Bike rack repair

[RosscoPCole]

Came out of the gym this morning to be greeted with a car parked up against the back of my bus. Their handbrake failed and it rolled down and hit my bus. Thank goodness for the bike rack. It stopped the car, smashed their rear window and dented their boot. There is a couple of small scratches on my rear bumper and a big scrape on the bike rack.
Their insurance company has offered me over £1,200 I'm my bank account today to get this repaired. Can the bike rack be easily fixed, or am I going to need to do something more drastic to get it fixed.

 

[eetmw]

Is it broken? In a flap I reversed into our drive too quickly and bumped rack and van against the garage :-( Rear of van has an allen head sized dent in the panel and it bent the bike rack. I just brought the crossbar into work where we have bigger vices, clamped it and bent it back.

I'm still sad about the whole incident.

Toby

 

[Johny]

Does 1200 not cover the cost of a replacement rack?

 

[moomin-j]

Came out of the gym this morning to be greeted with a car parked up against the back of my bus. Their handbrake failed and it rolled down and hit my bus. Thank goodness for the bike rack. It stopped the car, smashed their rear window and dented their boot. There is a couple of small scratches on my rear bumper and a big scrape on the bike rack. View attachment 230576
View attachment 230577Their insurance company has offered me over £1,200 I'm my bank account today to get this repaired. Can the bike rack be easily fixed, or am I going to need to do something more drastic to get it fixed.

Strip the bike rack down & get it all powder coated black?
It'll look like new.
Chips Away company should get those small bumper scratches sorted.
Time to make a few phone calls, I think?

 

[drinfinity]

I could make that look brand new for £650.

It looks cleaner than mine!

 

[RosscoPCole]

Thanks for the replies. Spoke to my local bodyshop. The guy there owns a T5 and a T6. There was also a T6.1 in getting a Leighton body kit fitted. He said that until the bike rack is taken off you cannot tell if there is any damage to the tailgate. So get it done properly through the insurance company as a repair to the tailgate plus the scratches fixed, a new bumper protector and a new bike rack would be more than the money the insurance company wants to give me as a pay off. I'd want to use them if possible as I have in the past and they do great work.
Lets see what the insurance company says

 

[drinfinity]

Fair point on tailgate damage. However, if it opens and closes without breaking the tail lights, you are probably in luck.

 

[eetmw]

Fair point on tailgate damage. However, if it opens and closes without breaking the tail lights, you are probably in luck.

Yes, I chipped the plastic on both lights along with the small dent

 

[RosscoPCole]

Popped into Breeze VW for them to have a look at the bike rack. It has been bent in the accident, so a new one is definitely needed. This is going to be way more than the money they were offering.

 

[EAN]

@RosscoPCole 100% other party’s fault so you shouldn’t accept anything less than getting you back into the position you were in before. For me that would be assessed by and repaired by a VW approved repairer, a new bike rack and any out of pocket costs associated the accident. You weren’t even in the vehicle so it’s totally cut and dry.

Many years ago a Post Office van hit my wife’s car whilst it was parked and my wife wasn’t in the car. When it got repaired the cheeky Post Office’s insurance assessor did a dirty arrangement with the repairer and didn’t authorise part of the repair and a small chip on another panel was just touched up. Needless to say I just told the repairer that I hadn’t agreed to that and never would have so they had to take it back and do the job properly, respraying the whole panel. It even took another attempt after that until I was satisfied, so ended up costing them more than just doing the job right in the first place. My wife’s insurance company was never involved.

 

[RosscoPCole]

@RosscoPCole 100% other party’s fault so you shouldn’t accept anything less than getting you back into the position you were in before. For me that would be assessed by and repaired by a VW approved repairer, a new bike rack and any out of pocket costs associated the accident. You weren’t even in the vehicle so it’s totally cut and dry.

Many years ago a Post Office van hit my wife’s car whilst it was parked and my wife wasn’t in the car. When it got repaired the cheeky Post Office’s insurance assessor did a dirty arrangement with the repairer and didn’t authorise part of the repair and a small chip on another panel was just touched up. Needless to say I just told the repairer that I hadn’t agreed to that and never would have so they had to take it back and do the job properly, respraying the whole panel. It even took another attempt after that until I was satisfied, so ended up costing them more than just doing the job right in the first place. My wife’s insurance company was never involved.

There is a bodyshop I trust, so will use them and the other party's insurance company has agreed i can use them. As I said he owns two Transporters and deals with them regularly. I know they will do an excellent job.

 

[Chris Sherwood]

If it’s a Thule rack they sell spare parts for them.