Door ding

[Max*]

So... I was parked dropping my kids off to school, and someone backed out of his driveway into my car. He stayed, thankfully. I'm about to file a claim through his insurance company

Question: can I file a diminished value claim? I heard it's only for serious damage (I think this will just be a new door cover), but at the same time if I sell my car, it'll cost less due to an accident?

 

[mobe]

Ouch. Well if you have to get hit that's a
Pretty good place for it as the door is a simple to remove, paint and install.

 

[Max*]

Claim has been filed. For whatever reason his insurance needed my insurance info also (he admitted 100% fault), I was hoping my insurance wouldn't find out for a while.

 

[Electricfan]

I can't imagine your insurance company will have any reaction, as long as his insurance pays in full. I got rear-ended years back and my insurance company was totally calm - just said call us if you need us. Man, that's the biggest "door ding" I've ever seen!!

 

[freeewilly]

It doesn't matter your insurance company knows about the indecent or not. As long as a insurance company is involved or police issues a report, it will show on carfax.

 

[Max*]

Insurance is such a scam. I was rear ended years ago, and my insurance company didn't have a record of it. When I called to negotiate a discount, they reran my report and the accident came up, well not only did I not get a discount, my rates went up for 3 years because I no longer qualified for sone clean driving history discount.

Such a scam.

Anyways, dimimshed value is unlikely due to the minor damage, or is it something I should purse?

 

[gaswalla]

Whoa...that's a bit more than a ding

 

[Cyclone]

Max, I would consider pursuing. Your car, if I recall correctly, is less than a year old. When the next buyer comes along and pulls a Carfax, they will see "accident report". You can show pics and the full repair order, but you will lose people who simple "move on to a car that hasn't been wrecked". As such, you will sell for a lower price since your car is "tainted". Personally, I've never filed for it, but purely because I was lucky. I didn't have any incidents until my truck was 6 years old. I still should have pursued it, but I didn't.

 

[CHG-ON]

And you call that a ding? That would check me into a psych ward!

 

[Sir Guacamolaf]

That looks bad, sorry to see your "ding"

 

[Max*]

Thanks Cyclone, yeah, the car is only 9 months old.

The "door ding" title was to add some... humor into an otherwise unfortunate situation. My wife was surprised at how well I handled it, heh. She thought I was going to go ballistic.

 

[rypalmer]

I'm sorry to say it, but your car appears to be a total loss.

 

[Max*]

Appraiser just left. That's a $1,900 repair, they were in touch directly with the Tesla certified body shop.

The good news is that even though the body shop is 1.5 hours from here, they'll come down to get my car and bring it back once it's done.

They need to replace the entire door (well the door shell), paint, blend, etc.

 

[sorka]

It doesn't matter your insurance company knows about the indecent or not. As long as a insurance company is involved or police issues a report, it will show on carfax.

My 8 year old Prius with 217K miles has had bad luck. It's been in 6 accidents. Rear ended twice, door backed into twice. Rebar falls off of work truck striking front bumper. Wife hits raccoon at 50 MPH. None of them have ever shown up on CarFax. The raccoon was $2500 in damage.

 

[Sir Guacamolaf]

To be honest, $1900 for done deal on a damage like that .. I think you got off easy. Tesla repairs can be much higher!

 

[Max*]

Took over 3 weeks, but they finally got the parts.

They're busy, so the next opening is in 9 days. Hopefully it's a quick repair (I don't see why it wouldn't be)

 

[Alex D]

Ouch, so sorry that happened. At least it's a reasonable fix and shouldn't take long at all. Like someone said before, you were lucky that it got that ding where it is, center door. A little bit more to the front and it might have been a bigger issue.

 

[Max*]

Alright, well that wasn't a $1,900 repair. That turned into a $3,750 repair.


In addition, Dorns (the shop I used) didn't extend my rental, so I'm dealing with the insurance company to call Dorns to request my rental be extended, so that Enterprise doesn't charge me for the extra time... sigh...


In addition, I inquired about diminished value. Haven't decided what I'll do yet, we'll see what the insurance company says tomorrow. On one hand, I don't want to deal with getting an estimator out and then fighting with the insurance company over maybe $1k-$2k, on the other hand I don't want to be low-balled too much either. I guess I'll decide after I talk to the insurance company.

And the final addition, Dorns send my car back on Friday (or Saturday?) to Tesla Tysons. I don't know who screwed up, but on Monday when I called to inquire where my car is Dorns told me they it's already at Tysons Tesla, and Tysons Tesla told me to "come over to pick it up anytime". Would've nice to get a call on Friday or Saturday, instead of waiting till Monday to get the car.

 

[Max*]

Final update to the thread. Esurance is sending me a check for $1,300 (just for me asking about the DV).

Yes, I realize I could've gotten more for more work, but I'm planning on keeping the car a long time (so my true DV will decrease with time, and I don't feel like l'm trying to rip the insurance company off), and it's more than I thought they'd give me without a fight.
So I'm happy, and they're probably happy I didn't fight it.

Dorns send an updated length of repairs, enterprise was paid.

Done and done.

 

[hybridbear]

Glad it worked out!