Progressive Sucks

Our BAD experience with Progressive Insurance Company

This is an up to date history of how they handed our claim
and how we feel about it!

This started out being a little story that was bad enough as it was but thanx to our really wonderful insurance company "aka Progressive.com" it got even worse and to date it appears that they aren't finished making it a memorable experience for us.

Whatever you do don't buy your insurance from Progressive
and if you already have change it NOW!
Not tomorrow but now
or this could be YOU!

This page is still under construction and we have alot to add to it so check in for updates.

Anyways here we go.

On June 16, 2005, Donna and I were heading toward home about 10:30 PM from one of Coyote Joe's Bike Nights.

Traveling south bound in the right lane less than a mile from the bar, not to mention less than a mile from our home we caught the red light at the intersection of Clinton Highway and Merchants Road.  As the only vehicle across all 4 south bound lanes we sat waiting for the light to turn green and we heard the sound of a vehicle skidding from behind us for what seemed to be at least 8 to 10 seconds and then we felt "The Big Bang!" and we found ourselves being catapulted like a rocket toward the intersection.  The next thing I remember was being shot through the windshield only to be pulled back again because my right hand leg was pinned beneath the bike and then rolling over on our side where we were then thrown off the bike.  Lucky for Donna she got to use me for a back stop and ride my back down to the point where we hit the pavement hard.  Lucky for me when the bike went over it released me from its hold or I may have had even worse injuries than I ended up with.

When it all stopped I was looking up at the sky thinking that this can't be good.  I turned my head to the left and there was Donna laying on the ground about 3 feet from me.  She was making an effort to get up and appeared to be ok so life was good. The next thing I remember was a fellow hovering over me asking me if I was ok.  He was a rather large fellow with a beard kinda like we have been told the lord looks like.  It sure wasn't the gorgeous looking angel I always imagined meeting after a situation such as this so I was pretty sure I was still alive and this wasn't heaven lol.

All of a sudden it hit me where we were, sprawled out across a traffic lane of a usually extremely busy highway and to top it off in the dark.  Well here come all the people one of which was a nurse who told me to sit down, I could be hurt but like I said I wasn't about to stay where I was considering the situation.  At that point all I could think of was getting the hell off the street before someone else ran us over again but for some reason I couldn't get up.  With Donna's and another fellows help I managed to and we made a bee line for the sidewalk and to my disbelief when I looked back toward the bike I saw what hit us.  Are you ready for this, because I sure wasn't, it was another motorcycle that had slammed into us!  Thinking you've got to be kidding could it get any weirder than this?   We then met the owner of it which turned out to be a gal.  Now you would expect that if your ever got ran over on a bike it would be by a car or truck but who in the world would have ever thought it would be by another motorcycle, geese!

Looking toward the east bound turn lane I saw Rick, the owner of Clinton Highway Wrecker Service, sitting there waiting on the light to turn.  I hollered out across the intersection at him, Damn Rick it took you all of a minute to get here, your service is really getting kinda slow don't ya think lol.  In an effort to keep us all from getting run over Rick lit up his emergency lights and pulled his wrecker around behind the wreck using it to block off the traffic lane .  Donna sat on hold with 911 for what seemed like 5 minutes in an effort to get the police out there and when they finally answered she was told they had already received several calls and they were already in route to us.  When Donna hung up with them our cell started ringing.  It was our daughter Brandy whom had already received the call from one of her friends that witnessed us laying in the road.  If things weren't bad enough we now had a freaked out teenager on the line crying her eyes out thinking the worst had happened to us.  Donna and I told her we were in one piece and ok as far as we knew but she told us she was on the way to us.

We're thinking the KFD fire trucks arrived next on the scene all of whom were very nice folks and patched up Donna's arm where she skidded across the pavement "Thanx Guys".  It wasn't that large of a wound and she just asked for a bandaid but when they got finished wrapping it up it looked like Donna's arm was being held in place with a whole roll of gauze. During this time the police had arrived on the scene and had the intersection blocked even better so we didn't have to worry about getting ran into anymore which was a total relief in itself.

