Accidents Happen

I've been rear-ended before, three times to be exact, but yesterday was a real accident. Previously I manged to get away with no damage or a tiny scratch but yesterday I was nailed by someone who was going nearly 40 mph before slamming on their brakes and eventually hitting me as he tried to swerve hard to the right. It's funny how vividly I can remember looking in the rear-view mirror and seeing the front of his Chevy suburban careening towards me with its brakes locked. Yet I can't remember the order things happened after that. In fact, this particular driver decided to take off on foot before the police could arrive and I couldn't give them a very good description. Everyone always says that you should pay attention to details, especially to people in situations like this. But I was more worried about the damage on the back of my truck and how this was such a horrible way to start out the Monday morning. Who would have thought the coward would have taken off on me leaving his vehicle behind!? I've given thought to always having my digital camera in the truck now -- you just never know when a picture would be needed. In fact, a camera phone would have sufficed.... I had two opportunities for good headshots as he was trying to open my passenger and driver door while I sat in the turn-lane with two lanes of fairly heavy traffic on both sides of me. I'm not exactly sure why he was trying to open my doors. I guess I will never find out.

I will say one positive thing about the ordeal - while insurance companies may have a bad rep, they really have the process down. Within 30 minutes of the accident I called them and answered questions for about 15 minutes. Within two hours this information was transferred to a local agent who then called me and we discussed local body-shop options. Turns out I work 2 blocks away from a body shop that Progressive Insurance prefers and they also offer free loaner cars (I don't have the rental coverage on my policy) so within 3 hours of my accident the truck was at the shop and I was driving my loaner already. The next morning they called with the quote to fix ($3,616) and said it would be done around Wednesday of next week. I really couldn't ask for better service than that!

Now all that needs to happen is for the police to track down my run-away criminal and hope he has insurance so I can get my deductible back. There's also a slight chance that insurance of the SUV owner (as opposed to the driver), which is registered to a car dealership, may have to pay as well. Either way, if my deductible is returned I will be even more satisfied.