The California Autobody Association on Thursday reminded auto body shops the Bureau of Automotive Repair will not view an insurer as the customer when it comes time to regulate the shop.
It’s a great refresher not just for arguably the car body repair sector’s most significant market but perhaps for that industry in particular.
If you believe the insurer is your customer, maybe you might wish to take another look at dwell in law or court precedent. Generally, the vehicle owner is the one that contracted the shop’s services and who owes the shop for that bill. They’re the client. The insurer’s job is just to reimburse that customer inside the scope from the first-party or third-party insurance contract.
California might just spell it out more clearly than a state. California Businesses and Professions Code 9880.1 explicitly says the insurer isn’t a car repairer’s customer.
“An insurer can never be a customer,” BAR operations branch program manager Matthew Gibson told a VeriFacts Guild 21 call recently. “… They’re excluded.”
The customer has the automobile or even the individual who brought it set for repair, he explained.
California Autobody Association lobbyist Jack Molodanof noted during a CAA webinar Thursday this was something collision repairers “completely don’t understand sometimes. …
“The next matter you realize, they think the insurance company is the customer. They aren't the client.”
The law was “pretty clear” concerning the identity from the customer, he said.
Insurers will also be not licensed to correct vehicles, and the BAR doesn’t have jurisdiction over carriers, Molodanof said.
“They are concerned in regards to you,” Molodanof told the collision repair audience.
If the BAR comes calling, protesting “‘The insurance company told me this'” won’t help a store, based on Molodanof.
“They don’t care,” he said from the BAR. “… You're the doctor.”
Understanding which party is really the shop’s customer might also help repairers avoid another potentially pitfall with the BAR: Failing to secure authorization.
This lack of authorization is one of the top complaints handled by the BAR, based on Molodanof. Repairers get “sloppy” or fail to seek authorization simply because they know some insurance company covers the price of the work. However the customer must first have signed off on the repairs regardless.
“That’s a big problem,” Molodanof said. It’s also a “red flag.”
He said that even if the repairer has been doing warranty or bring-back work, “you still want to get authorization” in California. Authorization is needed even if the work will be done free of charge, he explained. It’s also required for any revisions towards the estimate , he said.
