Ontario police have filed criminal charges against Tao Li, an XCMG Canada official, alleging he defrauded an Ontario distributor for $21 million by tampering with serial number plates on equipment sold in Canada.
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Ontario police have filed criminal charges against Tao Li, an XCMG Canada official, alleging he defrauded an Ontario distributor for $21 million by tampering with serial number plates on equipment the company was selling in Canada.
The allegations are set out in documents filed in the Ontario Court of Justice, according to the case described in the court materials.
XCMG is a major Chinese state-owned heavy equipment manufacturer. In recent months, the company has also been involved in civil lawsuits where it has been accused of fraudulently changing out serial numbers on its machines to make them appear newer than they actually were.
A veteran heavy equipment dealer said his family business began working with XCMG in 2017 and that issues emerged around 2021. “It’s destroyed our family,” the dealer said.
The dealer, whose company has dealerships in Prince George, Chilliwack and Kelowna, described a process in which serial number plates were changed to misrepresent the machines’ years. “There was a process of changing serial number plates and changing the years of the machines in order to maybe misrepresent to the end user what they were buying,” he said.
He gave an example of equipment being built in one year and sold with a different year label. “As an example, it would be built in 2020, but really sold to us as a 2022 machine,” he said.
XCMG Canada did not respond to a request for an interview, and in a previous statement the company said it was fully defending the claims in the civil actions.
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