"authorised" bodyshop my arse
Discussion
Someone crashed into my XF, and insurer nominated a repairer. Jaguar authorised repair centre, part of Jaguar main dealer. Happy days says me, can't get better than that... survey says eeee urrrr wrong
First try (2 weeks):
What a s
tbag though eh?
Moral of the story, always nominate your own repairer.
First try (2 weeks):
- car dirty, and compound spattered paintwork
- badly fitted rear bumper panel sitting proud of the neighbouring one
- rattled from inside driver's door traced to loose wire
- worst of all, dull and scratched paintwork to the area of repair
- dull paint to rear panel under OSR light cluster
- scrape to offside front wing
- scratches to driver's door under wing mirror (replaced as part of the repair)
- dull section to driver's door near handle
- scratch to OSF side of front bumper valance
- rear bumper loose near OSR wheel
- paint spray on offside rear alloy wheel! couldn't believe that one...
- chip to OSF quarter near bottom
- scratches on the OSR door edge
- scrapes to the wheel arch - just where they were meant to have done the repair for the 2nd time
- paintwork all along the offside is orange peel, just a horrible cheap spray job
What a s
tbag though eh?Moral of the story, always nominate your own repairer.
I had similar issues with a manufacturer authorised bodyshop but the benefit was I was able to continually throw it back to them until it was right - they never complained, never said i was fussy, never tried to charge me - they just kept trying again. Which is annoying and shouldn't have happened but we got there in the end and I had a decent brand new loaner each time.
Contrast this with finding a good independant. That really is like trying to find a diamond in the rough - its so hard to find a good bodyshop and the ones not affiliated to anyone but the gaffer out the back tend to be far more reluctant to continually redo things until its right...
If you know of a spot-on bodyshop then great but how Joe Public is supposed to find one I've no idea.
Contrast this with finding a good independant. That really is like trying to find a diamond in the rough - its so hard to find a good bodyshop and the ones not affiliated to anyone but the gaffer out the back tend to be far more reluctant to continually redo things until its right...
If you know of a spot-on bodyshop then great but how Joe Public is supposed to find one I've no idea.
Sump said:
Who's stupid enough not to choose their own repairer? 
How are people supposed to know who the repairer they want is? I chose my own repairer - the manufacturer - because really where else was I go to? 99% of the public don't have a mate in the trade or know of a great bodyshop. Sump said:
Who's stupid enough not to choose their own repairer?
Did you read the thread?It was a Jaguar approved / authorised dealer. Now, Jaguar don't make cheap cars and even older ones are often owned by people who want something a bit prestigious (even if it is an X-type) so one would assume the quality of work to be of a pretty high standard and be reassured by the dealers 'choice' bodyshop...
I had a claim earlier this year and the company that handled it (when I asked to appoint a main dealer to retain warranty) said they strongly recommended NOT using main dealers due to the number of problems they have. Car ended up going to their preferred garage, Alton Cars near barnsley, and they did an amazing job on quite a tricky repair.
It did look pretty funny, my lowly Ford in amongst a fleet of black/dark top end jags, audis and beemers.
It did look pretty funny, my lowly Ford in amongst a fleet of black/dark top end jags, audis and beemers.
A mate of mine is a panel beater and worked for a while at one of the larger bodyshops which will remain nameless, but are all over the country. They are screwed down by the insurance company they contract for (fixed fee per repair, no matter how minor or major), so in turn the bodyshops cut every corner they can.
The last straw for him came when he was repairing front end damage on a nearly new Merc. The wing was bent so far in it was touching the suspension strut, but they refused to replace the panel and made him repair it. He said he had to jump on it to get it anywhere near 'wing shaped' again, before loads of reshaping and filling. I'm not 'sure which insurance company it might have been, but suffice to say, using your insurance company's approved bodyshop is rarely a good idea.
The last straw for him came when he was repairing front end damage on a nearly new Merc. The wing was bent so far in it was touching the suspension strut, but they refused to replace the panel and made him repair it. He said he had to jump on it to get it anywhere near 'wing shaped' again, before loads of reshaping and filling. I'm not 'sure which insurance company it might have been, but suffice to say, using your insurance company's approved bodyshop is rarely a good idea.
Sump said:
Who's stupid enough not to choose their own repairer?
When my last car was hit in 2011, I nominated a Porsche approved bodyshop (I was with Admiral too). The difference in nominating your own bodysop is that you don't get a guaranteed courtesy car. Also, the excess for a non fault claim you have to pay out of your pocket to the repairer and then the insuer will set about recovering it from the other side. I don't think this is the case if you let your insurer sort everything out with their own repairer.
That said, Admiral checked with their courtesy car people (Albany) who said that they would still give me a car. Result. The repair work from JCT/Porsche was exactly as I expected - perfect. Courtesy car was nice too.
What wasn't nice was waiting for Admiral/Albany to recover my excess. It took them a full year and required continual chasing on my part. In the end I managed to get the contact and reference details of the third part insurer. I called them direct and they cheque sent in post 2 days later.
Moral of the story: Nominating your own repairer is the way to go, but be ready for the hassle of recovering your excess if it is a non fault claim.
Sump said:
Who's stupid enough not to choose their own repairer?
I've never had to have a car repaired or repainted. I have zero experience of the quality of any bodyshops despite decades of driving. If a car of mine got damaged I'd have no way of telling where I could get a good repair done.I would rather drive my car with dents in it than use Land Rover's local authorised repairer. They repaired my old one five times and on three of those occasions it had to be returned for it to be done again.
In fact the standard of their work is so bad that when I was thinking of trading it in, the sales manager at the dealership knocked me a grand off the trade in price because he'd need the body repairs doing again!.
Gassing Station | General Gassing | Top of Page | What's New | My Stuff