Body Shop Failure

[wylde1]

In my experience, for what it's worth, people usually get defensive and angry like this when they know they dropped the ball and are not mature enough to pick it back up when given a chance. They'd rather just leave the ball for someone else to pick it up. This guy knows full well that it looks like garbage, but the insurance company has probably already paid him, so there's nothing left in it for him (aside from customer satisfaction, which sadly doesn't seem to be much of a priority for many places)

Hope you get it fixed up without too much more of a headache.

I ran a painting business for a summer job a few years ago. In 4 months I did $90,000 in business and ran 4 crews of painters. I had exactly ONE customer check the "Would not recommend" box in my customer satisfaction survey and it still haunts me to this day. One of my painters (I was not on site at the time) was new and I'd had problems with him being messy and getting paint on things that weren't supposed to be painted. It was like he deliberately splattered things sometimes, it was crazy, I ended up letting him go because of it. but on one site, he splattered deck stain on patio stones.... and that does not come off. I could completely see why they were angry, and I did everything to try and clean it, even tried to find replacement patio stones but couldn't find any good matches. Anyway, as the business owner it is MY responsibility to make the customer happy, but you're only as good as your worst employee. If they screw up, it's on you to fix it, and that is something this particular owner doesn't seem to be understanding becuase he let it out of his shop without inspecting it, or having someone he trusts inspect it.

Originally Posted by Dack

I took it to the shop last night to discuss options for this paint job, and he started out by saying he doesn't know what I want him to do. He asked me "What do you want me to do?" and also "Well I didn't know I was working on a f*cking show car here Matt" and "Well you brought me this $35,000 car" and "I'm only human man, I can't get everything perfect" (what's even more funny is he never touched the car except to buff it) and he also said "well you know this car went out of my shop with some stuff like runs and what not and that's not something I let out of the shop, but I never had a chance to look at it before we rolled it out of the shop". Also "
He started to talk down to me (he's my old man's age, so probably 30+ years on me) and got irritated/pissed off. In turn, I started getting irritated that he couldn't keep his cool and thought he could talk down to me so I started pointing out everything that he never even touched with a little more fervor. And he said "well you know what, just bring he damn thing to me tomorrow, I'll spend all day on it fixing everything that you put on a list and tomorrow after work you can swing by and we'll check off everything on that list and once that's done, we're done". I said yeah well that's all I want. To have everything fixed. He also bitched about how he is only paid two hours to paint the door and other things, which only made him look more like the idiot because he couldn't do it right the first time.
There's a few other good quotes that I got from him last night, I'll post 'em when I think of them.

Another quote I just thought of was the one where he said "well you went over this paint job with a fine tooth comb, did you look that close at the rest of the car?" and I thought to myself "who gives a rats ass what the rest of the car looks like; if it looks bad, that's my beef with GM or my own scratches/etc, but the issue at hand is your sh*tty paint job, not what the rest of my car looks like"

Am I working with stupidity here or what?

[Waco]

1. Always ensure it's good before you leave the shop 2. Ensure your standards are clear up front, in writing before you drop off the car 3. Pay with VISA if you can so you can dispute it thru them if not done right 4. Learn the art of Verbal Judo (read the book); it will pay dividends in future conflicts.

I just went thru this with my dealer's body shop on a warranty repair, so I had a bit more leverage, but it took 3 trips total, and my car was in new condition and recently buffed. Good luck with it!

[CJohnson]

No offense but I would prolly flip out too. That has some of the worst "orange peel" I have seen in a long time. It can be wet sanded and made slick, but that still leaves the trash in the paint. I would make sure someone heard about this and it was fixed.

[Caspers2SSRS]

Originally Posted by trm0002

On what grounds? The body shop you chose to have do your work sucks so they (Geico) should make it all better? Yes they should, absolutely.


100% incorrect. You are..........


Once you decline to make arrangements to use one of their "partner" repair facilities, you forfeit the right to make Geico (or any insurance company for that matter) responsible for the outcome. That is the downside to the law that allows you to go to a repair facility of your choice. My uncle is the largest Allstate dealer in the State of Ohio and I have family members who actually work for Geico so I know of what I speak ( for once ). That's not to say that Geico in this case couldn't do the OP a favor and put some heat on the repair facililty; but they are in no way, shape, or form, required to.


Ding dong, he didn't say he refused to use a Geico approved shop..........nor did he say this one wasn't. He's not in New York either. The laws effected upon a insurance company and their relationship and obligation to paying consumers vary by state....... Thus your theory doesn't apply in this matter.



Ding Ding Ding We have a winner.

LOL and P. S . The day a Insurance Company starts doing consumers personal "Favors " is the day, I dump my Thirty Thousand shares of Geico from my investment portfollio.

[Entaille]

man I would be scared to let those morons try to fix it. I'd almost rather eat the loss and pay a better shop to do their work.

can't believe they spoke to you like that. their work is supposed to make it look as good as new. not a show car? **** them haha. you should not try to make excuses for your shoddy work or why you should be allowed to half ass it.

[Dack]

I never told Geico I wouldn't use a affiliated repair center but when I called them to begin the claim they told me I was at least two to three hours away from the nearest one and because of that I would have to pick a repair shop of my choice. Hell I didn't even talk to an adjuster really, the body shop was my adjuster...

[Dack]

Well after having the body shop try to fix their mess up twice, they still have not fixed many things, including a small open spot with no paint after the paint adhered the front of the rear quarterpanel to the front fender and busted open, revealing open metal. The only thing he tried to fix was the dust specks everywhere and he only got 1/3 of them and tried to fix his NASTY orangepeel only to make the middle glass smooth and leave the edges rough. In respect to the pictures I posted, is this enough evidence to have my car repainted by another shop (I was thinking of contacting the State Attorney General's office). I asked the other body shop I wanted it painted at and they said it would never leave their shop with defects like that (though it's business to them so they're biased). Is it bad enough to warrant a new paint job?

[robsls3]

I get get geico off their ass and have them get a adjuster to look at it.

[myold88]

Originally Posted by Dack

I never told Geico I wouldn't use a affiliated repair center but when I called them to begin the claim they told me I was at least two to three hours away from the nearest one and because of that I would have to pick a repair shop of my choice. Hell I didn't even talk to an adjuster really, the body shop was my adjuster...

Some of you guys just don't get it. The insurance company didn't repair this car, an independant repair facility did. As already stated on several posts, only if the insurance company suggests or demands that an owner use a perticular shop are they in any way responsible.
They don't fix damage they only pay to fix damage.
Regarding your above statement that the shop was your adjuster- In most States body shops are usually only licensed to repair cars. I know of none that are licensed insurance "adjusters", but many are licensed "appraisers".