Accident Advice: Insurance or Person?

Last paragraph says it all. Let you heart lead you. Everyone will have their own opinion.

Last time I got rear ended I hired a lawyer, but that was me.

Best of luck to you, I know things don't look great right now.

 

If the fella seemed trustworthy and you have all his info why not give him a chance to pay out of pocket if he is willing to... Go get a couple quotes and call the fella and see what he says.

Worst case is you eventually file a claim through insurance if he tries to screw you. The car is drivable obviously so the only thing is you would have to live with driving around with a scuffed up bumper till he pays..

I think it's the civil thing to do, you help the guy out by him not gettin canned from his job, plus you get your car fixed. Make sure he pays you for a rental car if that's necessary also.

 

you can contact your insurance company, get a repair quote and ask the guy for cash all in one day. id he balks, tell him to forget it. i have received the runaround in this situation as well.

 

I'd suggest time is of the essence - get quotes TODAY, contact him, tell him if he gets the money to you within x days (last time I specified 5 days), but if not you'll be lodging an insurance claim on DAY 6.

In my case, was similar to yours, when the repairer looked underneath, there was a deformed rear bumper reinforcement bar which needed replacing, pushing the price up considerably. I forwarded the quote to the other party - who ignored it, I gave a couple of extra days, sent a reminder saying "if not paid by 5pm tomorrow, I'll forward a claim to insurance" - insurance had it repaired within a week.

 

It's a moving accident, get a police report and call your insurance company, or be a crook, he is.

 

A body shop should be able to fix that for under$500

SM-N900P ?

 

Make sure to ask for an out of pocket quote and not an insurance quote as bodyshops have been known to tack on unnecessary items and or overbill for labor etc if insurance is paying...

Also if you have a discover card, are with USAA, or any number of other associations (AARP, AAA, etc) a rental car is normally much, much cheaper than full retail rental price. Heck we rented a brand new suburban and a Durango (swapped just for fun) for 10 full days in Cali for just over $400 after rebates..

Your bumper repair should take a couple days at most...

 

Your welcome. Hope it all works out for you

 

Having accident record on your insurance also is not a good thing, even it is not your fault. For 1K you can get repair, and may be keep couple hundreds, but check with trusted body shop, if there other issues. Good luck.

 

Thanks for doing this. I've been on both sides of the accident before when I was driving as a courier and appreciate people giving us a break.

The guy that hit me had the audacity to ask me to go to several places for a lower estimate after I told him how much the repair was. I called my insurance company and let them deal with.

The guy I hit gave me a quote and I paid it. No muss no fuss. His quote was ridiculously high for a scratch but still better than an increase in my premiums.

 

$1,000 sounds pretty good. For one thing, you only need to replace the bumper cover, which is that whole vinyl piece, and maybe a few clips. Very doubtful there's any other damage. Second, labor is trivial. Once you or your garage has the part, it's easy to install.
The only problem is if your Prius is blizzard Pearl and not white. That paint is hard to match.
There are a lot of $260 bumper covers out there. Painted to match will cost more but I doubt it's going to cost over $500 total, nor should it be in the shop more than a day.

 

Even at a shop, I could fine a place with a good job and less than 1K. Absolutely agree about color, super white is super popular, much easier to find painted parts but probably won't be a perfect match.

 

Its funny, but estimators always use the, "we won't know if there's more damage until we start to work on it," but in cases like this, you can easily remove that bumper cover and see if the styrofoam beneath it is damaged, or you can look at the bumper mounts to see if they're dented. In this photo, I doubt there's anything but the cosmetic damage. Some people would give it a cheap squirt of spray paint and pocket the $1,000, and that's perfectly legal.

 

I did something similar to what you are describing two cars ago. Young kid, stupid accident, gave him a break so his insurance payments wouldn't be higher than his car payments. Took him to the guy I use for all my body work, kids father gave body shop a CC number, payed promptly and in full. Worked for me.

 

It could be a LOT more than a $1000!!! all depends what (if anything) damaged behind the bumper plus they will have to bland in the side panels on both sides on the back.

Get the insurance information safe bet in most case the other guy can pay be the insurance at the end so no case.