Pay your Excess or we Will Not Help!

I do not want to stress, so I will state facts:.

Complaint: Asked by Santam to pay my Full Excess. (i am a customer) Claim: 3rd Party drove into my back bumper. (I was stationary at a stop street, they were turning into the Cape Gate Mall, Parking lot, not taking note of their lane, @18:25 yesterday) Damage: 3 identifiable Scratches to back bumper (paint shops usually insist to spray full panel to repair)

Feedback from Santam Agent - S. Molefe @09:32am today. "to claim via Santam you must pay your Full Access". "You may opt to pay for the damages yourself if under your excess amount". or "you may contact the 3rd party insurance and handle the communications yourself". "We will send you a No Claims letter". "There is no Manager on floor for you to speak to". "you may call back tomorrow to log a complaint". "You will have to revisit the area's police station for a case number". (45km away from me)

Insurance type: Santam Comprehensive on a Honda Crz [inception Nov 2017] High premium costs, even higher excess

Question: Is your policy for your customers to pay Full Excess regardless of the accident damage amount? Alternatively the customer needs to handle the entire Claim by themselves? Should I only bother contacting you guys for an emergency or when my cars got badly damaged? Personally drawing a big excess and awaiting (and hoping) for Santam to get it back will cost me money. I want to avoid that unless I am at fault, or the damages are huge. Its scratches...

I promote you guys to people since I been with Santam. I refer people. I didn't even know how good or bad you are. Just put my trust in Santam. I studied Public Relations. I work for a PR type of company. One voice can be louder than one premium...

Please elaborate....