Someone bumped into my car and drove off (on the day pep was presented at the ground).I feel your pain. All you want is for the insurance company to put you in the position you were before. That's what you paid for. My mate had similar to you, loved his car, absolutely loved it. A lady came out of a side street and hit him, she admitted liability immediately so no problem with her. My mate wanted the car repaired but the insurance company wrote it off and gave him their valuation. Now, he used that money plus £3000 of his own to get another car. So basically he is £3000 down and now has a car he doesn't love.
It would be interesting what garage owners, if any on here, say. My interpretation of this is that similar to vets, if insurance is involved, then the price of treatment/repair goes up. Now that sounds like a con.
Took it to get fixed. First question was are you paying yourself or is it insurance. Was paying myself so think it was about £180. Told me if it was insurance he would have charged about 2 grand.