my turn to do battle with State Farm.....

was at wally world yesterday with my wife, driving her car, 1994 chrysler concorde.
we stopped, looking for a parking space, and she yelled : "HE'S BACKING UP !" WAMMM !!!!!!!!!!!
a guy in a 2015 chevy colorado 4x4 stuffed his driver side rear bumper corner dead center in the driver's door.
when he hit, i was looking at his door mirror glass, and he immediately looked and made eye contact with me.
well, he pulls back into his space, and i pull into a space, and get out to change info.
i ask him : "don't you use your mirrors ?" he says he was looking at his backup camera and didn't see anything. so i asks him, since you hit almost dead center in the door, how come you didn't see the windshield, front fender, and bumper of the car in the screen ?
well he proceeds to tell me i was moving, and ran into him ! whatever..............
exchange info and he has State Farm. great.........
since nobody was hurt, and the police have more important things to do, we exchanged info and he left. [what a DUMA$$ i was for NOT getting the police there !]
i reported it to my agent [erie insurance] and since we have just liability on our drivers, she said of course erie wouldn't pay to have the boss's car fixed, [i knew that going in, if either of us wad up our drivers, i'll suck it up and either fix 'em or off to the "storage pile", but i make sure i have LOADS of coverage on the other guy] but would support us against State Farm to get compensation.
i then contacted the guy's agent, and he already filed a claim, stating i ran into him. so the fun begins.........
got home and took a couple of pics, then blew the dust off, and was surprised to find NO scratches or BROKEN paint ! i couldn't believe it !
if i was moving and ran into him as he claims, then there should have been motion scratches in the paint !
her car is a very nice example of that era, having no rust and original paint.
my buddy has an almost identical truck, so i'm going over to his place and position her car and his truck in the crash position, then take a screen shot of his backup camera, which i believe will show the car from the windshield forward, proving the guy wasn't looking when he backed out of his spot. [at least i hope so.....]
[but not very happy at this minute in time]

So get the pics into your insurance. Include a document of some sort asking how you "hit" him, do they really think you were sliding sideways? In a parking lot? WHILE he was backing out? Ask them now, who hit who?

If worse actually comes to worse, a paintless (PDR) guy can fix that.

my agent took a pic yesterday, then a claims adjuster called me yesterday afternoon and said an adjuster will be contacting me next week to set up an appointment to take more pictures.

oh, i forgot. the claims adjuster also took a taped conversation with my permission, so that should help. [i hope]

Any insurance adjuster with an ounce of forensic knowledge will know immediately that the other guy hit you.
Unless there's some parallel universe where Concordes slide perfectly sideways into bumper corners.

Unfortunately, nowadays you have to immediately photograph the impact, both vehicles, & the scene.
Police reports are great, but good luck getting one; they'll blow you off right away if there aren't injuries or an extreme situation.

I hope they don't total it.

Can you ask for camera footage of the parking lot at the time of the accident?

Yes, had this happen to a relative who's car was a hit and run victim in a parking lot. They caught the lady after a few weeks of searching for her car that was on the store video camera. Leaving the scene is not smart at all.

Unfortunately, as soon as he hit you, put the car in park and take pictures of the scene.

I'd tell the adjuster that both you and the wife aren't feeling great and headed to the doctor for an evaluation. It's a game of leverage if the other guy is a liar.

Glad you weren’t hurt, I wouldn’t worry too much, even State Farm can’t [censored] this up.

my suggested version
Worked well for me when dealing with SF, They became a lot more cooperative

0

You have to get over the who struck who crap. It doesn't matter. It's who owed the duty to who. The person backing out had the duty to yield. The location of the impact also shows you were clearly behind the other vehicle when they backed up.

As to the threat of medical treatment ha,ha that means nothing. It's a separate claim. Just sit back and let the adjuster go thru his steps. Ultimately they will pay the claim regardless of what the insured tries to claim. The company has the final say, its actually written into the SF policy.

I believe the standard is to not call the police for a fender bender but if one does not it becomes a legal mini court battle as to who is at fault with one of the involved lying. In many communities the police are too busy to arrive but in my community I have called the police and they arrived and the at fault driver was ticketed. The ticket and information on it is significant to proving who truly was responsible.

