My tC is cursed. I have had at least 6 or 7 times where my car was hit in a parking lot by someone else's door. I have gotten paintless dent repair each time out of my own pocket.

This time I was shopping at Walmart for Christmas (2 days before) and I was only in there for about a half an hour. I don't park my car right near the front of stores because I know this is where the most damage happens. Yet the damage always seems to find my tC.

I was there around 11:30pm. Store closes at midnight. I left numerous empty parking spots in between me and the store. When I come out there is a van parked to the right of me (my passenger side) and a cart in between my car and the van. I ALWAYS look at my car before and after parking somewhere in public because I am OCD with my car. I do the walkaround and find a dent and the paint cracked and peeled off the car down to the bare metal. The area isn't large where the paint is damaged (probably about 4 inches by 2 inches or so approx. I guess it either had to be done by a shopping cart or a car door. But the location and paint damage leads me to believe it was a cart. I doubt it was an actual car that hit it.

I had a Walmart employee or manager or whatever come out and look at the damage he said I had to call the police and file and report with them which I did. I also called the day after and spoke to someone hirer up and they gave me the contact of their loss and damage employee. I spoke with her and said the police have to request to view any video tape of the parking lot. She said she was going to look at tape and let me know if she is able to see anything but she can't tell me what she finds in particular. The cop I spoke with basically said that the outside cameras only recorded footage pointing towards the store and we wouldn't find anything off of them. It sounded to me like he was trying to get out of having to do police work because when i talked to Walmart it sounds like the cameras give a good view of the parking lot.

Anyways, I am still waiting for Walmart to call me (probably tomorrow). I doubt anything will come of it. And if they do find something the officer better do the work to request the footage. I know the do have their own insurance but it would only be covered under certain circumstances.

My options are to go through insurance (I have a $100 deductible) and file a claim (I had 2 verbal estimates done and they were both for around $500 because they said the whole fender had to be repainted. I do have accident forgiveness so my rates won't go up but it will count as an accident and remain in the computer and I would lose my good driver's discount. Plus it is probably smart to save the insurance for a bigger claim god forbid it were to happen.
I could also go get the dent removed from a PDR guy a know for $50 and then just use primer and touchup paint (the one in the bottle with the brush and the pen) myself until the spring until I could afford paying for it out of pocket. Getting the dent out will cause more of the paint to flake though probably.
I could also leave the dent as is and just put the primer and touchup paint on because they would have to fix the dent anyways when they paint it. I know it isn't going to come out good because I have to do it outside and with these temps in NY it will never come out right but it is more to prevent further damage.

The real problem is this is the first time it has involved paint damage. I was told if I leave it the way it is with the bare metal showing the paint will continue to peel (which it has) and it will develop rust and continue to rust especially in the winter with all the salt on the roads.

Has anyone had any incidents in Walmart parking lots (where they supposedly have the parking lots under surverlance)?

What would you do if it was your car?
I know a lot of you have probably dealt with a lot more damage to your cars and might say why is he getting all crazy about a little dent and paint damage. It is because my tC is the only nice material thing I have in my life and I have worked very hard for it. I have driven all pieces of junk before this car and this is the closest I will get to a "nice" car in probably awhile.

Sorry for such a long post. I appreciate your help and your patience to all those who have taken the time to read all of this. I am just tired of being the victim I always take extra caution not to hit other cars with a cart I was using or my car door out of respect for other people's property. I guess a lot of people weren't raised right and/or cannot fess up and deal with the consequences of their own actions.

Here are some pics of the damage. Some of the reflections from other things in the parking lot and some left over salt and snow might look like damage but it isn't.

 

That's quite a nasty hit. And you think a shopping cart did that?

That cart would have to be moving pretty fast to strip your paint down to the bare metal like that. I think it was deliberate for sure, but knowing Wal-Mart carts and how the corners of them are lined with plastic protectors, it's really hard to believe a cart did that. I think someone clipped you with their car instead.


BTW, you're on ScionLife. Of course everyone on here is obsessive about their cars. If not, we wouldn't be here, now would we? :D

Good luck with your tC buddy!

 

id guess a cart also. ive given up on protecting mine

 

Without divulging far too much, I can tell you 100% all the cameras outside are monitoring a close distance around the building some pointed at fire doors, entrances, and the few that are pointed abroad are aimed at traffic coming into and out of the store. Any cameras outside are for their benefit and not yours.

You'd be surprised what a shopping cart can do when it picks up speed, speaking from experience. Especially seeing as how it's on a line.

unfortunately not much more I can say except just be thankfull for small favors it's only a fender. Could be worse...

 

^Sadly you're not the only one. The front of my car has a bit of damage of rocks being kicked up, actually have a decent chip that has gone to the metal on the hood. Might just cover it up with a sticker or vinyl lol. I have a dent on the rear quarter too, might PDR that, haven't decided yet.

That dent on the fender is(or close) on the crease, ouch. Best of luck on getting the store to pay for the repair.

 

Chrisb is right camera are flooded on that parking lot. So that should be your first step.

 

First thing you should do is stop babying your car so much . The more you do it as in "OC" way that you more sh*t happens to your car. Car but no so much. If you know what I mean.

 

Ok, here is what the truth is. They do have cameras that cover the parking lot and if they are all working properly have a pretty good picture. If it was a shopping cart that hit your car then Wal-Mart does have the insurance to cover it and you will need to speak with their CMI rep about the repairs. They are not allowed to give you any information about what they seen on the video and thats where the cop comes into play. He can obtain a copy of the video and share it with you if he chooses to but they normally dont. If it was another customer that hit your car then its up to the police to do their job and Wal-Mart is not at fault. Thats about it and good luck with the repairs.

