest
assured that we require renters to purchase insurance, a damage waiver, or
leave a full deposit. Renters: you have the choice of three kinds of coverage:
you can purchase short-term coverage through our site, you can upload a
certificate of insurance, or you can leave a deposit for the value of the
equipment. Read more about coverage here._

~~~
jjoonathan
> Owners: rest assured that we require renters to purchase insurance, a damage
> waiver, or leave a full deposit.

I'm sure they have their loopholes in order, but damn this is deceptive.

~~~
jjwhitaker
So they have one of the following:

1\. Certification of renters insurance with the renters information, which if
fake is fraud.

2\. A waiver of some kind covering damage to the item, probably out of pocket
I-accept-all-risk type signed by the renter, which if fake is fraud.

3\. Full deposit of the rented gear to payout to the owner if
lost/stolen/damaged, which if declined may be fraud or at least grounds to
stop the transaction and protect the owner.

Meaning there is either enough info to find the renter at least for a civil
suite or there is fraud. Who is liable for fraud here? Legally I'm not sure
but based on the reply and posturing from KitSplit I'd say they are. Based on
this info I'm not going to use or advocate their platform.

It looks like the renter went for the deposit option but the transaction was
declined. Kitsplit should have stopped the transaction there, minimum. One
can't claim to be 99.99% perfect then do nothing in response to the .01% where
clients lose thousands from theft on a a technicality.

------
msie
This is horrible. Hopefully KitSplit goes out of business soon. What’s the use
of the company? Might as well lend out gear through Craigslist. Too many
companies relying on the honour system.

~~~
jdreyfuss
These kinds of sites are exactly that: niche Craigslists. Since they are
marketplaces, they see their job as connecting two groups that want to engage
with each other (in this case, camera owners and people who want to rent a
camera), and anything beyond connecting people has nothing to do with them.

It's best to think of these kind of sites as digital telephone poles with
flyers and act accordingly, but it's hard when, in an attempt to grow their
user base, they exaggerate the value they offer and make people think they're
safer or getting more out of them than they really offer. Those kind of
tactics deserve to be called out

------
Bokanovsky
I'd never give out expensive gear on a rental site like this. If they can't
really deal with people not returning / stealing cameras, what happens if they
return the camera damaged? Or scratch the lens up? Sure you get money for
someone to use your unused camera for a day, but how do you know that they'll
treat your equipment as you would? What if they switch your camera out for one
in worse condition?

The risk to reward ratio for this doesn't work for me.

~~~
taejo
It seems pretty clear that they _do_ have insurance for accidental damage, and
that's exactly where they're trying to hide the fact that they _don 't_ have
insurance against fraudulent renters.

The risk profile for fraud is very different from accidents, which is why it's
harder to insure against fraud, but also why you really need that insurance
(or a deposit, or whatever).

------
onemoresoop
I wouldn't be surprised if KitSplit knew all along about all the loopholes and
are as a matter of fact acting on it themselves. Find gullible victims, send
someone to pick equipment, and you know the rest. When the image becomes
really bad they close shop. If the insurance was paying they would be
investigated eventually but they do know legally nobody can get them.

And I expect to see all kinds of modern ways of theft popping up everywhere.

~~~
TomVDB
You wouldn't be surprised if KitSplit was a criminal enterprise from the
bottom up???

~~~
onemoresoop
I wouldnt be. Im not surprised by anything anymore. But here I’m just
speculating. Today I heard of KitSplit for the first time and will not touch
them with a ten foot pole.

------
Nrsolis
Sue first and sue often. Really.

You've already done most of the legwork on this. Now all you need to do is get
this into small claims court.

Trust me: once KitSplit gets that notification from the court that they're
being hauled into court and are going to need to hire a lawyer to defend
themselves, you're gonna be working with a whole different level of people at
Kitsplit. That's your best chance to get compensated.

SUE THE BASTARDS.

~~~
staticautomatic
EDIT: In some small claims courts, including CA, you can't have a lawyer
represent you.

~~~
cthalupa
How would this work for businesses? The owner or CEO gets dragged in? Seems
unlikely, otherwise you could just DoS a business by keeping their leadership
embroiled in small claims issues.

