Minor damage from accident, can I negotiate with his insurance company?

pwrshft99 · Jun 19, 2018

Long story short, my girl got rear-ended last week. I was with her, it wasn't bad at all, minor damage was done.

Cop came and wrote a report, other driver at fault and she got no ticket. Happen during the weekend so talking to his insurance has not happen yet, other than to verify he filed a report. She is expected to talk to them today about estimates.

Her car is very common, it needs a rear bumper cover and a trunk lid and it will be good to go. Looked up the parts used and can get both for under $500 total.

I have never been in an accident and would like her to benefit as much as possible obviously. There is no doubt I can do the work, the trunk lid is 4 bolts and a harness and a bumper cover can't be that hard.

IronSnake · Jun 19, 2018

I've done it. So what happens if the other company cuts you a check for the estimate amount, or will work directly with a body shop and pay them. It's up to you.

I had a ranger practically totaled by some dumb white girl who was on her phone. She turned across in front of me. Well I ended up buy an entire manly forged bottom end and managed to make out like a bandit. Fixed the truck for 150 bucks after having the frame pulled. Kept about 2k in pocket after.

pwrshft99 · Jun 19, 2018

IronSnake said:
I've done it. So what happens if the other company cuts you a check for the estimate amount, or will work directly with a body shop and pay them. It's up to you.

I had a ranger practically totaled by some dumb white girl who was on her phone. She turned across in front of me. Well I ended up buy an entire manly forged bottom end and managed to make out like a bandit. Fixed the truck for 150 bucks after having the frame pulled. Kept about 2k in pocket after.

Ok, I wasn't sure if they would pay her or the body shop directly.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 19, 2018

pwrshft99 said:
Ok, I wasn't sure if they would pay her or the body shop directly.

Depends usually if there is still a lien on the vehicle. The insurance company will put your name and the shop's name on the check to ensure that the vehicle gets fixed and that you can't just walk away with the money and the bank ends up with a broken car down the road. The bank won't cash the check for you if they body shop's name is on it.

08mojo · Jun 19, 2018

Got rear-ended back in December while my wife was driving. We worked directly with the other driver's insurance (their fault, they hit us) and the check was sent directly to us with my wife's name on the check. The accident was much like yours: very minor with very little damage.

AustinSN · Jun 19, 2018

I had a lady back into my old mustang and the adjuster sent me a check in the mail to my name only.

He looked defeated, we had just had a nasty hail storm. It worked out in my favor.

And yes, the claims process is a negotiation.

pwrshft99 · Jun 19, 2018

svtfocus2cobra said:
Depends usually if there is still a lien on the vehicle. The insurance company will put your name and the shop's name on the check to ensure that the vehicle gets fixed and that you can't just walk away with the money and the bank ends up with a broken car down the road. The bank won't cash the check for you if they body shop's name is on it.

She just paid it off and is quite upset. I'm hoping to atleast get it to acceptable condition and trade the car in using the insurance money to upgrade

pwrshft99 · Jun 19, 2018

08mojo said:
Got rear-ended back in December while my wife was driving. We worked directly with the other driver's insurance (their fault, they hit us) and the check was sent directly to us with my wife's name on the check. The accident was much like yours: very minor with very little damage.

Her damage was minimal but he had a newer Lincoln and it took a beating. From what I saw, hood, bumper, grill were all toast. It was leaking coolant under it too. We were doing under 15 mph

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 19, 2018

pwrshft99 said:
She just paid it off and is quite upset. I'm hoping to atleast get it to acceptable condition and trade the car in using the insurance money to upgrade

If it is paid off then they should send it to you only. You can ask and if they say they are going to issue it with both names just tell them that you would like it issued to you only because you are not sure when you will be able to get it into the shop. I have called to have checks issued to the customer only for the same reasons you want. They made the check out to my shop and were going to send it to us, but I just told them that the customer will not be able to bring the car in for some time due to scheduling conflicts and that I don't want to take the check if I am not going to be doing the work right away. Usually they will oblige.

2KBlackGT · Jun 19, 2018

svtfocus2cobra said:
Depends usually if there is still a lien on the vehicle. The insurance company will put your name and the shop's name on the check to ensure that the vehicle gets fixed and that you can't just walk away with the money and the bank ends up with a broken car down the road. The bank won't cash the check for you if they body shop's name is on it.

My experiance was different. State Farm sent the check to me in my name(not the lein holders) and I paid the shop. Who knew SRT8 wheels were worth 5k. Drove to NC and bought a set with tires for 1800.

