VW roof and insurance

[Roger M. Woodbury]

Sounds like a deal....the aftermarket top with the insurance company paying
the freight.  The OEM top at $500 more?  Why?

The comment about insurance companies and body shops having or not having
your best interest at heart is irrelevant and inappropriate.  While I cannot
speak much about body shops, I can speak a good deal about insurance
companies, having been an independent agency owner for quite a few years.

While I am no fan of insurance companies...ANY of them...I do understand
what they are and what they are supposed to do.

Buying an insurance policy is entering into a legal contract that has
certain rights and obligations that are imposed upon BOTH parties.  Like
buying an automobile, it is not joining some secret society or entering into
some special brotherhood.

In my twenty years before the mast of the insurance industry, most people
who were dissatisfied with auto insurance settlements had totally
unreasonable expectations concerning the value of their vehicle.

It sounds like your insurance company is doing a really good job of honoring
their obligations, which is to "repair or replace with like kind and
quality" the vehicle damaged by an insured peril.  Do not offer any special
praise for their offer.  It has NOTHING to do with anyone's best interest.
It is merely doing what they should do, agreed to do in issuing the policy
(contract), and which you expected them to do when you paid the premiums.

The biggest single problem with the insurance industry today, in my opinion,
is that there no longer is a strong agency force whose primary purpose is to
sell and service policies on a local level, and at the same time, to educate
their customers and PROTECT their customers from their own ignorance and
that of insurance claims departments, adjusters, and bean counters.

Enjoy your new top.  Sounds like you got a good deal.  Renew your policy!

Roger
(Sold the agencies when it got to be unfun....about a dozen years ago....)