Insurance

["Warren, Howard" <HKWARREN@xxxxxxxxxxxx>]

<<<<<
I would like to appeal to the group for some assistance on U.S. auto
insurance adjusters.  I was involved in an accident yesterday in my
(formerly pristine) Verde, nothing really major and definitely fixable
but even relatively minor damage seems to run well into the multiple
thousands these days.
>>>>>

Well, I swore I'd never talk about insurance again after my last flaming
but <g>...

The price guide you want is the "Cars of Particular Interest" (CPI)
guide.  Generally, auto insurers use the trade-in value of a car to
determine how much they're willing to pay.  The basic "blue books"
(Kelley's, Edmunds, NADA) are worthless for Alfas.  An Alfa Romeo is
rarely traded in, and as such, the only ones the dealers see are crappy
examples.  The good ones go from owner directly to owner.

Remember, what you're trying to do is convince the insurance company the
car is worth enough to repair it.  Things to do to make the insurance
company pay rather that "total" it:

1) Use the CPI as a baseline for pricing.

2) Get a local recognized Alfa (or similar exotic) expert to appraise
the car in writing.

3) Photos of the car both before and after the wreck.

4) Ask other Digesters to send you copies of recent bills of sale
involving similar Verdes.  An insurance company doesn't care much about
the price in the classified ads, they want proof that the *actual*
selling price is substantially higher than whatever "blue book" they
might try to use.  The blue books are guidelines, not gospel.

5) Be polite.  Again, be calm, be polite.  Pretend you are Spock using
your logic to present your case.  Claims examiners are yelled at by
hostile people every day.  After all, their job is to judge how to
handle the claim, and sometimes the claimant disagrees and gets hostile.
But if you are calm, polite and nice; have the documentation above, most
claims examiners will give you a fair hearing.  Approach it as a
cooperative venture, not an adversarial venture.

6) Finally, if all else fails and the insurance company wants to total
the car, find out how much they're willing to pay *without* totalling it
and pay for the rest yourself.  Obviously this is not a good option, but
a friend of mine bought a wrecked GTV-6, literally rebuilt it, then had
a major legal fight to remove the "salvaged" notation from the title.
Besides, a Verde shouldn't be a parts car just because of a fender
bender! <g>

Howard K. Warren, Little Rock, AR
Sr. Systems Analyst, AEGON Insurance group
1988 Milano Platinum, "Snow Hawk", 150k miles

------------------------------