****** COMPANY IN 2019!!!! UTTERLY POOR SERVICE AND CUSTOMER CARE

My BMW 3 series was damaged by a Mr. Roper who has insurance with Santam. A claim was made to get my car fixed by his insurer as he was in the wrong and was liable for payment.

I submitted my claim on 23 July 2019. Noted that the SLA was a response within 10 days,

I followed up with Phakamile in your team. He doesn’t respond ever on the first time. Always a second, maybe even third mail before he will respond

6 August he said he will finalize my claim by COB. He didn’t, instead he went on leave without even responding to my mail. He left a forwarding address for someone in your team Itumeleng who also just ignored my communication.

Then two mails later he responses with a settlement offer lower than my claim amount. No explanation, no options. In fact, he had the nerve to tell me there will be no revised settlement offer.

Is this how your company treats third party claims?

Should I take this up with your client as he is the one who crashed into me and is liable for my repairs?

He advised me to talk to the panel beater as he had agreed to reducing the amount. I had to deal with an angry panel beater who feels bamboozled into dropping his price when he doesn’t want to, he threatened not to even take my job as this was not how he works, and I was wasting his time. There are two other panel beaters -why does Phakamile not contact them to resolve?

I was angry and sent Phakamile a very strongly worded email about how I want to speak to the claims manager to resolve this issue. He ignored my mail and basically refused to send your details. I mailed Rosinah and she also refused to hand over your details and referred me back to Phakamile. This is against your company policy by the way and I think you should advise your team of this – because they are obligated to hand, me these details as the first step of resolution. I am within my rights to approach the Ombudsman in this regard.

The resolution I would like to see here

1. An understanding of your complaint’s procedure going forward as I fully intending escalating further should you not be able to help.

2. I want my claim finalized today. You are long overdue and outside of your own SLA. and your delays impact me personally with regards to starting my own insurance as I need to repair my car first. I have already had to push out my start date which puts my car at risk in case of an accident.

3. I want to understand about who must pay for vehicle car hire whilst my car is being repaired. this accident was not my fault and feel you should help me to arrange. Does Mr. Roper Policy have car hire?

4. An apology for the distress I has suffered under your team’s care

Isaac The Panel beater called me back and he has outlined the following

He received a call from someone assume it was the assessor. They discussed reducing the price of some items. He asked the assessor to send him an email of what he proposed to reduce as he could not agree without seeing the difference and discussing with his boss.

Upon receiving the reduced quote. He enquired about the door – as the assessor was proposing he cut the door price to R3750. He sent an email querying where and how he was supposed to get a door that was priced so low. That email was never responded to.

He heard nothing from anyone for two weeks until earlier this week when I received the settlement that he had supposedly agreed to. I asked when I could bring my car and confirmed the reduction.

He knew nothing about this and refused to entrain any reduction in price.

O the same day he got a call from the same assessor who gave him the contact details of where he can get the door. Upon pricing the door at the place, they initially quoted him R8500, when he challenged this saying that the doors should be R3750 the supplier refused. Only when he mentioned Santam the supplier remembered that he had set aside a door for Santam.

He says to me he was immediately not comfortable with this arrangement as to why he is receiving a set aside door not for public consumption. He feels that the door will not be up to scratch and he won’t be able to offer me a guarantee on it.

He spoke of the administration of having to load a new supplier, going to the supplier to establish a relationship and give a guarantee for someone he does not have a working business relationship with and has never even met before. He is not prepared to do that and said as much to the assessor.

Then I call him again insisting that he agreed to the reduced price as he had agreed to this with the assessor. I mentioned him signing something to agree to the reduction. That’s when he got angry because he had not done this. Their policy is to sign any revisions on a quote or issue a new quote if there any changes.

Then yesterday afternoon he gets a call again from the same assessor who without viable cause continued to insist he must take the door that he has rejected and further reduce his labour costs.

He explained to the assessor that this is not possible. They had a long argument about this as the assessor could not provide justification on why he must further reduce his price when he has discounted the price for me already at quotation stage. The assessor insulted him that he is complaining so much over R800, why can’t he just accept it because he needs to cut the price for his company.

The assessor then insisted to go over his head and speak with his boss in order to push this reduction. Isaac advised him to call back after 30 minutes when the boss would be back as he was out at that time delivering a car.

The assessor never called back yesterday afternoon to discuss further about this issue that was not resolved in his eyes.

I then call now again today to insist on the very same thing he advised me on earlier this week. that he cannot reduce any further as he has already given me his best price. anything lower makes this job unprofitable for him.

He has had enough of this back and forth and is not interested in discussing further. My options are to accept his original quote or kindly take my car elsewhere for repairs. He is also insisting on 100% of the money paid upfront before he even begins the work as he has lost trust in me, he doesn’t even care that I am coming through an insurance company.

Why am I not supposed that you have pushed this man too far with your lies? I myself had had enough. I will not wait any longer for more lies and fabrications designed to frustrate this entire process.

Maybe we are both being treated this way because he is a black panel beater and I am a black client. Because I am sure Mr Roper didn’t receive this kind of treatment when he did his claim. And I have never heard of a panel beater being threatened to reduce their costs or lose the business. In 2019, Santam is still as ****** as ever . Well rest assured that this is not over. Black as I am , I will get this resolved and my car repaired.

This was my last email to Santam and still no response