Some yoghurt hit my six-week old car with what I think was an errant shopping trolley and put a two inch tablespoon like indentation on my rear wing and a slight 1/4'' scratch underneath the dent on the top seam of the bumper. It's in an awkward spot just about where the rear bumper and rear wing meet. No note
The dent is not creased and looks as if it could be popped out. The scratch would be very easy to touch in as it's minute. My insurance firm are happy to do the work but with a £120 excess it might be worth taking a personal loss as I can't see how the bodyshop work would top £250.
Would it be worth giving a firm like Chips Away a bell? I don't know if they could do this kind of thing, my feeling is that it's touch and go if they could get a vacuum seal around the dent as the wing/bumper seam is very close. I've got a stonechip on the bonnet so I could get both done in one go.
Any advice/experiences?
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It is our company policy for all small dents and scratches on company cars to be seen by a chips away type service first.
1. its cheaper
2. its quicker
3. its more convenient
Call them, if they cant fix it what have you lost?
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I gave a Chips away firm local to work a ring, he sub-contracts the dent removal work out and said it would take a few hours. He was a little concerned about the location of the dent but said that the use of rods would slowly work the dent out which is a new method on me. He quoted £200 +vat. The chip has it has made a slight indentation on the metal, he only promise an 80% remedy.
He said that the nature and location of the dent might require a bodyshop repair, if so, it's an insurance job.
I'm going to ring another SMART franchise out nearer to home for a second opinion.
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Just had a very informative chat with a SMART franchise, he owns a Rover 75 as well and at least knows the area I'm talking about. It's a bodyshop job as the metal terminates only 2'' under the bumper and no amount of pushing with rods will ease the dent out. It's a drill and pull job.
So I'm off to an MGR bodyshop for an estimate, the only silver lining to this cloud is paint is a warranty item so I'm only paying for labour. I get 10% off that due to a privilege card so it looks as if it'll be a personal loss.
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Surely if the body panels are soft enough to indent by impact from yoghurt, they won't take much pushing out again??? Are you sure it wasn't a can of beans?
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It was reported last week that a pallet of yoghurt escaped from tesco's warehouse. Gangs of yoghurt have been roaming the country attacking cars.
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3500,
My sister-in-law found a dent in her car when she returned to it after shopping in a supermarket. It looked as though it might have been hit by a trolley so she spoke to the supermarket manager and he offered to pay for repair. It was only a tiny dent in a wing of a Nissan Micra but the repair cost £300 and the supermarket met the bill as they promised.
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p.s. I'm picking up my own new Rover 75 CDT (131ps) next Tuesday. I hope there's no yogurt on the roads around here!
Incidentally, are you aware that there's a Rover 75/ MGZT forum on Yahoo. Worth signing up, if you haven't already ...
autos.groups.yahoo.com/group/Rover75MGZT/
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Apologies for the mockney, I blame a long lost friend who lives in Hackney who was on holiday with us last week. That was his expression when he noticed the dent, it's kind of stuck.
I wish I could go back to the supermarket, it's in Bude when I was on hols last week. I think I'd have a job convincing them, no-one noticed it for a few days.
I got in touch with the MGR bodyshop, it's £400 all in and I'm taking it as an personal loss. Time to get out the plastic and put it down to experience :(
Dizzy, enjoy the new car, stick to the 600miles @ 3000rpm though. Once beyond that, enjoy, despite the odd knock it really is an awesome car. I'd recommend Shell Diesel too, I'm getting 47mpg in mixed driving better than the Esso stuff which makes it sound a bit noiser and I got only 43 on the same kind of driving.
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