In general I don’t think the police will get involved in minor accidents that happen on private property such as a store parking lot.

There is no "standard" with regard to that.

Police departments decide what they will respond to. Some refuse to respond to an MVA unless there are injuries being claimed or a traffic hazard exists. Others will respond to any report of an MVA.

Police will not cite on private property. Some agencies will just write an informational report. Others will write an actual accident report and comment on the facts of the loss, but will typically not address liability. This is because they can't cite someone.

We got hit in the Penny's parking lot some years back. Slow speed, no real damage of any kind. Called the cops. It took a while but an officer showed up, assessed the incident, said it was below the threshold for a citation. I did ask him if there will be a record of his involvement and he said there would be. I was good with that. My fear is that at the accident everyone is fine and then suddenly I find myself in court with the other driver in a neck brace and his lawyer claiming because of me his client will never be able to work again.

that's what i was wondering. i have been looking around on craigs list and fakepage market place hoping to find one of these cars for good spare body parts, but have struck out mostly.
anything that is listed has rust or damage issues. these cars were kind of like the aspen and volare, it seems the rust was a factory "option".
also, the ones listed seem to be in the $850 - $1300 or so range, so depending on what kind of estimate[s] i get, it could be close to being totaled.
i'll see what/if i can find any old car value guide says, if that thing is even listed.

it's funny you should mention back and neck pain.
both my wife and i suffer from both of these issues due to age and other medical issues.
in fact, we had just came from the hospital where i had just received injections in both of my knees and hips due to wear and tear. we figured we would stop at wally world and pick up a few things. shoulda just went home instead.

i was thinking about that. i'll have my claim agent do that monday.
thanks for reminding me !

mopX ....rumor has it that Haggarty has a special coverage 4 u

Dust insurance !

If more than an inch of dust collects on the vehicle yur storing ....

They send out a special POWER WASHER to clean it off !

Over the what THIRTY YEARS you’ve had yer Charger...... just think how many times you could have used those bennies !

now DoC, the dust was just the little that had landed on her car over the last few days since it was last washed.
the "boss" insists on a clean SHINY car !
and i have had my charger for FIFTY ONE yEaRs, thank you...........

got an appointment with the insurance adjuster. he is coming over to take pics and measurements. then off to get a couple of estimates.

Why are you wasting your time getting multiple estimates? You don't have to do that. No state requires you to do that. Pick the shop you want to fix it, and that's it. Or, if you're going to fix it yourself (which you are 100% allowed to do), get an estimate from the shop that you'd have fix it if you weren't going to fix it yourself. Don't waste your time running around. Don't waste the time of multiple shops who aren't going to be fixing your car.

you have a good point. the adjuster that's coming to look at it should have a good idea what the damage figure is.

When my 71 HemiCuda got hit in a shopping lot (I wasn't even in the car) Snake Farm was my Insurer (big mistake having them), they required 3 licensed local bodyshop estimates from me, they sent out no appraiser, everything was done by mail or phone, then they wanted to "total" my car for a creased rear qtr, highest estimate I had was $1800...... they never paid a dime the weasels, after months of calls/letters from me, but they had no problem asking for monthly installments....it was a stated valued policy with full coverage, live and learn...

Don't count on it, over the decades, dealing with various adjusters/appraisers both in the shop and my home, I find most have little to no knowledge what they're looking at vehicle or damage wise.... I did enjoy some retribution on Snake Farm some years ago when one of Snake Farm's insured total out my Daughter Ford Escort, it was a $600 4cylinder econo $hitbox, that I slapped some junkyard Escort GT body flare pkg and a quickie paint job on, car looked great for a kids first beater, probably had no more than $1K in the whole car, the Snake Farm goof showed up after 3-4 weeks of waiting, fortunately for me he told me I had one of those rare GT Escorts worth some money!, I didn't say a word....he cut a check for $3800

My buddy's RR got hit and State Farm paid $40K to have it fully repaired. But I've heard a bunch of other stories where State Farm refused to pay claims or made it super difficult to collect so it is hard to know what to believe. Maybe it all depends on the specific person involved.

Their "requirement" is not relevant. They don't make the rules, the state legislature does. You don't need 3 estimates, period.