Next on the scene was the big white bus from Coyote Joe's bar, it was beginning to look like a convention because in a matter of minutes we had all kinds of people we knew all around us.   Even Dial from Knoxville Harley Davidson was on the scene trying to do what he could to help.

Well here came the worst part of it all which was our daughter arriving on the scene.

Just imagine what went through her mind when she approached the big 4 lane intersection which was lit up like the Christmas tree in New York's Rockefeller Center with police cars, fire trucks and wreckers sitting just about everywhere you could put them and somewhere in the middle of it all, was your parents.

Donna and I both talked to Brandy on the phone assuring her we were ok but judging from the tears in her eyes and the look on her face as she was approaching us it didn't seem to make much of a difference.  Seeing your child in such a situation cuts right into your heart and isn't something I'd wish on anyone.

Once the police and fire department fellows finished up with us and our scooter was loaded up on a roll back on its way to Clinton Highway Wrecker Service then Rick and Brandy helped me hobble my way down the street to where Brandy had abandoned her car in the middle of the east bout lane of Merchants Road for the ride home.

"Thanx Rick"

By the 10th step to the car my foot was really talking to me and I knew I was in trouble with my leg and foot and I was going to have to head for the emergency room at St. Mary's Hospital.

In an effort to save my boot from getting cut off me at the emergency room we stopped by the house to see if we could get it off.   It wasn't pretty but with Donna and Brandy's help not to mention a little bit of screaming like a girl we managed to do it with only the loss of a few tears.  While we were there, Brandy remembered the crutches we had from when Donna had broken her foot several years before so she hunted them up so that I would have them to get around and we were off the the hospital.

Donna called a nurse friend of ours that we rode with all the time who worked in the ER part of the hospital. She called ahead to fellow co workers and let them know we were coming.  We weren't there very long at all before they called my name and took me back to one of the rooms. 

Thanks Girl!

The rest of that story will have to be told later but now on to the bike.

This is the first time we saw our scooter since last night in the dark.
At first glance it doesn't look as bad as we thought it would but it's one of those things that the more you look the more you see.

Progressive had an adjuster meet us at Clinton Highway Wrecker Service that afternoon, less than 24 hours after the accident.

He assured us that the gal that rear ended us did in fact have insurance with them
and that everything would be handled promptly and that we had nothing to worry about which was one hell of a stress relief to us at the time.

Right off the bat the adjuster, James Lebakken gave us a form to sign along with a self addressed stamped envelope for us to mail to him so that they could have our medical bills released to them as soon as possible.
According to him it was so they could quickly pay our medical bills.

In further conversation with the adjuster he was pretty intent on getting our scooter moved out of Clinton Highway Wrecker Services indoor care so that his company wouldn't have to keep paying them storage on it so he asked us to please have it moved to Knoxville Harley Davidson as soon as possible not only to get a more thorough estimate of the damages but also to lessen the storage costs endured by his company.

While he was doing the estimate on our scooter we were looking at this form
and it didn't just release our medical bills to them like he said it did.

It was a form that gave them the right to all our medical records back to the beginning of time
and it also states that the information they derived from them would no longer be private,
meaning they would become public records.

That in itself seemed a bit over our heads so we made a decision to talk to a lawyer prior to signing anything which it turned out was the a good decision because from what we gathered from him when we were about to be hoo-dooed!

Yes we know it's Saturday but James the adjuster told us he works Tuesday through Saturday 9-5 so that means he could have called us but he didn't.

There all probably out riding there scooters

Well we tried calling the adjuster to find out the next step

We were told it was the fellows day off, oh yeah we forgot, so we would have to wait until Tuesday to find out anything about our scooters fate
<sigh>

Another day of No Productivity
We talked to the adjuster "James"
and he said he would fax us his
estimate that afternoon
but it never arrived.

Yeah!

After having to call them once again this morning at 12:34 PM

We finally got the Progressive estimate which in reality wasn't much but it was a start.  It was missing the storage bill and had no sales tax.  It also had a note wanting to know where to have the bike moved to so Donna and I went to Knoxville Harley Davidson's service department to see when they could get to it.