I imagine you can't have outside counsel represent you, but the business can
probably send their own lawyer and delegate authority to them.

~~~
cbsks
When suing a corporation in small claims court in the state of California, an
attorney may only be present if they are an officer or director of the
corporation and all other officers and directors are attorneys.

[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?sectionNum=116.530.&lawCode=CCP)

The corporation doesn't need to be represented by an officer or director,
however, they can also be represented by a non-attorney employee: "a
corporation may appear and participate in a small claims action only through a
regular employee, or a duly appointed or elected officer or director, who is
employed, appointed, or elected for purposes other than solely representing
the corporation in small claims court."

[https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySectio...](https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/codes_displaySection.xhtml?lawCode=CCP&sectionNum=116.540).

~~~
cthalupa
Looks like this is a per state thing. If my googling is accurate, this is only
true in California, Michigan, and Nebraska. New York, where KitSplit is based,
definitely allows a lawyer to represent you in small claims court.

~~~
cbsks
I can’t find an authoritative source right now, but some random legal advise
websites mention that some states allow you to sue an out-of-state business in
small claims court as long as you are a resident.

------
ikeboy
This is what small claims court is for.

The contract might not be enforceable if they have other text on their website
saying otherwise. Worth trying to get a judge to agree with you for $3500.

------
shereadsthenews
When Pro Camera Rental still existed in SF, you left a deposit of the full
value of the hardware you were renting.

~~~
dsfyu404ed
This is how all the free specialty tools rentals at the auto parts stores
works.

You don't have to bring it back unless you want your money back.

------
lol768
Another interesting discussion thread:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918)

~~~
voodoochicken
The person in that thread was compensated, hopefully that happens here too.

------
donniefitz2
I'm founder of a similar 2 sided marketplace addressing the same market, but
for buying and selling ([https://gearoffer.com](https://gearoffer.com)).

KitSplit likely has a fraud problem that's much larger than they admit. Even
at our small scale, we often get fraud attempts. The key is to adapt the
platform once you find a hole. Otherwise, these fraudsters will come back,
frequently. If KitSplit tout their ability to prevent fraud in the first
place, but this person was able to find a long list of other victims, I'm
guessing KitSplit isn't plugging the holes and this type of scam will
continue.

------
yellowarchangel
This sounds familiar:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918)

[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18340552](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18340552)

"... They’ve also assured me they are making improvements to their policies
and will have additional updates soon..."

So in the 7 months since that last article, they have seemingly made
deteriorations as now they won't even offer to pay for the OPs equipment.

~~~
Spectral
While reading this article I had the same thought, read something similar on
HN before. Sounds like nothing's changed on KitSplit. Looks like they found
their profit/payment line - continue to screw the 0.01% and leave them in the
dark and only pay up the the even smaller % that decide to pursue them in
court.

------
sahaskatta
I had an analogous experience with another service Omni
[https://omni.co](https://omni.co) not too long ago. I rented out my drone as
I wasn't using it too regularly. I had confidence that their insurance policy
would cover any damage by renters.

I recently had my drone returned to me as I was planning to use it on an
upcoming vacation. I did not bother to inspect the drone when they sent it
back to me. A few weeks later, I decided to use it and realized there was
scuffs, damage to the propellers, and that the camera gimbal was broken.

A renter had crashed my drone. I contacted Omni to request details on filing
an insurance claim. I got an email stating that I only had 48 hours after the
item was returned to me to file a claim. Quite frustrating. I will definitely
will be reading the details of these insurance policies in the future.

------
Beefin
It seems the distinction of "voluntary parting" completely diffuses the
responsibility of theft from KitSplit, since every exchange is voluntary
through their service. My question is why they haven't received a cease and
desist from legal enforcement since their platform is aiding and abetting
crime...

~~~
Beefin
And according to Wiki they've been around for 5 years:
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KitSplit](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KitSplit)

------
news_to_me
> If it sounds too good to be true, it usually is. For this reason, don’t
> trust a company with a trust page.

A true sign of what the Web has become

~~~
function_seven
It's a corollary of the common line, “at $COMPANY, we take $ISSUE very
seriously.”

A phrase that usually means they don't take $ISSUE seriously at all! Or at
least, they didn't. Which is why they're saying it.

------
pvaldes
Treat it as anything stolen. Go to the police with the serial number of your
camera and any proof of your property like photos, videos or so. Exiftool is
your friend. They probably will discover a vault of many other stolen objects
in the same place.

~~~
bluedino
He did. The cops don't care because it's only $3,500 in equipment.