We received a repayment demand from SF on a Mercedes SUV. It was a base model with faux leather interior. When determining the value of the vehicle, SF added not one, not two, but three (!!!) different leather interior packages to the list of options, along with the woodgrain steering wheel. The vehicle clearly did not have a black leather interior, AND a white leather interior, AND a gray leather interior (or whatever color the 3rd one was), and they actually sent us a picture of the base model steering wheel. We told them all of this. They threw a fit. I got my buddy who owns a shop that does the collision work for the local MB dealer to get me a copy of the build sheet for the vehicle in question. It confirmed that we were right, and SF was wrong. We gave them a copy, reduced their payment demand by almost $17k and told them to pound sand. They went away and never made another peep.

so should i get one estimate ?
my insurance claims guy is coming this afternoon around 3:30.

You don't have to get any estimates if you don't want to. You can tell them you want them to come look at it. They may ask you to go to one of their direct repair shops to get an estimate. You are allowed to tell them no. They don't get to dictate where you gen an estimate from, how many estimates you get, etc.

I would, just to know how on base he is, it costs you nothing but some of your time.....The Insurance industry is most certainly a mixed bag of nuts

Another resource is the dodgeintrepid.net classifieds.

Go to the shop you want to use and get an estimate. The only problem you'll have is if the price you get is way out of line or if their adjuster under cuts the repair value. That's usually the only reason you'd need multiple estimates.

Now if they want to write off your car and you disagree on value that's a different story. Thats what caused me the most headaches with state farm but once I was finally able get it through to them that their offer was too low and got the proof they wanted it was resolved pretty quick. It took several weeks to get there tho.

That doesn't look like anything major on the concorde. Even a paintless dent guy might be able to get it out depending on what access they have inside the door.

You don't ever need multiple estimates. Do you want to turn control of your repairs over to the insurance company and let them try to dictate things? Get multiple estimates, do what the insurance company tells you that you "have" to do, try to appease them, try to find a compromise between them and the shop that wrote your original estimate. Or, you can listen to the guy with almost 30 years of experience in this arena, and keep control of the situation by standing your ground and knowing your rights. Your call.

here is the update.
i have already decided that my one buddy [who lives in jamestown, ny] will be fixing the car. he has already looked at it, and he said it will be a relatively easy fix, however, the problem will be the blend between the front fender and the rear door. he has done body work his whole life, and is retired now working out of his shop at home. i have known him for over 45 years, and he does very good work.
i had one estimate done locally, and it was $1441.43. [i had guessed it would be roughly around $1000-1200]
state farm wants to pay me 60%, as they said i was 30% at fault. what happened to the other 10% ????
i also reenacted the crash, using my buddy's pickup, which is almost identical to the guy's truck that hit me. after observing what is in the backup cam, it's almost laughingly obvious the guy wasn't watching it as he claimed.
also, my buddy's truck has a "beeper" alarm that goes off when it's about 6 feet or so away from hitting what is in the camera's range. i'm guessing the other guy's truck has this as well.
i am going to have my attorney write a letter to state farm and see what their response is.

Years ago I had a somewhat similar issue, wife was driving down the alley to park in our garage, guy pulls out from along side a fence perpendicular to the alley and located so that he could not see oncoming traffic and ht the side of my wife's car.

We immediately called our insurance, after exchanging ifo and getting home. Was told to file with his insurance to simplify the deductible recovery. SO we hung up and called his insurance. They took all our information and we waited.

Several weeks later after being told they were not going to cover our car because he claimed we hit him, no one came out to even look at the cars and him dodging their calls, I got mad. Told his insurance that I was going to get an attorney, I had talked to my insurance about this and they offered to sue on my behalf. As they told me "it's part of what you pay us for". Next day his insurance, after mine had a talk with them, called up and claimed they had gotten in touch with him again and the story they got this time was not consistent so they'd pay up.

