Problems with insurance repair

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Sun 11 Dec 2005 22:05
Problems with insurance repair - scotty
Hi all

I'm looking for some advice here. About 18 months back, the wife pranged her Polo. The insurance company insisted the repair was done by their tame guys rather than our local independant - usual practice I'm sure. We live in West Cumbria, bur the car was taken all the way to Durham for the repair which included a new bonnet which obviously had to be sprayed.

All seemed ok but after about 10 months I noticed a problem developing with the paint on the bonnet. To cut a long story short the insurance and repair company eventually accepted that there was a problem with the way the bonnet had been prepared for final spraying and agreed to take the car away and redo the paint job.

Wifey got the car back last week, but the delivery driver said that the petrol gauge was no longer working. Our local garage guy suspects that the instrument head has a problem because some other indicator lights (such as oil) have also stopped working. These were all previously ok before the car taken back to Durham.

Now to the point. Do we stand any chance of putting the blame on this repair company and getting it fixed FOC or is it a lost cause? Are they likely to have done anything which could have caused a short and damaged the instrument head?

Cheers for any advice,
Les
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Sun 11 Dec 2005 23:02
Problems with insurance repair - Hamsafar
You would have to find out the cause and then blame them if it is likely something they did.
If it is the instrument cluster itsself, I don't see how painting a bonnet could do this.
If they jetwashed teh engine bay to remove sanding/buffing dust and you find water ingress has caused the problem, then you may have a chance - you need to find the cause first, and then the root cause, and they need to be responsible for the root cause.
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