~~~
tempestn
Varies based on the police department, but once it showed up on craigslist
that might have been enough to get them to act. They're not going to waste a
bunch of resources investigating, but they might get involved if they can just
show up at the thief's house.

------
ajnin
Interesting bit about the other person who had stuff stolen receiving the
exact same emails from KitSplit. If they bothered to have created a script for
this it means that they're probably dealing with this stuff frequently, more
than one in 10'000 times as they claim. They also are probably shamelessly
lying when they say that they discussed the case in length with "Kristina" but
that she ultimately decided to deny the claim. Makes it sound like they're
really trying to help while in reality they're only deploying diversion
tactics. They've been misleading him all along.

------
evancox100
"Additionally, a lawyer friend of mine has pointed out that the terms of use
that we’ve agreed upon with KitSplit is a contract set up to devoid them of
liability for serious potential crimes, like theft."

Do you really need a lawyer to tell you that ToS are designed to absolve the
service of liability?

------
coding123
See also [https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-k...](https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-kit-for-95-and-had-it-legally-stolen/)

~~~
ddalex
The difference there is that in that case KitSplit compensated the owner.

They declined to compensate here presumably because they didn't think that he
can raise a stink - the original piece was on petapixel which is really
popular with photographers.

------
dclowd9901
Good lord, look at the response from one of the founders. Even with the
absolutely sane and calm response from the author (I would be burning their
fucking offices down), the company still comes back with bullshit lines and
offers no recompense.

Whoever's funding this, I'm holding them to account. Boycotts for all.

------
giarc
Unethical, but the best course of action for someone is to simply find a
smashed up piece of equipment and claim it was returned damaged and not
stolen. Sounds like they would insure damaged equipment but not stolen
equipment. However, that also would be fraud.

------
orliesaurus
If you write KitSplit on Google and scroll a few lines, you see: "How I Lent
My $4,500 Camera Kit for $95 and Had It Stolen - PetaPixel" That's a huge red
flag. If I were you I would go full TrustPilot on these folks!

------
maverick2007
I'm curious at what point it makes sense for them to just pay out the $3430
difference to make this story have a happy ending. I'm a photographer that
would love to make a little extra cash or to rent a lens from someone else
through this service but I never will because of how poorly they handled this
whereas if they had owned up and made it right instead of hiding behind
legalese I probably would be more likely to use it.

At what point it how many lost users like me does it take to make paying out
cheaper than loss of business?

~~~
yellowarchangel
There is absolutely no way the bad press they're getting is worth saving a
measly 3430. HOWEVER, from this 1 point alone (and the thread from last year
about the same issue with kitsplit), we can deduce that kitsplit probably has
enough thefts that they can't afford to "pay off" all the people being stolen
from.

Their claim that "99.99% of people aren't scammed" seems awfully smelly, as
they could use their _modest_ 20% cut from rentings to pay off all the people
who are stolen from.

------
jechamt
Now that the medium post and this HN response (and possibly others) have
gained traction, the author and other similarly affected parties may be
interested to communicate this shift in momentum to investors, conveniently
listed on kitsplit's website:
[https://angel.co/company/kitsplit/jobs](https://angel.co/company/kitsplit/jobs)

Mostly individuals (and perhaps this is not the complete picture) through
AngelList, perhaps AngelList (angel.co) itself might be interested to know in
more detail the actual policies and communications of one of its listed
companies.

Deciding to not cover this claim and claims like it seems to be a short-
sighted and heavily financially-motivated decision. Perhaps if the financial
stakes of that decision were more clear, the author could pursue a different
result.

Perhaps, though, this momentum has come too late. Food for thought as I
haven't seen it discussed here so far.

------
the-pigeon
Wow. So basically KitSplit tricks people into thinking they will cover your
equipment if something happens to it but then doesn't at all.

That's super scummy. I think the author of this is way too nice to them. Take
them to small claims court as others suggested. Having a loophole buried in
the terms of service does not allow you to lie about your service.

------
datapolitical
A great example of why tech needs regulation. Normal people get hurt when
risks aren’t disclosed in an effective manner. You should absolutely file a
class action lawsuit and I bet they’ll settle just to avoid the bad press.

If this crappy, unethical business practice becomes widely known I doubt
people will keep using them.

------
holografix
This is absolutely fucked. Surely they can be sued for something. If you setup
a go fund me I’ll put some cash in.

