UrQ Accident Update

[ANDREW FINNEY <afinney@bigplanet.com>]

Here is the update on my battle with Integon.

As some of you may remember someone hit my parked UrQ during a snow
storm on
January 14. Integon was incredibly slow to send someone out to estimate
the
damage, and even he was using the wrong car from his database. I has to
give
him a faxed parts list from Barry at Clair Audi. Well, then they finally

came back at the end of February and said the car was worth $3000 and
that's
all I was getting. I promptly faxed them a list of 15 similar cars
selling
in the $9-12k range. This did no good. The lady said my car was not like

these because it had high miles. Some of these cars were in the
150-175,000
mi range.

I then sent her all the receipts for the total repaint including
stripping
to bare metal and the umpteen thousands in parts. She said this was just

upkeep

Then I sent her Ned's phone number and asked her to call. She didn't
want
to.

Then I called the NY state insurance board to file a complaint and found
out
that if they total your car, you have 30 days in which to find a similar

one. If you can't find one for the money they gave you, you can ask for
them
to pay more. I also discovered that when push comes to shove I could ask

them to locate a similar car and provide it to me. I also found out that

Integon had already broken NY law by taking too long to provide a check
or a
reason why a check had not been provided. Plus you by law can ask to see
how
they derive the value of your car.

So I call her up and demand to know why she's low balling me and could I
see
the source. she sends me two sources. One the CCC or something was right
on,
it showed low range of $6000, high range of $9000. The other source was
a
car specific database that new that the previous owner had had a small
accident in Colorado. There was a flaw in the database though. It was
showing the car as a 4000Q, despite having the right VIN. So I set off
down
that path. Convincing her that the database was comparing my car to a
4000Q
and that my car was in excellent shape, therefore the estimate damage of

$6100 should be totally paid for. I got her to $5800.

Then I said, forget liability, forget the law, forget the pressure you
get
from above, don't you think it's the right thing to do to give me what
it
will cost to repair my car. I went on like this for 10 minutes and
eventually she said, fine, but you'll have to sign a waiver. Like I
wasn't
going to have to do that anyway.

So, I received and deposited the check for $6100 today and all the parts
are
ordered. The car goes into the shop in a week, provided the shippers can
get
the parts here.

I got:
Front and rear Euro bumpers w/ all new lights from Quattro Sports in the
UK
(Thanks Steve E.)
Smoked rear taillights and Swiss center piece from the same

Majority of front left fender from KAR (very nice bunch of guys)
Rear valence from KAR
Drivers Seat w/ 6000 mi from KAR

The work is being done by SVE, the same guys who did Dave Lawsons
awesome
UrQ overhaul.

Well, there it is. Thanks to all who offered helpful advise.

Andrew Finney
1983 UrQ