Might need an attorney since you are both State Farm.

i have erie insurance, the guy that hit me has state farm.
as this car is old, i just have liability on it, but WAY more than is necessary, just in case i or my wife cause an accident.
i'm man enough that if either of us cause an accident, i'll bite the bullet and fix our stuff my self, and erie will pay for the damages we cause.
however, if someone else wacks us, it's a way different story !
erie has already said they won't cover the damage, and i don't expect them to. i believe state farm needs to step up, but i believe it will take some prodding from me for them to do so.
if this was like every other 93-97 concorde in the state of pennsylvania, it wouldn't be such a big deal.
this car is NICE, and we have decided long ago, this will last us the rest of our time[s] here. if WE wad it up bad, off to the boneyard it will go, and we will find something else.
as it is, we are most certainly going to fix it.

SF will cave after your attorney contacts them, as they should. Their driver is clearly 100% at fault here.

It’s always all about the bengimans

A good Paintless Dent guy should be able to fix that pretty easily. My wife KO'd both passenger doors of my my 2004 Dodge pickup, and they looked that bad or worse. Paintless dent guy here local fixed them to where you can't tell it. Cost me $280, and I didn't even bother to turn it in to my insurance.

Is there a method that does not require an attorney?

Around here they are $200 to $300 and hour and a letter will cost an hour. Kinda stinks you have to pay $300 to get a company to do what's right.

He can be persistent and do it himself. He can threaten to take their insured to small claims court. In fact, he can actually file in small claims court. That will force SF to provide a defense for their insured in court, as they are contractually obligated to do so. No way they will waste time/money defending that. They'll pay. It's a $1,500 claim, they want him to absorb 30% of it. It would cost them far more than $500 to hire an attorney to show up and defend this.

I just finished a dispute with American Family. I was on firm legal ground and wrote them a letter that if they didn't handle the situation I was sending a formal complaint to the ND Insurance Commissioner's office. Did the trick. Something similar may work here.

^ also good advice.

I’m one of the I hope I never have to deal with State Farm again guys. I got rear ended in the almost spotless 2003 Chevy Malibu I bought from my mother estate after she passed away. A very careless woman hit me with her Cadillac Escalade while I was stopped at a stop sign. My car was totaled and I received whiplash and suffered headaches for 8 months. Two mri’s, four weeks of therapy, five hours in the emergency room, and three doctors appointments later they offered me 800.00. I got a lawyer and because my over 5000.00 in bills got knocked down to almost nothing being paid out by the insurance company. Since recovery is based on payouts I got 2000.00 and my laser got 1000.00. Lots of hassle and pain for that.

If that's the case, wouldn't you also be responsible for 30% of the repairs to the other car?

Bogus. That's 100% the fault of the other driver.

one nice thing about my attorney, i went to school with him, and was his first "customer" when he came out of law school.
he filed the paperwork and did the requirements needed for me when my buddy and i started our junkyard back in 1972.
i have been with him since, and he always cuts me a good deal on fees when i need him.

then there is the Pa. rule on "backing" :

JUSTIA
View the 2019 Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes I View Other Versions of the
Pennsylvania Consolidated Statutes
2010 Pennsylvania Code
Title 75 - VEHICLES
Cilapl~l~ ij'j = Miscellaneous Provisions---""""'- - T .!.!..L._ ·0-- 01- 1-. - _1_.!_
;S7="~ = Llliiilitli Ii~ 1uaclUIIg.
§ 3702.
(a)
Limitations on backing.
General rule.--No driver shall back a vehicle unless the
movement can be made with safety and without interfering with
other traffic and then only after ~yielding the right-of-way to
moving traffic and pedestrians.
(b) Limited access highways.--No driver shall back a vehicle.
upon any shoulder or roadway of any limited access highway.
Cross References. Section 3702 is referred to in sections
1535, 3326 of this title

one of the first things i asked this guy was, : "what would you have done if i had of been a pedestrian ?"
his response was "you were going the wrong way !"...........???????????????

all this effort i am putting out just because this car is NICE !

If both parties are at fault in an accident, but one is clearly more at fault, the party who is less at fault not responsible for any of the majority at fault's damages unless the accident happens in a state that has pure comparative negligence laws. Most states have what's called modified comparative negligence, meaning the majority at fault party is responsible for whatever % of damage they are liable for, but the less at fault party is not responsible for any damage at all.

Were you going the wrong way down the aisle in the parking lot? Because if you were, that changes things a bit.

was in my lane going the correct way.