------
wyldfire
> Because in the end, I genuinely do think that KitSplit is a great idea on
> paper

Is it..‽

> Additionally, I watched my stolen property being sold on Craigslist — that
> was the sweet icing on the cake.

Why not use that opportunity to arrange a "purchase"? Either identify the
thief by surveillance (follow to their home e.g.) or attempt a retrieval via
brute force (hired guard etc)? At least with the thief's identity it might be
possible to pursue a legal way to get back the gear or be compensated.

[1]
[https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/1l16cq/a_friend_found...](https://www.reddit.com/r/pics/comments/1l16cq/a_friend_found_her_stolen_bike_on_craigslist_and/)

~~~
sdca
>attempt a retrieval via brute force (hired guard etc)

This can be a very bad idea, especially if the seller isn't a thief but
someone who unknowingly purchased the stolen property.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O._J._Simpson_robbery_case](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/O._J._Simpson_robbery_case)

------
Lunatic666
As a fellow photographer (even the same gear), I understand the author's pain
in losing it. I really hope they can get it back and the thief is held liable.
What I truly admire is how professional the blog entry is written after being
badly ripped off like that.

------
usaphp
From KitSplit Q&A post [1]:

> "they appreciate the peace of mind they get because KitSplit vets everyone
> who joins, and assures that everything on the platform is covered."

> However, we know that sometimes things go wrong, and we’re not taking any
> chances with expensive camera gear. That’s why we vet everyone on the
> platform to make sure they are who they say they are, and make sure that
> every piece of gear rented via KitSplit is fully insured.

[1] - [https://medium.com/@VeriduHQ/a-short-q-a-with-kitsplit-
and-s...](https://medium.com/@VeriduHQ/a-short-q-a-with-kitsplit-and-some-
puppies-187ff7311541)

------
holografix
Hope the founders get inundated with questions about this on Twitter where
they are very vocal. Anyone using their services need to be made aware that
you’re basically donating your camera gear to anyone who might rob you.

------
instaheat
Would Checkr be a possible solution to "Vet" people that join.

I just joined on a whim, and the verification process is a joke. I'm already
"verified" with the fancy check logo next to my name, INSTANTLY.

------
pacetherace
Try that "voluntary parting" with a rental car and see what happens.

------
wiseleo
To the CEO Lizbeth:

Replace vague suggestions like "recommend" with "must have voluntary parting
coverage on your own insurance policy". Collect the policy number. Require
confirmation that policy is active before every listing goes live.

Long-term solution: work with a carrier to underwrite this risk for your
lenders so they don't need to involve their insurance.

It's clear that the platform is forcing its paying customers to shoulder all
risk. Theft by not returning is the primary risk for which the customers are
paying a premium.

------
blairanderson
If you rent to someone and they don't give it back, the easy thing to do is
call it theft, but legally its a breach of contract known in the rental world
as "voluntary parting".

I used to work for kitsplits biggest competitor, we had the same problems.
AirBnb has similar issues.

[https://www.google.com/search?q=voluntary+parting+coverage](https://www.google.com/search?q=voluntary+parting+coverage)

The gear owner could/should have bought their own insurance to cover this.

------
kevin_b_er
This happened to someone else in a writeup in November of last year. There's
no "peace of mind" when renting on KitSplit. They say "We've got you covered"
but this can happen easily. How can they have you "covered" when your stuff
can be stolen by "voluntary parting".

I put forth that KitSplit is a middleman which provides nothing to the
experience and their percentage carries no value. It is not in your interest
to rent anything through them vs craigslist.

------
heyyyouu
There should be a fund to pay Google Ads to make this the top search for
KiKsplit on Google. Then they'd take you all seriously.

------
1024core
Small claims court is your only option.

BTW: if the OP had done some Googling: [https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-
i-lent-my-4500-camera-k...](https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-kit-for-95-and-had-it-legally-stolen/)

------
eithed
This is not the first time something like this happens -
[https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-k...](https://petapixel.com/2018/10/29/how-i-lent-
my-4500-camera-kit-for-95-and-had-it-legally-stolen/)

------
Finnucane
At least it seems clear how they came up with the name. Someone gets your kit,
and they split.

------
DanBC
See also the comments to this article form 8 months ago:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18332918)

------
uniformlyrandom
How many defrauded owners to we need to start a class-action lawsuit?

------
rchrd2
Somehow the name makes sense. KitSplit - Split from your kit.

------
Havoc
Seems borderline fraudulent on kitsplits part. Clearly they know this is a
major issue and are putting people’s livelihood at risk yet they continue
anyway.

------
boyadjian
Renting is a profession. Strange world nowadays, where everybody thinks he can
make anything, just because "There is an application for that".

------
purple_ducks
Seems like KitSplit's provided you with false information as they actually
hadn't verified the user's identity.

Seems like a nice base for your claim.

------
jamalrashid
Goodness me! Here in Germany we have insurance on most of our goods - I don't
think most other societies use insurance as much as Germans do

------
easymovet
They should really hold the full amount in escrow, with something like Bitcoin
so they don’t have to worry about transaction denials.

------
londons_explore
Best to just put a little GPS tag in every bit of equipment.

Anything expensive ships in a case - just cut an extra slot in the back of the
foam and put a tag in. Make sure you get the tags that have more than 3 days
battery life!

Then, when it goes missing, wait a few weeks for it to end up resold to
someone, then go pick it up. Since they bought it from some shady guy, the
loss is on them. If they won't give it back, call the police while standing
outside their front door.

------
z3t4
I been thinking of starting a "renting" company but figured out that it would
basically be an insurance company.

