Nrma's Smash Repair Bingle
Illawarra Mercury
Saturday September 3, 2005
The upheavals in car insurance brought about by Insurance Australia Group's (IAG) decision to revise its repair criteria have created unrest among panel beaters.
IAG companies NRMA Insurance (not to be confused with NRMA and its roadside repair service) and CGU have copped a lot of flak in recent months, not only from the repair industry but also from policy holders. To quickly recap, NRMA and CGU no longer want to give policy holders a choice of repairers. Instead, vehicles are taken to a central location where they are assessed and photographed.The images and assessment sheets are posted on a website and panel beaters are expected to tender for the job. The customer has no idea who will repair the car or where and the repairer hopes that his bid is low enough to secure the work. Policy holders can have a repairer choice, but they must pay for that privilege. Overdrive has, in the last several weeks, received a lot of calls from disgruntled NRMA policy holders and unhappy panel beaters, both groups wanting a better deal from Australia's biggest insurer. Last week things changed a little with Mercedes-Benz weighing into the argument and decidedly not happy with NRMA and CGU. Mercedes-Benz (and others such as Lexus and Saab) have a number of "preferred repairers" and suggest that a bingled Benz insured with NRMA will be fixed for the cheapest price without necessarily getting the best people to do it or using authorised Benz parts. The worry is that because M-B (and others) builds its cars using complex safety cells repairers who are not qualified by the car maker or do the job with non-genuine parts can cause potential ongoing safety problems. Understand that M-B, through its Mercedes-Benz Insurance affiliate, does have a vested interest here but even so, it does raise a valid point. Only time will tell if NRMA Insurance (or IAG, call it what you will) has cut off its nose to spite its face or it has actually invented a better way of doing business. Right now though angry panel beaters, policy holders and some rivals are suggesting it might be wrong.
© 2005 Illawarra Mercury