Modern Vespa

hi! i have a 2017 (previously flawless) vespa primavera 150cc. i hit a pothole and it caused me to lose balance and my vespa ended up dropping to the left. it created a dent in the front panel which caused slight separation. additionally the brake handle and mirror are scratched. my heart hurts more because my baby is finally no longer flawless.

i have a $500 deductible insurance through geico. i do think i can maybe claim this through the city since it's a pothole but i'm not 100% sure.

should i wait to put the claim in insurance or do i claim the pothole through the city first? i'm not sure how to work this, as even a claim through the city may take 6 months.

additionally how would this affect my insurance rates? i have a perfect driving record past 10 years. i have a car as well. thanks!

That sucks. Over here you can file a claim to the C&C. Don't know whose responsible for the roads over there but find out which one is responsible and file a claim. Worth a try and then if they don't pony up use your insurance. Don't know if you can wait 6 months. You might want to see what you need to do to file a claim and get some estimates and whatever else you'll need. Can you pay out of pocket? Once you file a claim your premiums usually go up. $500 is a pretty big deductable. Pot hole damaged my valve stem which caused my front tire to lose all it's air.. I paid out of pocket but i was lucky . Could of been worse. Good luck

How bad is that separation? The Vespa has a monocoque frame, meaning the body is the chassis. Insurance companies often total out a Vespa due to seemingly minor damage.

Can you post a pic of the damage so we can give advice?

I had a dent in my cowl. Found a great body shop. The got the dent out and resprayed the bike section. Did a awesome job and you can't tell it even happened. Cost came to under $500. If i can get it done over here, where everything cost a lot more, you should be able to come under $500 also.

was there a police report?
You can try to file a claim with public works or whatever dept in your county is responsible for the repair of roads.
How big was this pot hole that caused your accident?

Ultimately your insurance company is supposed to be your "advocate" and is supposed to pursue the "parties" that caused the damage. However... you have to prove the pot hole was unavoidable. Which if your wheel(s) arent taco'd is going to be a stretch!

I had similar damage to my 2017 GTV300 a few months ago. I have Progressive with a $250 deductible and the repair bill from the local dealer was pretty expensive in my opinion.

Progressive was great to work with, they worked with the dealer to determine the cost of the repairs, issued a check to me the same day the adjuster came to my home to view the bike and called after the repairs were completed to ensure everything with the dealer went smoothly.

Just received my annual renewal with a slight $20 increase in premiums, for me it was well worth filing a claim.

thanks sincerely for all the replies/advice.

these are the photos as requested. as you can see there was separation. i had to push it back in to try to 'snap' it together but it's definitely still separated. other pic shows the actual impact. also i think the vespa may sound a little funny, but i may be paranoid. i think i had to move the kill switch all the way from off to on again to get the vespa to turn on after dropping it.

aside from that, some scratches on mirror, rubber area, etc.

I would contact the insurance company and have them fix it, then they can go after the city if necessary. Save you a lot of trouble, might even ask about possible rate increase. That looks like more than $500.

I'm surprised to hear a pothole is reason to have a government agency pay for damage. I suspect my rural county folks would get a good laugh from that one? or my state hwy dept.?
The damage seen in your pics is easily repaired by any good AB shop-if they want the job or not? and to me the other looming question is does your policy go up if you make that claim.
In my own situation I do high deductible policies to save premiums (plus I fix my own stuff) and reality says most accidents that justify a repair will be lots more than what this mishap created, thus a high deductibles a drop in the bucket.

Sorry WHAT? You pay"Road Taxes" so the state has funds to maintain the roads, if they don't do their job they are liable for accidents caused by their neglect. In Va if a pot hole has been reported and not reaired in 24 hours, the state is liable for any damage the pot hole caused.
Bet most states are like this.

When everyones lawyered up that stuff probably works. Did I use the word sorry?
I've bent alu wheels on Interstates before-never though about getting damages as I don't want to lose my claim free discount. Lawyers make those level of claims predictably expensive for the average claim.

Small claims court covers litigation up to $3500 I think and niether side can bring a laywer in small claims court

a follow-up question.

if i end up going through insurance which i'm pretty sure what i will have to do,

i know there were mentions of AB repair shops, but there is an actual official Vespa service center.

is there a reason to take the vespa to one over the other? OFFICIAL vs 3rd party repair?

http://www.vespabk.com/

I doubt that service center will do body work. They usually send body work out to a proper shop. I asked around and got the name of a good one here. They took out a cowl dent and resprayed the whole left side for $300. Good luck

I have done small claims court and won my case in 3 states, each time I was cheated on a deal as the buyer by someone. The $$$ amounts vary by state law.

OP, quite few larger auto dealers keep their own AB shops but no two wheeled vehicles have enough volume to do that work. They might have a referral that they like but I'd shop around for a small, 1-2 person shop that can justify smaller jobs. That damage will not likely interest a big shop. Asking people who do the service at the dealer might yield a straight forward referral as people who get dirty know the others who are in vehicle trades. If a tech school nearby might ask the teacher. My retired from gig.

Call the closest Vespa dealer and ask who they use for body work. That is the route I would go.

If you have Geico and claim in on your insurance, it will go up. Probably more than you think. Don't get the bright idea of calling them and asking how much it will go up if you claim the accident either.

