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Bumper bender, now what?

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So it finally happen, some inconsiderate bastard backed into my car while parked.

Now what, it’s the rear quarter panel and bumper. Do I need to take this to a Tesla shop or can joe down the block buff that out?
 
Dropped off the car today at a Tesla Authorized body shop here in Long Island. Said the damage wasnt bad and that they can "work the metal" to get out the dent and repaint the panel and bumper. They said I didnt need the whole panel replace but for $1200 bucks + deductible I'm very skeptic. Its at a Geico repair shop and inspected by the on-site Geico adjuster, the job is warrantied so we''ll see how it goes. They ETA the car back to me by Thursday, I'll keep you posted.

Cleaned her up the best I could before I brought it in.

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Ok so the works done and she looks good. There is a panel gap difference between the bumper lip and where it meets the body but I don’t exactly remember if it was like that before the accident. Maybe someone can post a pic of their rear quarter panel so I can check. The turn around was excellent, dropped it off Monday picked it up Thursday but here’s the kicker...that was $3300 worth of repairs which is insane. My deductible is $500 so no big deal, and I took it to a Geico Xpress / Tesla certified repair shop which had a Geico employee there overseeing the repairs. A bulk of the work was in labor to unplug and disassemble stuff but there was a $1300 “parts” charge that the owner explain to me that was just a line item for stuff they had to do (fishy), and that the panel obviously was not replaced.

Overall good experience, not let’s see if my insurance premium goes up next year.
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The parts costs will probably come down over the course of several months but the labor will remain stubbornly high.

that is incredible turnaround tho.. for the Model S you would be looking at 2 weeks at a very ambitious minimum and probably 3 weeks if I was being more realistic.. although even as I write this i'm wondering if parts availability for the Model S have improved over the past year to the point where "a week or so" turn around time is now possible.

my last accident was pretty major so even tho the parts were mostly in stock.. there was a lot of work to be done to the car which took a while.
 
Anyone adding a 1300 parts charge to the bill, that is not actually parts is taking you and your insurance company for a ride.

I definitely questioned the charge however the owner told me that its the way the roll up certain misc items. There is a Geico adjuster with a desk inside the body shop's office so if Geico is cool with the phantom parts up-charge who am I to complain.
 
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You are the customer who's rates will be raised, of course the adjuster wouldn't mind that either.

$1300 in "Misc items"...lol. Smells like fraud to me, wonder if the adjuster gets a piece or is just blind to it.

Can you give an example of what was already itemized on the bill? Was paint and such already paid?
 
Most insurances won't officially pay Tesla approved body shop labor rates. The final bill reflects the Insurance company's max labor rate and then you often see "misc chargers" which are often actually just the differential between the body shop labor rate and the max labor rate the insurance will pay.

i'm not sure why they do this.. but i can think of a few reasons.
 
Can you give an example of what was already itemized on the bill?

Im planning on bringing it up with Geico, Im not buying the shop's position on this "parts" charge. But on another note, they did do a good job on the repair and they are the closest and only Tesla approved body shop in my area...do I really wanna piss in their sandwich? hmmm

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Most insurances won't officially pay Tesla approved body shop labor rates. The final bill reflects the Insurance company's max labor rate and then you often see "misc chargers" which are often actually just the differential between the body shop labor rate and the max labor rate the insurance will pay.

i'm not sure why they do this.. but i can think of a few reasons.

Hmmm, this kinda make sense, my dentist does same thing she bills $300 for cleaning and $500 for checkup, insurance pays her $550 total and patient suppose to pays the rest but she never bills me because the real cost of the procedure is $550, but she knows if she billed insurance $550 she'd only get $200 bucks. o_O