johnqt3

I never imagined this would happen to me, all I ever worried about when owning my s2k was someone slashing my top for the seats. Last night I attended a friends BBQ and this morning I wake up with a friends IM asking "Did anything happen to your car last night?" I was thinking no wayyy, till my mom calls me right there and then asking what happened to my car. I run out and there it is, a key mark from my driver side fender to my rear quarter with the door being the most deepest. I'm not mad or upset at the moment because thats just a waste of energy and time. What I would like to know is if there is anything I can do to fix this other then bringing it to a body shop and reporting it to my insurance company. The keyed marks are very thin and I can feel the scratch with my nails when i glide across it, does that mean its deep enough that no polishes, buffers or whatever will no work? Please give me your opinions. Also this happened at a friends house last night, do I still need a police report to file a claim through my insurance?

Thanks

PuFF

damn that's what i'm afraid of more than my seats lol a while ago, somebody keyed my gurl 2000 integra...i guess i would sugguest getting a whole new paint job since the DIY was a pita. there's a thread on a guy who repaired all the rock chips with some touch up paint. see if that might be able to help with the keyed marks.

got any pics?

ajlafleche

The touch up paint sucks. It's barely usable on the smallest of paint blems. Sad to say, you're going to have to fork over some cash, eihter as deductable or as direct payment to the body shop. Get an estimate form a reputable shop. If it's less than the deductable take care of it out of pocket, just so hte insurance vampires don'r decide to mess with your premiums. They can't in Mass for vandalism, but that may be different without the level of regulation we have.

jtpassat

sucks.. but if you can dig your nail into it that means its deep enough that you can't buff it out.

the right way to do it is to just get a respray...$$$$

PsychoBen

Sounds like the damage is over a typical comprehensive deductible, assuming it is $500 or lower. If yours is, say, $1,000, then perhaps it won't do any good reporting to your insurance as it would probably show up later on carfax. If damage is decidedly more than the deductible then it make sense to go thru your insurance. They'll customarily ask you if you have filed a police report though one is not typically required in this case. This will not affect your premium, at least not in MA it won't.

It def needs to be repainted. Touch-up paint will look really really bad. Sounds like it will close to a $1,000 job. Sorry to hear about it man.

johnqt3

Thanks for the advice. I will have it estimated tomorrow. In the meantime if it does happen to be a lot more then my $500 deductible is there a time frame that I need to report it to my insurance to have them cover it? Can I call them like a month from now still?

Lainey

I'd report it now. You can probably arrange for the repair when you want.

I think they may frown on the "Oh yeah, my car got keyed a month ago." kind of reports.

PsychoBen

I think you could, but there's really no reason to wait, say, a month before reporting to your insurance. You can actually call them to file a claim and dismiss it later if you deemed it is not necessary. I've done that once before.

Lainey

Just for the record, a lower deductible on comprehensive coverage (fire, theft, vandalism) may not raise your premium too much. You can have a different deductible than you do for collision.

We have $300.00 for comprehensive. It would pay off for an incident such as this.

MikeyC

That's really terrible. My friend's BMW got keyed a few months back. Some jerk just went down the street and keyed like 6 cars in a row.

Re-painting it will make it look better and hopefully your insurance won't go up. What I found recently is that you will get really f-ed by the dealer when you try to trade the car in.

It doesn't matter if you have a great paint repair done. They all have paint thickness meters now. So, they can tell what panels have been repainted.