Let's say it costs $800 to fix the bike. You pay 500, they pay 300, and then your rate goes up 400 a year. Sound financial decision? You decide to switch insurance, or buy a new car and the insurance agent asks if you've had a claim in the last 7 years. What do you think saying yes will do to the rate they quote you?

They are going to get their money back, in spades.

this scares me haa. makes me wonder why i'm paying all this money into insurance then. luckily i never had to use it, until now possibly.

I have progressive insurance and used it twice with my 250. the second time they totaled my Roja. Mostly body damage. the current owner had it repaired by a local body shop and then a copy backed into the front end. Again he had her fixed and she looks great.

We have a couple local body shops for our small city that do great work with scooters and motorcycles. I am sure you can find one in JC or nearby.

I am from the heights. left sooo many years ago. PS 28 was my grammar school. Would have attended Dickenson High School had we stayed in JC.

Good luck to you. Call the local Ducati BMW dealer and ask about body shops.

If you ever hit someone and put them in the hospital. Then you'll be wishing you had bought the highest coverage you could like I do so you don't end up getting sued when the insurance doesn't pay all their bill.

You can alway just get liability and insure the scooter yourself for damage.

hi! ended up going with insurance. for what it's worth, i have attached the vespa repair bill (an official vespa repair shop).

Not in my experience. When OAD and I dumped my BMW GT in the barn, it was totaled and Geico was great to work with and my premiums have remained stable for 3-4 years now.

In my personal experience there are zero free rides with insurance companies. It's a profit business and the money will flow somehow. It's no accident that I caddied for drs, lawyers, car dealers, stock brokers, bankers(higher ups only), a few big time farmers and insurance administrators when I was a kid-I learned who had the bucks real fast there @ the country club.
I have several friends who own and operate auto body shops and they can tell you the low down on every insurer from years of seeing how situations were treated and customer & agent comments. Often adjusters are ex-auto body people who know the shop owners. A few "work deals" under the table, some are just button pushers who never worked in the actual trade, it varies. There is a huge national "take-off parts business in auto parts removed from vehicles that were well covered by a policy. I cannot count the take-off plastic bumpers I've bought that were easily repaired and often in-color too. Typical parts are trim items, front sheet meta-hoods,fenders and some cooling.
The price increase in the repair comes out "you know who's" pocket book and is driven by customers who demand a NEW!!! PART!!!
My Kentucky Farm Bureau doesn't insure PTW's thus I've tried several companies over the years. I've never made a PTW insurance claim or been claimed against in over 50 years of riding but each company I've used in past 10-15 years has begun premium creep after the first year or so, except my now Progressive policy.
LEO's often write up accidents as 50/50 to avoid court duty and affecting what they don't really know about an occurrence they wern't there to witness. The "other party" will gold dig accidents and I have had several times where they flat out lied to either claim against my policy when it was their fault or had no insurance. I find it interesting that someone with no insurance nor drivers license can make a claim against my policy on a 50/50 accident! Having three sons driving(all were/are safe, excellent drivers, even in their teens and never had a true at fault accident) opened my eyes to insurance claims beyond my own many years as an operator.
Building wrecked, virtually always totaled cars, opened my eyes to what it takes to get a vehicle totaled and why rates are so high.
I'm remembering a phone conversation with the vice president of KY FB insurance after they tried to take away my claim free discount from an incident passing through STL on I-70 and my car was hit in front by a bucket that flew from a service truck in front of me and caused much damage but no stoppage accident. The guy asked me if "I hit the bucket" or "if the bucket hit me" and I got seriously pissed off. I asked him what's the difference now given you decided one way and took away my discount? Now because I need the discount money you ask me the magic question.
Those folks spend their days feeling like it's their money, not ours.
The insurance TV ads make me (somewhat) sick...
Rant over but I could tell some doozies on those guys.

My total repair cost completed by my local Vespa shop was in the same range for a minor accident I had last year.

Stirring the pot...
I'd like to get $40 to refinish a center stand. They milked that repair for everything they could.

Wow. :shock :hey geeked out every penny on that invoice. No wonder insurance premiums keep going up. Glad you got it fixed, tho

Living where wages are lower I have either done the AB work myself or in a few cases I feed the job in part to a friend and we stay away from the insurance as I do get a hefty claim free discount.
A tornado passed through my area a few years ago and the same KY Farm Bureau (they insure much of the property here and tend to have favorable rates too) has been raising home/farm insurance through the roof ever since.
They definitely were taken to task by the storm as one small town (West Liberty, KY) was wiped out. I had a hail roof and one late model car which I repaired well under the estimate payout via paint free repair guy and local labor. My one year old (then) Cadillac CTS4 repair was below what the Vespa cost above and hit hard all over.

The thing is everyone's insurance goes up to cover this sort of stuff. Then you get people writing posts about how unfair the cost of their insurance is. The common sense approach to buying a first bike it to get one that's used and preferably cheap - because you're almost certainly going to drop it. After a year or two you sell it on to someone else to learn on and then you get the bike you originally wanted. Hopefully not something that's too big of a jump in size or power. Personally, I'd of just kept the damage and figured that now I wouldn't have to worry about dropping it any more but I do understand that my point of view is in the minority.