~~~
jjwhitaker
Which wouldn't be a terrible idea. Insurance is just another way to
crowdsource money for stable/safe investments where the front is peace of
mind. One could probably operate under a pure risk assessment model but why
not put the extra cash into short term T bills then maybe once more cushion is
established low risk mutual funds?

Hopefully I'm missing some major regulatory issue.

------
pastor_elm
Should have taken a photo of the guy and got his license plate number. Maybe
even asked to check his ID.

~~~
i_am_nomad
KitSplit is a New York company.

------
eMSF
Sharing economy, all right. Some refuse to acknowledge the issues that are
well known.

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mikehines
Free publicity for KitSplit, which I hope it won't lead to explosive growth.

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dopamean
How is kitsplit different from renting out your gear to random people on the
street? They seem to provide no actual service and definitely not the most
important one: security of your gear. What a waste of a company.

~~~
rhino369
A marketplace for connecting renters and owners is valuable. Their real issue
is that their marketing essentially says they cover stolen gear, but their
fine print says they don't. That's no bueno.

~~~
munk-a
They might be pursuable under false advertising - if you got a good lawyer you
might even get them in conspiracy to commit theft via their poor vetting
system. These guys really need to be held accountable.

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tantalor
How much more does this "voluntary parting insurance" cost?

Back-of-envelope for a $3500 replacement cost @ .1% chance of loss, the
nominal insurance cost is $3.50. Double that for the insurance premium, so
maybe $7. That's 10% of the owner's cut, which definitely seems worth it in
hindsight.

~~~
jellicle
Except that if you were actually in the voluntary parting insurance business,
you'd find: fraud is a lot more than 0.1%, and fraud to take advantage of your
insurance would be very real (Bill and Dave are buddies, Bill claims Dave
didn't return his camera, Bill and Dave end up with the reimbursement AND the
camera). You'd have to do a ton of legwork to try to keep your fraud losses
low, and your insurance would be expensive as hell.

I mean, what's the proper premium charge for a $1000 camera loaned out to
"random Craigslist guy", a premium where, overall, you end up making money
exceeding your losses due to payouts? $500? $999? At least one in a thousand
transactions WON'T be fraudulent, right?

~~~
tantalor
Not sure why I got downvoted there, I'm just using the information provided by
KitSplit:

 _These instances are extremely rare on KitSplit and happen less than 0.1% of
the time_ [https://kitsplit.com/insurance](https://kitsplit.com/insurance)

If the actual rate of fraud is higher than 0.1% as you suggest then KitSplit
is liable for losses; they are the ones perpetrating a fraud.

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ydnaclementine
KitSplit, pay us to get split away from your equipment kit

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css
Looks like Medium is down right now.