As usual they were pretty busy and we had to wait close to an hour to get to chat with someone. I was hurting pretty bad from my injuries, not to mention stoned from pain meds so after about about 20 minutes they went and found me a chair so I could sit down.  At this point I was only good for about 10 minutes standing due to my injuries not to mention the meds I was on lol.  Anyways our turn up to bat finally came and we got to chat with a the service manager a fellow named Brandon about when they could do an estimate on our bike.  Brandon and the rest of the shop all ready knew all about it because they already had the Gal's bike that ran into us in their shop.  Brandon said they were pretty busy this week and that

the soonest they could get to it was Tuesday of next week.

We stated to Brandon that providing there wasn't any frame damage and our bike didn't total we planned on doing the repairs on our bike ourselves so we needed anything they took apart put back together so we wouldn't have such a difficult time doing the repairs not to mention we didn't want our scooter coming home in boxes and he said that was no problem at all.  He also said that there are 13 " I think" measurements at points on the frame that they will make to assure that the frame was not damaged and that they would go over it with a fine tooth comb to be sure to cover things as best as they could be so we could avoid that pain in the ass supplement thing with Progressive which would help save both us and them time and money.

Today at 1:21pm we Received Progressive's 2nd estimate figuring storage thru tomorrow and sales tax

plus also contained in the fax was a letter stating that any storage past tomorrow

would come out of our pocket.

Clell called James (after stewing) about 2:30 and told him that

we didn't appreciate the letter telling us we were not mitigating our responsibilities fast enough for them.

It wasn't our fault but his fault in taking so long to get back with us on things that was taking so long!

  We received a check for $5,691.98 in the mail which we put away safely until we knew what to do with it. 

We also received the same letter about storage in the mail

We called the Harley dealer and talked to Brandon who said we could have it brought down there and they could store it inside until they got to it so we had it towed down there.

Our Bike was taken to Knoxville Harley Davidson today to please Progressive.

Day 9 Saturday June 25th 2005 No Word from Progressive

Day 10 Sunday June 26th No Word from Progressive, There probably out riding their scooters again

Day 11 Monday June 27th No Word from Progressive But we got to meet with a lawyer today

Needless to say he told us not to sign that form and for us to tell them to contact his office
for any medical information they needed.

Next Question was what to do with the check that Progressive sent us, if we should deposit it or just hold on to it?.

He told us that we shouldn't cash the check until everything was final or at the very least the closest it could come to it that we could live with.

Brandon, from Knoxville Harley, called and said that the estimate was done and the bike was ready to be picked up and taken back to our shop.  We went down there and took a look at their estimate and had to have them add the right hand foot board, the tour pak lid organizer, and the flag.  We also asked how much it would be for them to mount and balance the new tire on the new rim and Brandon said that it would cost $35.00.  While we were there we called Clinton Highway Wrecker and they said it would cost $75.00 to tow our bike back to our shop after the insurance company pays them for their estimate.

This needed to happen soon because they weren't storing our bike
inside like we understood they would.

Instead it was being stored outside under a damp, dirty, dark carport.

We did find out that the Progressive had paid $495.81 for the initial tow and storage bill to Knoxville Harley because Harley had paid Clinton Highway Wrecker Service when our bike arrived at their place on Friday.

So the balance owed to get our bike out of hock from Knoxville Harley would be $401.41
plus the $75.00 which equals
$476.41 in all.

We left a message on Mr. James Lebakken's, the adjuster at Progressive, voice mail at 8:07am telling him that the latest estimate exceeded his by $2,196.46 and faxed him copies.

Since we STILL hadn't heard a word from the adjuster at Progressive

Donna gave them a call at 2:11 PM and talked to a fellow named Fred Sliger who verified that they had in fact received our fax.  Later that evening at 7:11 PM Mr. Lebakken "James" called and said that he would work on it tomorrow.

Today we had to make a payment to the bank on
our broken dead horse of
$404.16

This was something we would have had to do anyways but
not being able to work sure made it tough for us to do.