 

this^^^^

 

don't file a claim with your insurance company for such a small amount of money. unfortunately this stuff happens, and it's best to just bend over and deal with it yourself. i'm sorry "mayhem" found you, but at least it's just cosmetic damage. i would get it taken care of asap though to prevent rust damage. it's actually better to just park with everyone else in large parking lots like walmart, because when you park alone you're really allowing your car to be singled out by griefers & jerks. best of luck with everything.

 

some ones wheels look ate up....lol

 

Yes 2 of my wheels are ate up. Don't know how. But when stuff like this happens and I have to spend more money just to get the car looking back to stock condition then I can't get new wheels or a lip kit or lower my car. I have spent a large amount of money just fixing dents in my car. Thanks for pointing that out though like I didn't know and make me feel even worse.

Thanks to everyone else who had commented so far. I am still waiting to hear back from Walmart. Now I will have to wait until Monday. I don't know if I should put primer and touchup while I am waiting because I don't know if that will affect the claim and estimates (if there is one-a very slim chance). Metal hasn't started to rust yet. Anyone know how long it will take to start to damage? I wish I had the money now just to go fix it myself. Times are rough now. I had big plans for this car and nothing ever happened because it just keeps getting damaged.

 

@OP, i'm not trying to be rude, but you (anyone) should be able to fix small problems with your car if/when they happen. obviously it's not your fault that this stuff keeps happening to you, but if you can't afford to fix small problems with your vehicle when they happen you probably should not have bought a brand new car. i would wait and see if walmart offers to help you out before you do any work to the damaged area of the car. as i said before in my previous response though, i really dont think filing a claim for this is the right decision. car insurance is insanely expensive, and even more so when you actually use it--accident forgiveness or not.

 

^^^when someone else messes with your property though, it makes whatever damage they did 10x worse than what it actually is. I have had a hole in my front bumper since 2007, from where I backed a work truck into it. Since then, Ive been keyed, and had a rear fender backed into (hit and run)... both of which I claimed on insurance, and had fixed (at the same time). But... the hole in the front bumper is still there. I can deal with me f_cking up my own ****, but when a stranger does it... it just erks the f_ck out of you. I think if the OP dropped a hammer on his car in is garage and caused the same amount of damage, he wouldnt be as ____ed.

...And Lowes told me the same thing about filing a police report to request security camera footage. I later found from a neighbor the damage wasnt done at lowes, but that they saw some chick back into my car and take off (it was parked in the street). filed a police report with a descripiton of the car and no plates, never heard ____ back...didnt really expect to.

 

I am the same way about being OCD about my car, I find the best option to do is park near the auto care entrance, it's usually busy with employee activity and it's out of the way. They should have a back entrance to the store there as well. It's not always good to go to those places late a night though, because just such thing tends to happen. Someone to mess with another's car, that's just crossing the line, that ____ should never happen.

 

I know how you feel, I too gave up a bit on trying not to get my car hit or anything. I didn't get much in the beginning, but when I started to notice my passenger side door had little knicks in it from people opening their doors and hitting my car. I started thinking of ways that I could prevent that when I went out shopping or whatnot, like parking in between cars so it wouldn't be out in the open for other cars to come and hit it. I also tried parking somewhere far from other cars so people wouldn't park near me and somehow when I come out, someone decided to park next to me as if there wasn't 20 other spaces around where they could have parked, they had to park next to me! I haven't even tried fixing the few knicks on my passenger door bc you only can tell if I point them out or if you stare at it. The one thing that made me really give up was the day I parked on the side of a not so busy street (driver's side facing the street, passenger side facing the curb) next to the doctor's office. I wasn't even in there an hour and when I come out, my driver's side door got two big scratches on it! They are a little down from the mirror and are about as long as a quarter of the door. Mind you, these scratches are deep down to the metal. I think it was done on purpose bc there was cars parked behind and in front of me and they were fine. To this day, it still irritates me bc I was never able to find out how it happened. It's like, you try to keep your car safe and more sh*t happens to it. I too always try not to hit anyone's car when I'm getting out of mine, but it's like good deeds like that don't matter when you end up with two big scratches on your car door.

I will admit though, I know I said I gave up on the whole situation of not getting hit, but I'm sure you all can agree that it's not that one gives up completely. It's more like one doesn't try as hard. I still do try to park away from others or between two cars where I know they have space to open their doors without hitting mine. Lol What can I say, it's my tC!

 

^^ I would tend to agree with this...
also, from the pics you posted, IMHO I'd be really surprised if the dent was caused by anything other than a shopping cart given the fact that it was in a Walmart parking lot when it happened. The slight crease of the dent looks more horizontal to me which certainly would line up with how most shopping carts are made.
I usually baby my tC's too and protect them the best that I can. And try not to get too bummed when something happens to one of them that's beyond my control. My 4X4 however... sees a lot of fun offroad action so dents in that one are more like merit badges lol.

 

I park out in egypt everywhere i go. In my work parking lot, my car is atleast 4 rows away from everyone elses. Everyone jokes about it but I have never had a door ding or anything.

 

This is why you don't go to walmart.

 

This is exactly how I feel. I am glad there is someone else out there that understands what I am going through. I scraped the bottom of my front bumper pulling into a parking spot but I deal with it because it is something I did myself but when my car is parked and I come back to it damaged it is one of the worst feelings I have experienced.