~~~
shereadsthenews
The amazing part is how they serve you the full content of the article but
then fail to serve their javascript that would allow you to SCROLL DOWN and
read it.

~~~
fabiensanglard
What a sad world that you need javascript to scroll down a page now.

------
josejuanisaac
how about learning to respect the dangers of the sharing economy? cheap-for-
me-not-for-thee

------
_bxg1
The silicon valley of today is nothing more than a haven for fly-by-night,
under-regulated capitalism. Usually there's a bit of software sprinkled on
top. Most of these companies aren't innovating in technology at all, they're
innovating in gaming the economy for their own enrichment.

------
onemoresoop
They seem legit because they have a public facing, and are bamboozling the
owners, make them feel safe (who reads the find print and the legalese anyway)
when in fact they are just like any random guy on the street. Who knows, maybe
that was the whole business plan, make profits, when image becomes really bad
close shop. Crazy profits. They are setup legally quite well, they basically
risk nothing.

~~~
hrktb
I think the worst part is, even reading all the legalese, one can come under
the impression it’s a legit company that tried to cover their users and will
genuinely help in case of trouble.

~~~
TylerE
"Please note, however, that the insurance accepted on KitSplit is industry
standard equipment rental insurance and does not cover some rare instances,
such as if a renter commits fraud. These instances are extremely rare on
KitSplit and happen less than 0.1% of the time, but we recommend that owners
get their own annual policy with voluntary parting coverage in addition to the
insurance provided by the renter."

Seems pretty clear to me that you are not in fact covered.

~~~
3JPLW
> some rare instances, such as if a renter commits fraud

That's still super weasely. Why not say: "if the renter fails to return your
equipment?"

Oh, because that's horrifying and will scare everyone away.

~~~
magashna
For the same reason they call getting robbed "voluntary parting"

What a laugh, hopefully I don't get "involuntarily punctured" during a
"voluntary parting" gone wrong.

------
milemi
KitSplit - we’ll split you from your kit!

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gingabriska
How come a company doesn't require enough enough from the scammers to track
them down and get the camera back?

This company is literally doing nothing to help them. I feel so sad looking at
this entire thing, not only he lost his camera but also wasted so much time
with zero support offered by the company.

~~~
cpach
I’m not sure it would help in this case; seems like the fraudster used a
stolen identity.

------
mabbo
KitSplit is a marketplace for connecting owners of expensive items with people
who want to steal those expensive items.

It's very technical in nature, you see.

~~~
dexterdog
No, Kitsplit is a site that facilitates the theft of your equipment for a
small fee.

~~~
lrc
And in just such a way as to prevent your insurance company from paying a
claim!

~~~
TheOtherHobbes
Professional equipment thieves love it!

------
dx7tnt
There's a traditional idiom where I come from:

"The fool and his camera equipment are easily parted."

------
hawkesnest
I can guarantee you that if I saw something stolen from me on CL I'd be
certain to reclaim my gear. One way or another.

~~~
save_ferris
FYI, OJ Simpson went to prison for stealing back memorabilia he claimed was
stolen from him, just in case you're insinuating you'd do the same.

~~~
mullen
Guns were involved, that is why OJ went to jail.

If OJ walked in to the room without guns or "muscle", saw his stuff, then
walked out and called the police, he would have been okay.

~~~
ghostbrainalpha
I'm in Las Vegas and followed it fairly closely because I have friends in the
DA's office.

It was even worse than that, OJ is truly beyond redemption. Every effort has
been made to protect him from the system and his brain just can't process
decisions correctly.

I'd bet everything I own that his autopsy will show serious CTE issues, and
that he will be back in prison within the year.

------
MisterTea
So you rented out your gear on what amounts to craigs list and now your
shocked that someone split with your kit (hence the aptly named site.) Did you
stop to think about how the service is supposed to protect you from theft?

> One specific area that KitSplit talks about in-depth is their proprietary
> vetting system ...

That should have been where you stopped reading and walked away. From my
experience, let me tell you what "proprietary" means: A. we have no process OR
B. we use what everyone else is but want to stand out from the rest so we lied
to you.

How do you vet trust on the internet? Think about how hard it is to steal a
rental car. Do they have a magical proprietary process? No. They take all of
your personal info and use that as collateral against you should you decide
not to return the car.

Bottom line, and I'll happily take the karma hit: you're a sucker. And I'm not
being mean, but driving the point home. You believed some rent seekers bland
promises of magic fairies and pixie dust in order to secure a quick buck. You
know the old saying: If it sound too good to be true...

~~~
Retra
They may be a sucker, but there is still value in warning people and/or
litigating to recover losses. We afford people the ability to make mistakes so
that we can effectively learn from them, not simply to punish people for being
imperfect.

