Salem shop owner deals with short pays

by Anne Koppel Conway

With a twinkle in his eye, Brent Gilmour, owner, operator of Hyacinth Collision Centre in Salem said, “I’m a hothead.” He’s having “issues with Geico and Safeco.” But his way of handling a situation is not with anger but by “killing them with kindness.”

He has good relationships with most insurers, Gilmour said. The Collision Centre is a direct repair facility for Progressive. “They treat me good. They are setting industry standards by paying full refinishing charges. And Progressive doesn’t ask for discounts.”

He also has “a very good working relationship with Farmers.” He is not one of their direct repair facilities but finds the insurer to be “one of the easiest one’s to work with.”

Back to Geico: The insurer wants to reimburse the Hyacinth Collision Centre $46.24 an hour for a job, but “the prevailing rate is $48.24 an hour,” Gilmour said. The auto insurer disagreed.

The body shop owner doesn’t want “to be unfair” to anyone, but painting is a two-step process, he said; and he wants to get adequately reimbursed for the work he does. He is willing to print out the Collision Estimating Guides P-pages (Procedural pages) for the insurer to bring home what the prevailing rate should be.

To prove his point, he sent pictures of the job and documentation to 11 other auto insurance companies, including State Farm, All State, Progressive and Farmers to get blind estimates from each. They all came back with a $48.28 rate.

Comparing the two rates, the difference on the job was $44.40. The Geico representative told him, Gilmour recalled, “What’s the big deal? It’s only $44.40. We’re not paying it.”

Gilmour told him, “Don’t tell me it’s a piddling amount. If it’s so small, you should pay it.”

When the shop owner showed his customer the 11 insurance companies’ blind estimates, the customer readily acknowledged that the $48.28 figure was the prevailing rate. He didn’t want Gilmour to be stuck with the balance and agreed to pay the difference.

On Gilmour’s behalf the customer went to bat for the Keizer body shop by called Geico. Then, the customer called Gilmour and told him, “Brent, Geico agreed to pay the difference.”

Gilmour is holding onto the customer’s check, until he receives the one from the insurer.

Having “the same $46.26 rate battle with Safeco,” Gilmour has been talking to one of the “higher ups” in the insurance company. “He is a super nice person. He understands where I’m coming from and will talk to his higher up” regarding the prevailing rate.

Gilmour has been in the auto collision repair business for 22 years. At age 21, he started in a local Salem shop after returning from a stint in the US Army. In 1998, he and one of his partners Neil Carroll built their 10,000 square foot facility entirely with their own hands. They started in 1997 by cutting down trees on the property and eight months later the shop with two downdraft paint booths was complete. The third shop owner is Ruth Carroll.