Customers regularly arrive at my shop immediately after being involved in a minor rear-end collision. The driver who just rear-ended them begs to avoid an insurance claim and offers that they will pay cash to repair their car. I am thus tasked with performing a damage assessment and offering general advice on the subject.
With that in mind let me tell you about my company’s courtesy car. It’s a tough life being a courtesy car as almost every car I have offered to customers seems to have a shorter lifespan than it should. My latest is a Suzuki SX4, which went out last week and returned a day later after the customer driving it was rear-ended by a 17-year-old driver.
My customer kept a cool head at the accident scene and explained that her own car was in for service and the other driver would also have to deal with me. Damage didn’t appear significant to them at the scene and soon the teenage driver’s mom, dad and even brother got involved trying to persuade me for a cash settlement.
Provinces differ, but in Ontario, a collision must be reported when combined damage of all vehicles involved exceeds $2,000. In British Columbia, it is $1,000. The Lexus that the teenager was driving was extensively damaged and I knew it was easily more than $2,000 from the single photo I saw. My guess was $10,000. A police report was absolutely required.
The damage to the rear bumper of the courtesy car at Lou Trottier's shop, All About Imports, in Mississauga.Lou Trottier/The Globe and Mail
Look at the first picture of the Suzuki, it doesn’t look that bad, does it? Just a simple bumper cover, but is that all the damage? As soon as the courtesy car arrived back at the shop, we brought it in for an inspection. While not apparent to the inexperienced eye, I immediately noticed that the damage was far worse than just a plastic bumper cover. The impact had caused the whole rear end of the car to be shifted downward, the rear panels, which are adjacent to the trunk, were creased and the paint was cracked.
The impact had caused the whole rear end of the courtesy car to be shifted downward, the rear panels, which are adjacent to the trunk, were creased and the paint was cracked.Lou Trottier/The Globe and Mail
The father of the 17-year-old called me moments later and I recognized that eerie feeling within the first minutes of the call that things were about to get ugly. He was begging me not to report the crash as his daughter had just gotten her licence two months prior and this incident was going to wreak havoc with his insurance policy. I tried to explain the severity, but he was not hearing me. His son had quickly arrived at the scene to assist his sister and sent dad a picture of only the rear bumper damage on the Suzuki. The son was also a young, inexperienced auto technician apprentice and was guiding his father who knew little about cars.
Moments after I informed dad that there was no flexibility in a police report, he switched tactics and asked for me and my customer to falsify the police report to show him as the driver and not his daughter. Once again, I refused and when I did, the conversation took a turn. He started yelling, stating all mechanics are thieves and that I was a scam artist ruining his daughter’s driving career. I hung up on him moments later feeling unsettled. I also felt bad for his young son as he was entering a career that his dad had zero respect for. While that is a subject for another day, this lack of respect is one of the many reasons why young people don’t want to enter trades any more and also why so many experienced auto technicians change careers.
My insurance adjuster agreed with my initial assessment and the car has been declared a total loss as it needed repair to the chassis, both rear quarter panels required replacement in addition to the bumper. The final number has not been settled yet but the estimate to repair was more than $5,000. The car was not worth fixing.
So, how do you know how much damage is actually present when you are not an expert? Let me try and simplify. When you are looking at scratches and minor indents in your bumper from the licence plate attached to the car that just rear-ended you, it’s generally safe to assume that you will be under or close to the legal must-report limit. If there are parts and pieces from either car broken off and lying on the ground, you are probably going to be close or over, especially when one of the vehicles involved is a newer vehicle.
Remember, the dollar amount in most provinces is the combination of both vehicles. A simple headlight and bumper replacement will often be more than $3,000. A single headlight assembly alone can cost upward of $1,000 on many models sporting hi-intensity discharge (HID) headlights that many manufacturers now favour. When in doubt get it inspected by a professional.
About 20 per cent of the cars I inspect which aren’t just simple paint scratches or minor indents end up being a cash-no-paperwork settlement. The remainder are either well over the limit or the person begging for the cash settlement gets upset like the father above because in their head, the repair was a simple piece of plastic. My general rule is that if you are the not-at-fault party and are unsure or uncomfortable in any way, report it because in my experience it rarely works out the way the at-fault party wants it to. Most of them have this thought process that for a couple of grand they are going to buy themselves out of a sticky situation. As soon as the real estimate to repair comes in, they almost always bail.
Lou Trottier is owner-operator of All About Imports in Mississauga. Have a question about maintenance and repair? E-mail globedrive@globeandmail.com, placing “Lou’s Garage” in the subject line.
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