Some lady hit my car while it was parked outside my apartment complex. It's an SUV, and she must have been pretty retarded to slam into it as hard as she did. Its a 2004 RX-8, my baby, velocity red.

After a 'professional' body-shop (the kind the local VW dealership uses) has had my car for two weeks, the body shop calls me to tell me that the insurance company wont pay for the paint.

The insurance company calls me and tells me that the body shop messed up the paint, and painted half the car "hooker red" - and that it was obviously the wrong color. They wont pay for the body shop's mistakes, and they told the body shop to get it right - that they get to pay for their own mistakes.

After talking around, everyone seems to ask "Are you going to keep your car?". I love my car... but everyone seems to think that when I get it back, it wont be "just right". That they are "never the same". What do you guys think?

The car slammed into the back right panel, dented it in kinda 'bad'. Enough that the car was drivable, but any kind of suspension travel made the wheel rub horribly on the back right. It was $2500 worth of damage.

 

when I went to my bodyshop they repaired it to perfect before accident conditon. they repainted half the car in winning blue and other than a drip which I pointed out and they fixed it is pretty damn perfect. sounds like you need a better bodyshop, but besides that the shop should be insured through their own insurance and its their problem to complete the job as intended.

 

I used to believe no body shop could make a car good as new. That if my car was hit, that was it—it would never be the same. But several years ago I crossed paths with a really good "body guy" and he explained to me that this is, indeed, possible. His shop was filled with not just new cars like ours, but also some classic restorations and modern custom jobs. Most of those classic cars you see on Barrett-Jackson and at Pebble Beach have been fixed/restored good as new—often even better than new (duh!). Fixing our cars to this standard is, by comparison, relatively easy!

Many communities have a shop or two that are capable of this kind of work. It's rarely the body shop at the dealer—who often do good but not great work (which is fine 'cause that's all most people really want and that's all they're willing to pay for). But there's probably a place not too far from you where people go for custom work, custom paint jobs, or just to get their '57 Chevy restored. That's the place you want! Find out who it is and get your free estimate.

How do you find a place like that? Ask other car nuts. Go online to Porsche, Ferrari, Bentley forums and ask there. Or just phone the closest Porsche or BMW dealer and ask them who they send their cars to.

Just my 2¢.

 

^^ totally agree what staticlag and New Yorker said.
The paint screwup is the body shop's problem, they must pay for their mistakes - but finding a good body shop is crucial. If you do find one, then yes, they should be able to fix the car to perfection, unless the damage was really bad and the frame was severely bent or something.

 

If the body shop screwed up than they have to fix it on their dime.

Choose body shops very carefully in general.

 

i dread going to the body shop.

 

my problem w/ body shops isn't that they can't do great work, but more in how ethical they are and how they handle your car. even the best, most expensive places that are the exclusive shops for mercedes, lexus, bmw still have cockroach employees or mid-level managers who just don't understand or give a rats *** about the importance of treating customers' car with the utmost care and respect.

for example, one of LA's most acclaimed body shop, Marcos autobody, does really nice work. but, when i had my beamer fixed there, when i got my car back i found dry cleaning receipts under the front seats, take out food receipts, and worse is there were actual parts stolen off my vehicle in the trunk- specifically plastic pins used to hold up the trunk lining. my damage was all in the front, and i never eat in the car nor do i ever dry clean anything. so it's a no brainer what happened. so, i guess they forgot to order parts to repair another car and decided it was easier to steal them off mine. also, they didn't properly seal the cabin, so the interior of my car smelled like paint for weeks, if not months afterwards. what's the good in it looking "good as new" if u get cancer or die from over exposure to paint fumes?

and, sadly- marco's is a five star shop. this is the bs that i hate dealing with. the repair itself, they did a great job on. it's the other stuff that makes me want to puke.

 

When I bashed the front fender (including some damage to the door), I was really worried about them being able to match my Shinka black-cherry paint. I called my local dealer for a suggestion on a body shop, and got a very strong recommendation for one (Evergreen Auto Rebuild, Kirkland, WA). They were superb. I can't tell the difference, looks "good as new" to me. And no receipts under the seats or other problems. So yes, it is possible, if you find the right shop.

 

My son stuffed my old Honda Civic into a concrete wall at 55 mph. The rumple zones crumbled, the engine & tranny got pushed under the passenger compartment just like its supposed to. The car was 1 yr old & the insurance company was $300 from writing it off. Instead, they paid to have it fixed. I visited the shop a few times while they were working on the car & it did come back to me as good or better than new. Absolutely remarkable what they can do with modern equipment. I would not sweat a fender smash at all. But get the idiots to paint the car the right color. Sounds like a bunch of clowns..........

 

Well, here's to hoping then. This body shop has the 'image' of being quite nice (Big building, new-ish, many dealerships use it, etc) - so I hope things turn out alright.

