Conclusion of the Car Saga

So I am happy to report that the car saga has finally ended. :) After fighting, and I do mean fighting, with the insurance company, they finally agreed to pay for all of the damages. Based on this, the body shop did all of the repairs and I picked up the car. However, at that time, I still had not received a check from the insurance company. So, I contacted them, and as usual, I had to leave a message. The next day, I received the checks and called the insurance company, because the check was made payable to my last name first, which I thought was odd. The insurance company told me that was normal, so I just deposited the check. Well, three days later, my bank contacted me saying that there was a stop payment on the check. As you could imagine, I was livid. So I had to call the insurance company again, and ask them what the freak! Needless to say, she was like, you told me to cancel it, and I was like um, what? If I said that, why would have I tried to deposit it? It didn't make sense. A new check was mailed to me and the call ended with the insurance company hanging up on me. I LOVE THEIR CUSTOMER SERVICE!!! I am just happy to report that my car is repaired and I finally have been paid by the insurance company (I think!).

Car Update

So it has been awhile since I have posted about my car, so I figured I would update you what has happened in the past two weeks. The insurance company finally agreed to cover the cost of the repairs, but would only pay approximately $1,500. So, I took the car to the body shop and they immediately, to my surprise, started working on it. However, when they started to take some of the pieces off my car to be repaired, they discovered that the front grill and the hood were damaged. The grill is broken and the hood is bent, but the body shop said that it was “minor additional damage.” They have contacted the insurance company for additional authorization on Monday, May 12. However, as of this afternoon, the insurance company still has not authorized the additional repairs, so my car is just sitting there. The ironic thing is, the insurance company thought all repairs would be completed in two days, but it has been two days of waiting for approval, rather than repair work. I guess they just want me to keep the rental car a little bit longer, because if the body shop does not hear back soon, the repairs will not be completed by this weekend.

My Car May Be a Total Loss???

So the estimator came to my house last night and said that he agreed with the repairs that the body shop said need to be done. However, he also said considering my car's age (8 years) and total mileage (~55,000), the insurance company may consider the car a total loss! The total estimated cost of the repairs was only $1,800. When I went onto Kelley Blue Book today, the value of my car is at least $5,600 for a private party sale. I am not sure how this would qualify as a total loss, but I am awaiting to hear back from the insurance company.

Car Update

Okay, I admit that my car was not damaged as much as this jeep, but because of how this process has evolved, you would think that we are talking about a lot of damage. I received a phone call today from the appraiser who wanted to drive by and look at my car sometime during the day. I explained that I am at work during the day and that I park at the Metro so getting to my car is quite difficult. So we arranged to meet sometime between 5 - 7 PM, which means I need to leave work early, but hopefully this will get the ball rolling. I mentioned to him that I have the written estimate from the body shop where the work would be done and he did not seem pleased to hear that. The only reason I mentioned it is because the insurance company told me to do so. Ugh the frustration! To my understanding, which may not be correct because the rules seem to be constantly changing, after receiving the estimate, I am supposed to then go to the body shop and have them look at the estimate. If they disagree with the estimate, then the body shop and the appraiser need to come to some form of an agreement. Now why this would occur if I already have the written estimate from the body shop, I do not know and I hope it does not happen, but if it does, you will be the first to know about it.

Day One

What better title than "Day One" to describe my first blog post. Who knows how long this will last or how often I will actually blog, but I figure, why not give this a shot. I was excited to start the blog, because quite a few friends of mine have a blog, but was shocked to see the limited selection that Google has for blog templates. Personally, I am not a fan of the template that I selected, but I think it is a matter of choosing the lesser evils.

Speaking of lesser evils, I am pondering the recent car accident that my car was involved in. I have owned my car since I graduated from college (back in 2000). My car has been with me through a lot and I try to take the best care of it, so whenever something happens to it, it is difficult for me to deal with. Well, with that said, let me describe what happened this past weekend. I parked on the street in front of my house and sometime on Saturday morning, my next door neighbor's brother, who apparently is now staying with my neighbor while he and his wife go house hunting (yeah, good luck with that), backed out of the drive way and hit the front corner of the my car. Upon hitting my car, to my understanding, he told his wife to go to our house and tell us that he hit me, but he had to run to work. His wife said that it was too early to knock on my door and that they would tell me later. It is still unclear why they didn't leave a note on my car to tell me, but such as life. Needless to say, when I went outside on Saturday, I saw what appeared to be a red taillight that was cracked by the front of my car. Therefore, I became suspicious and checked the corner and then I saw the damage: my front bumper and side fender was scraped, and the headlight was cracked. After about 10 minutes of Kara and I looking around to see what had happened, the neighbor's brother's wife ran outside in her pajamas to let us know that her husband hit my car. After talking to her, she called her husband who then spoke to me via cell phone and apologized for hitting my car. (I do have to admit, if there ever were a person that I would want to hit my car, it would be him, because he has been so nice and friendly about the matter. With that said, I NEVER want anyone to hit my car, so that is not an invite.) He wanted to settle this without going through insurance, so I said on Monday, I would go to the body shop and get an estimate and we could settle it then. So on Monday, I went to two different body shops and the result was the same. In addition to the damage I listed above, the insight radiator support was cracked, so the estimated damage was approximately $1,800. When I communicated that to the neighbor's brother, he informed me that he was only willing and able to pay $1,500 to repair my car, without going through insurance, so he said that he would file a claim with his insurance. This is the where the lesser of the two evils comes in. I am truly wondering, would I have been better off just accepting the $1,500 from him in cash and paying the difference out of pocket or am I better off going through his insurance. At this point, it is too late, and we are going through his insurance. However, as this situation continues to unfold, I truly question whether I made the right decision. The insurance company is disregarding the estimates I received and assigned my case to a body shop in Lorton! That is only a 30+ minute drive away, without traffic! So I called the insurance company, who apologized and said they would try to find someone closer. Oh the joys!