Then in 2016 when a uninsured old man hit me State Farm again sent the check to me in my name only.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 19, 2018

2KBlackGT said:
My experiance was different. State Farm sent the check to me in my name(not the lein holders) and I paid the shop. Who knew SRT8 wheels were worth 5k. Drove to NC and bought a set with tires for 1800.

Then in 2016 when a uninsured old man hit me State Farm again sent the check to me in my name only.

It's not made the lien holder, it is just to protect the lien holder. Im sure the banks worked out a deal with the insurance companies to not cash checks if they have the shops name on the check with the insured. Lots of people will just take the money and run so if they were to do that with bank owned vehicles then the banks would be left with a lot of less than perfect cars if they are ever repossessed.

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Black2010 · Jun 20, 2018

Have you done bodywork before? If not, don't be quite so quick to assume it will only need a bumper cover and trunk lid. If you were more than 5mph chances are very high that their is more damage under that bumper that will need to be fixed. Not sure (and doubt familiar) with your GF's car but most cars have absorption aspects to their bumpers. Sometimes it's plastic or foam and sometimes it can actually be parts that are intended to bend/buckle.

If their was that much damage to the other car I would be extremely surprised if their wasn't more needed than you are thinking. That is one of the good aspects of having a shop do the work. If the claims adjuster misses something (they "should" account for the above) the shop works with them to get the claim adjusted to cover it. If you get a check you are SOL at that point. It's really going to depend on how good and/or experienced that adjuster is in knowing what else could be damaged and needs to be added to the initial claim.

At minimum, take the car to a reputable body shop and get an claim from them before accepting the check from the insurance company. That should help cover you as well with some of the hidden expenses.

Sorry if you knew this already but based off your question I'm assuming you don't have much experience with body shops, accident repair and or claims so I wanted to offer some help.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 20, 2018

Black2010 said:
Have you done bodywork before? If not, don't be quite so quick to assume it will only need a bumper cover and trunk lid. If you were more than 5mph chances are very high that their is more damage under that bumper that will need to be fixed. Not sure (and doubt familiar) with your GF's car but most cars have absorption aspects to their bumpers. Sometimes it's plastic or foam and sometimes it can actually be parts that are intended to bend/buckle.

If their was that much damage to the other car I would be extremely surprised if their wasn't more needed than you are thinking. That is one of the good aspects of having a shop do the work. If the claims adjuster misses something (they "should" account for the above) the shop works with them to get the claim adjusted to cover it. If you get a check you are SOL at that point. It's really going to depend on how good and/or experienced that adjuster is in knowing what else could be damaged and needs to be added to the initial claim.

At minimum, take the car to a reputable body shop and get an claim from them before accepting the check from the insurance company. That should help cover you as well with some of the hidden expenses.

Sorry if you knew this already but based off your question I'm assuming you don't have much experience with body shops, accident repair and or claims so I wanted to offer some help.

This is correct. The insurance companies really don't put too much effort into a lot of the smaller hits as shown by how they are now doing estimates just by sending photos to them. They rely on the body shops to do the tear down and supplement for whatever was missed on the initial estimate. Doing it that way saves them money as you are given less in case you take the money and walk and/or the shop fixes something without supplementing it. Insurance companies can be shady as hell.

KilledbyKenne · Jun 20, 2018

I was rear ended in my daily driver that has a lein. The insurance company didn't send me a check. They deposited the money directly into my account over the phone. Then I scheduled with my body shop and paid them when the work was done.

derklug · Jun 20, 2018

Michigan is different from almost everyone because of no-fault, but when I hit a deer with my 97, the check came in my name as there was no lien. However, to keep full coverage, I had to have an adjuster inspect the car to insure the repairs had been made.

svtfocus2cobra · Jun 21, 2018

It's not guaranteed that that is how they will handle the payment but I would say the majority of the time that is how it is done. Just something to keep in mind if you are hoping to pocket the money instead.

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CV355 · Jun 21, 2018

It depends on the limits. For minor damage such as what you are describing, it shouldn't be a problem. But, if the damages ever exceed the limits, then you wont be able to negotiate at all.

Last year, my wife was in two car accidents (neither her fault)- the first exceeded limits by a factor of nearly 40:1. The second was also head-on, but at 30mph rather than combined 150mph. We were able to negotiate on the second accident, and when additional issues were found, they tacked on a supplement. I politely argued (seriously, politely, these people were very nice) that since the vehicle was brand new off the lot, the value depreciated more from the accident. They actually helped us out with that too. A few months later, I switched to this guy's insurance company simply because of how good they were to work with.

Minor damage from accident, can I negotiate with his insurance company?

pwrshft99

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IronSnake

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