 

well i'll tell you what, i had a relatively moderate incident roughly two years ago and the car really was the same afterwards and still runs beautifully even at the edge of reason.

 

They have to fix their own mistakes.

After the fix

AVOID THAT PLACE

 

Well, I got my car back.

I find it odd that the damage was only on the back right fender, but they repainted the trunk, and the back left fender, gas cap, etc. Seems excessive.

At first glance it looks fine and dandy, metal flakes and all. I'll inspect it better in the daylight.

There's a paint bubble that I pointed out, and they said I could bring it in to have them fix it. Also, there's a small 'new' dent on the back left fender that I swear wasnt there, but they insist that it was. It's barely noticible so I'll just cut my losses when it comes to that.

I did however get to see where they drove with my navigation. When I got in the car, the needle was COMPLETELY EMPTY ON GAS (lowest I've ever seen it), and the gas pump put in a bit over 15 gallons (most I've ever filled her up with). They took it for a few spins around a few blocks, major roads.

I dont konw why they would have to drive my car at all, but whatever.

After driving the rental Grand Prix I felt out of place in my own RX-8. I just couldnt position the seat comfortably. That feeling will go away soon, here's to hoping

 

Sounds like this new shop is okay, but not good and I wouldn't consider it great by any stretch.

My car is currently at the bodyshop as well, for a hit and run detailed elsewhere here. I was choosing between two different shops and talked with the manager, toured the shop, and asked about their processes to determine which shop to choose. One shop was large and very well equipped, they also have a ton of Mazda experience and is highly recommended by some forum members. I'm sure my car would have come out great. However, the shop I ultimately ended up going with is a small shop where the owner is involved intimately with the repair and is highly recommended by a coworker. He also does repairs for a lot of high end dealerships in the area. I let both shops know when I was visiting them that I have extremely high standards and am interested in inspecting their work as they are going through the repair process. In the end, the deciding factor wasn't so much the quality of the two shops, but that I felt I could trust the smaller shop more, but we shall see when I get my car back in a few days.

 

I took my last car in for some paint work and noticed that they put on 10 miles, and I too didn't understand why they had to drive it. So I called them on it. Turned out their shop is 5 miles away from their office at the dealership.

If you had a lot of gas used up, I'd call them on it. You have proof on your nav - it'd be interesting to see what kind of story they have... How many gallons do you think you had left when you dropped off the car?

 

That's why you make sure they write down the milage on your reciept when you drop off the car.

 

The interesting thing is that places seem to think that you'll never notice. I had a Honda once, with no navigation system, no GPS locator, or anything that could possibly track my car. I had it in for service once, and they logged the mileage. It came back with around 40 miles more on the odometer - and the service manager ended up calling the technician on it...

What's more, that very day, a friend spotted my car (it was somewhat distinctive) being driven by 'someone else' quite far from my home, and ended up calling me on my cell phone to tell me...

 

Just put down in writing " you will be sued if you drive my car"

 

I approve of this.

 

i have to look for a bodyshop soon MTA hit my car and the letter they send me i have to actually repair my car then send them the bill, which i got mad about because what if i dont have the money to fix it?

 

http://guidetodetailing.com/articles.php?articleId=20

 

my car right now is also in the work, recently my car was damage in passenger side in the back fender by a friggin VW. i'm worry that the body shop won't be able to put it back in the original condition, where as the the arch in the fender will be shave off, i asked my friends and they recommended me this place. Just worry about the exterior fender wher the arch is.

 

"Does a body-shop ever repair your car to the way it was?"

Before… and after…

(Not mine. Found it on the internet.)

 

in my experience, i say no, cause my driver side back fender had the arch shave off, one the most lameness point for me, and now i'm afraid the other side is going to be same, wish i had gotten a girl pregnant then let that happen to my car. You may be get better result in different shops.

 

I have had four major repairs over the years and have been fortunate to have had good to excellent results in each one. I always do a lot of research and try to find places through recommendations, selecting from at least three "finalists" out of 1/2 dozen or so "candidates". However, don't count on any of them knowing anything about rotarys, especially the RX-8 and it's no-start-after-short-warmup, etc., quirks, plus some will never listen to any of your "warnings". You might best start with recommendations from your local rotary engine mechanic's shop. I won't be going back to the last shop, however, as they still owe me money on parts I paid for that the insurance company later reimbursed them on, plus they "lost" my slightly damaged oil cooler that was replaced, that I had requested be returned. You should always request to at least see parts that are being replaced. Although they did good body & paint work (ok, I did have to make them realign the bumper that failed the pencil erasure gap test), I'll still post their name here, once my dispute with them is settled. In any event, you shouldn't settle for anything less than "perfect", unless you are paying substandard rates.