Day 15 Friday July 1st No Word from Progressive

Day 16 Saturday July 2nd No Word from Progressive

Day 17 Sunday July 3rd No Word from Progressive

Day 18 Monday July 4th No Word from Progressive

Day 19

Tuesday

July 5th

Well James the adjuster from Progressives tomorrow turned out to be 5 tomorrows later
but he finally called about 2 PM today offering us a check of $1,516.45 if we want to come pick it up across town.  Donna told him she didn't see any sense in driving across town to pick up a check that is short $184.20.

James said that it didn't include the tow bill or helmets because he needs a copy of the tow bill
and he has to have our helmets before he will pay us for them.
He said it was a safety thing Progressive required to insure that they were never used again.

Donna told him we don't have copy of the tow bill because as you are aware the bike is still at Harley.

She also had to remind him that we haven't been able to work and it's kind of hard on us to pay Harley the $401.41 to get our bike out of hock plus the $75.00 to have it towed back to our store not to mention that it's kind of hard to get a receipt for towing something that hasn't been towed yet.

As far as the helmets go, she told him he's welcome to them.

Another thing about the helmets that 
I as I write this with my now very paranoid mindset I wonder if the reason they want them from us is so they can disappear because they show evidence of the impacts our heads took when we hit the pavement.

Isn't a shame one has to think this way?

It has been raining for the past two weeks on and off here and our scooter is really beginning to turn to shit.

Realizing that Progressive obviously
isn't going to settle our claim any time soon

and our bike is not being stored inside as we were told it would be not to mention our summer time is running out and we needed to get this show on the road ASAP.

Progressive's adjusters are well aware that it's going to take several weeks to obtain all the parts we need to get back on the road especially the painted parts and we just can't understand why they are dragging this out so long

SO WE CHOSE TO USE OUR MONEY TO PAY THE $401.41 PLUS $75.00 FOR TOWING

to get our bike out of Knoxville Harley-Davidson's Damp Dark Carport

so that we could take it to our shop where it could be kept indoors so it won't be rusting down in the elements while the folks at Progressive make up their minds what WE'RE going to do.

We'd like to take it home where the conditions would be even better
Normally the bike shares the upper garage with our daughters Saturn but due to the fact I'm crippled up and can't do the basement stairs yet we have to park our Suburban in it which unfortunately isn't large enough to hold both of them at the same time not to mention we don't have the means to transport it back and forth.  Even if we had a trailer and could there is no way in my condition I could load or off load it so were just kinda stuck doing things the best as we can.

When the guy from the wrecker service parked
our bike in our shops cutting room bay we noticed this switch knob was MIA.

In the light the bike looked even nastier than it did sitting in Knoxville Harley's carport storage area.  Hopefully we got it before the moist dirt did any damage to the paint and the rust pits haven't set into our chrome. It's a far cry from the condition it was in the last night we got to ride it.  If we sound kinda fussy about our bike we hate that for ya, for what we paid for it we planned on it lasting us a very long time.  This thing got better care from Donna than I do, it was her baby and she kept it always shining like a new button.

Did you know Progressive has a special exclusion for this kind of damage written into the policy.

I bet I know how it got there!

The first order of the day called for making up an accurate parts list.

We tried listing the parts we needed from the two repair estimates but things weren't adding up.
The description of the parts didn't really tell us what was what and there were several bent parts that weren't on the lists as far as we could tell. 

This pretty much put us at a stand still because it was pretty plain to see
that we were going to have to have a parts manual before we could even think about ordering anything and we were also going to have to have a service manual also to verify what parts are going to be needed.

Donna went on a mission and started calling the 3 Harley Dealers in our area until she found what we needed at Smokey Mountain Harley Davidson in Maryville, TN.

What should have been about a 60 minute drive to get there and back took her about 2 hours after driving around lost and then when she got there she got the run around for at least another hour before they could find the guy that knew where the books were lol.

Needless to say we weren't going to be able to get anything finished today so we headed for the barn and spent the rest of the evening becoming familiar wtih the two manuals.

