2/5/14 10:48 AM

Sometimes I feel really, really dumb when face with simple problems. This is one of those times.

My car is in the shop for a repair covered by insurance. Between the time the adjustor found the time to inspect the demage and ok the repair, it's been over a week I'm without my own car. I do get a rental car but it's a 2 door coup which is a pain to get in and out of in the tight parking space in the company lot. Still, that's a minor problem.

Now the car is nearing the finish of the repapir, except I haven't got my insurance check yet.

We're just got hammered with 6" of snow plus 1/10" of ICE! So I have serious doubt we'll get mail delivered today. If I don't get the check on Thursday's mail, the Friday mail will be too late for me to bring to the shop (the shop is not open on weekend).

To make matter's worse, there's another storm coming Sunday/Monday. So there's no guarantee I'll get my car back till middle of next week if I choose to wait.

What's the risk if I charge the repair to my CC and pick up the car? The insurance check is a 2 party check, need to be signed by both the shop and me. Normally, I would endorse it over to the shop and drive away with no impact on my wallet. So in this case, I would need to go to the shop and get it endorsed to me (when I eventually gets the check in the mail). If there's no hiccup, the money "should be" in my account before the CC charges is due.

The reason I want my own car back, beside it being the car I'm familiar with, is I'm planning to go skiing this weekend and my car is an all wheel drive while the rental is front wheel drive only. The place I'm going will really benefit from the AWD, or it'll be kind of white knuckled.

The whole freaking reason I own a AWD car is so I can go skiing when there's snow! So I really want to get my car back. But it's nearly $2000 dollars at stake.

Would you pick it up and charge it to the CC with the believe "the check is in the mail"? What do you see would be the risk?

I want to make a list in my mind of the potential pitfall before plunging down that $2000 hole...

2/5/14 11:17 AM

Give the shop your Credit Card number to hold as a security deposit, of sorts, plus a copy of your driver's license, when you pick up the car. This is basically the same process when you go to a dealership to test drive a car, no? If you have check-is-in-the-mail documentation, bring that, too. Return later with the check.

I would think the repair shop would be happy with that arrangement as they will not want to shoulder the ~$60 credit card transaction fee. Remind them of that plus the benefit of freeing up space on the shop floor/lot.

2/5/14 11:31 AM

Side note; verify storage fee issues and who pays if the check is late coming after the car is dome if not released??

2/5/14 2:11 PM

quote:

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verify storage fee issues and who pays

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