Door Ding and dealing with insurance....
 

Hey guys, I just got my door dinged in the parking lot by the car parked next to me. I took pictures and I waited for the owner to come back to his car. After some convincing, I was finally able to get his insurance information and I filed a claim. They took all the information and said someone will call me Monday.

So... I've never had to deal with insurance before... Anything I need to look out for or do in the meantime? I'm just not really sure what to expect when they call or what further steps there are.

Any advice is greatly appreciated.

Just take pictures and share it with your insurance. They are there for you and will do all the work. Find a shop or two where you would like to get the ding fixed. Get a few quotes, and just wait for them to call you back. Luckily for you it is just a ding!

I got rear ended and had to replace my baby's ass end, but she is back to normal.

Kind of off-topic, but how did you know it was the car next to you and not some other car?

Well the dent was right next to my driver's side door handle, so I knew that dent was brand new when I came back to my car and saw it. Plus I was at dinner so my car was only parked there for ~ 1 hr (1.5 hrs at most), not much time for several cars to come in and out of the spot next to me).

Given the short time frame and the "freshness" of the dent, the most apparent suspect was the car next to me. After checking the edges of his car door (which would have made the contact with mine), there was either white paint on the edge of the door or a paint chip at around the same height as my dent and (from eyeballing the door swinging motion) apparently aligned with it as well. Black paint was also exchanged onto my door.

When he first arrived back at his car, I didn't straight away accuse him and his passengers. I showed him the dent, showed him the apparent chip/exchange of paint, and the apparent alignment of the chip with the dent. He initially denied it, and said that he was only there to pick people up (4 other passengers) and that no one had opened the door when he initially parked (it was the back door, passenger side). I was skeptical and asked him to open the door to see if the paint chip on his door aligned with the dent in my door. Sure enough, it aligned perfectly. So perfectly, that he didn't even argue when I asked him to just give me his insurance to deal with it.

It sucks for him cause I think the little kid sitting in back probably swung the door open with reckless abandon. But I was pretty livid that he kept lying to me about what happened and wouldn't take any responsibility. I think I'm even more pissed because I started believing him. If he would have moved his car an inch where the chip and dent didn't align or even to another spot, I would have been screwed and stuck to deal with it myself.

Now I'm just hoping that I don't somehow get screwed by insurance. Like I said, I've been fortunate enough not to have to deal with insurance claims since I started driving (over 10 years ago), but now I have no idea what to expect...

Pictures tell the best story, no matter what you say or do -- you cannot deny images.

in this situation, before he arrived I would have taken pictures of your dent and his paint chip, then when he does arrive take the picture where the door swung out so that he can't lie his ass off.

But good job in getting the insurance info -- since it's his fault it's not your problem.

insurance will fix your door since it's a claim, unless they find some loop hole, body damage is body damage.

Good luck and I wish you the best!

Man, that really worked out well. I don't think I've ever gotten close to catching a door dinger, and I don't think I could've handled a situation like that quite as well as you did. :thumbsup: But paintless dent repair is amazing (and pretty cheap), so I wouldn't sweat it too much. Unless the dent deeply messed up your paint.

Haha, thanks... I wish I did handle it "well." After, the damage aligned and I told him to just give me his insurance and deal with it (I'm not going to lie, I was pretty pissed at this point cause that's when I realized he was lying and expected me to deal with it), he told me "Alright, just shut the fuck up." Things went downhill quite fast after that. I wasn't going to let things escalate to a fight or anything, but we exchanged a lot of words.

I haven't had experience with the paintless dent repair and I have no idea if it would work here. I've attached photos of the dent if anyone was interested. You can see the main dent corresponds to the chip in his door and the white paint scraped below the main dent is on his door as well.

That looks like a serious dent. I'm glad you got his info so he can pay for it.

Yeah, that's a pretty bad dent. Right on the crease, but I bet a skilled repairer could do it. Maybe it will just cost a little more and more time. It really does look like it was his car. That level of denting (and especially cuz of the location) would piss me off so much. I'd personally still try to find an awesome PDR guy to see if he can do it first, just cuz I try to avoid removing the factory paint as much as possible.