[The Fantasist]

I'm on holiday in Nice France visiting my daughter who lives here with my ex. My ex has returned to Moscow and left me the keys to her Merc saying I could use it when I wanted. Anyway I decided to take my little one up to Menton for some dinner and whilst overtaking a parked bus that was unloading passengers I stupidly smashed the side of the car in against the back of the bus!! Because I'm used to driving on the left I just fucked up my spacial awareness and have dented both doors and the back panel,I felt physically sick when I saw what I'd done. I'm an utter dick! Fortunately the car works fine but it's going to need new doors I'm sure.

Anyone ever totaled a friend's car and if yes,how did you tell them? I'm going to have to phone her to explain but not sure how to tell her. If my daughter wasn't in the car I'd lie and say someone hit me and drove off but my 8 year old would inadvertently spill the beans.

Also anyone know how much these things cost to fix? It's a Mercedes A180,one year old. El Mech,anyone? Will her insurance cover it if was nobody else's fault?

[el mechanico]

I don't know how insurance works where your at but here you'd have to have collision in your policy. Both door skins paint and blend here on that car would be around 3k.

[JohnKreese]

After reading El Mech's posts about smashing the phone, I truly believed that this thread was going to be about someone one-upping him...

[The Fantasist]

Many thanks El Mech for the reply. I could just about live with that,seems my future holiday plans have just disappeared into the back of a bus though.

[el mechanico]

(07-26-2012 02:09 PM)Vorkuta Wrote:  

Many thanks El Mech for the reply. I could just about live with that,seems my future holiday plans have just disappeared into the back of a bus though.

Slap some bondo on there and spray bomb it. Tell her the shop you took it to did a bad job and go on your vacation and you'll bring it back to them when you get back. She'll just get used to it and forget about it

[Aliblahba]

Hey Vorkuta! I gotta song for you. jajaja. This is good Sunday afternoon drinking song. Hope it makes you feel better.

[porscheguy]

The big factor is the level of insurance coverage one is required to carry. In the US most finance companies require you to carry full coverage for the duration of the loan period, and you'd be a fool not to. How do you tell a friend or fuck buddy that you've wrecked their car? With honesty. Even if she's on vacation herself, don't wait to tell her out of fear that you're going to ruin her vacation. She'll be pissed off, but overall, Russians don't give a fuck about that kind of stuff like westerners. They tend to live in the moment. Do what you can to get repairs started on it. She needs to know right away so she can do whatever she needs to do to get a claim moving and repairs started. Unless you've got $7K-$8K in cash to pay for the repairs, it's going to be an insurance job.

The A-class isn't available in the US, but Mercedes sheet metal is going to be pricey. If the quarter panel is ruined, the replacement labor is going to be expensive. They're going to have to repaint most of the vehicle because they'll need to blend the panels in the front fender, the rear tailgate, and possibly the hood and roof.

Now some of the guys here may start with some bullshit about how you have to game your way out of this, and turn the situation around, and blame her for letting you use her car. That's kind of ignorant. If you did this to your best friend's car, you wouldn't pull that.

You fucked it up. Be honest. Come clean, and do what you've got to do to make it right. And don't cut corners. She may forgive a lot, but the point where people usually go into a rage is after it gets fixed, and they realize it was fixed to a low standard. That's when they get pissed because that's when they think "my car is ruined."

[FretDancer]

Haha. So what did your ex said when she found out ?