 The cost was $92.64 and 4 hours.

Day 24 Sunday July 10th No Word from Progressive

Today we started tearing the bike down to get up an accurate parts order.

This is a shot of our rear wheel that was bent from the impact.

She must have really been moving when she hit us
to do this type of damage. The guys at Knoxville Harley told me her front rim had the same type of damage.

Left side, Center and Right hand side rear views

The left hand side of the bike

We removed the saddle bag racks along with the tour pak and a few more parts.

When we got down to the frame we found frame damage Harley had missed.

We were under the understanding that the damage to our bike was all simple bolt on parts replacement with the exception of a scratch or two here and there we could touch up with a small bottle of touch up paint but the damage we found was way past that stage.

At that point since that's something alot more major than originally figured we gave it up until we could talk to someone about what we had found.

This tab is the left front mounting bolt of the rear fender and appears to be the worst bent of the ones we found so far.

Left hand side shots of the damage

This is the left rear fender mounting bracket.

It's hard to see in these pictures but there are no less than 5 cracks radiating all around the bolt hole.

These cracks may be just superficial and confined only to the powder coat itself.  The only method I'm aware of for repairing something like this is to grind the powder coat down to the metal and that operation itself may help mask cracks.  If it is cracked it would have to be cut off the frame and replaced or if it's small perhaps it could be welded.  The end result of that would be a weaker metal than it was from the factory unless the entire frame went through a process like the swing arms do in our helicopter called "normalizing" which restores the metal to the same toughness throughout that it was designed to be.  If it isn't the parts will break off the main frame just shy of where they were welded back on.

Rear views of the top tubes of the frame.

The RH tube appears to be higher than the LH one.
It may just be an illusion from the way the lift is holding the bike.
Not having any books with dimensions and points to measure from for the frame we can't tell how much if any the tubes are bent.

It appears that the rear brake caliper is out of alignment. It's a cast part and the only way we can see it doing what it's doing is that the rear axle itself must be bent because that's all it appears to be mounted to.

Another shot of the same situation. At this point we didn't see much point in tearing it down further.

Donna called Brandon at Knoxville Harley and asked him who he had told me about at Progressive that might be a bit more productive to deal with.

He told her to call Matt Kepper and gave her his number.  She called Matt about 9 & left a message on his voice mail and asked that he call us.  He called us about 10:05 and said that he would dig into the situation and come by in the next 2-3 days and reevaluate the situation.

About 3:50 PM Donna called the Main Harley headquarters in Wisconsin and spoke to a fellow named Phillip.

She described the damage and asked him if repairing the frame was an option for us.

Phillip at Harley Davidson said

they do not advise any repairs on the frame and gave her a file number of 306587 for the insurance company to reference in the event they balked about it.

Later that afternoon lo and behold Matt the adjuster from Progressive showed up.

We played show and tell with him and he agreed that a new frame was in order and
there was a pretty good possibility that this would total our bike.

He took some pictures and said that he would relay what he saw
and show the pictures to the proper people and have them get back with us.

Donna Called Progressive and spoke with Matt at 10:35 am to see where we are on the bike.

He checked and said that Mr. "James" Lebakken had dropped the ball and not done a thing.

Donna asked him if he could please get somebody to do something because
it's been 4 1/2 weeks now!

At 3:55 PM Donna called the Progressive Insurance Company's main number in an effort to get somebody that will do something to bring this deal to closure.

The girl that answered punched in the claim number and then put her on hold for a while.  When she came back she told Donna that a property damage manager is reviewing the case and that
it shouldn't be more than a day or so until they let us know something.

Donna told them that we are sending the bike back to storage after two days so they need to make a decision soon.  We just don't have the space for it here and we can't take it home.

Next Donna called the Harley Dealer parts guy we had in limbo

to let him know we are still waiting on the insurance company to decide if they are going to total the bike or not and that's why we can't give him the go ahead to order the parts we priced with him.

NEXT Donna called the bank to ask them if there was anything they could

do to help us through this situation.

They said about the only way they could help us out any is by allowing us to defer a maximum of one payment and that there is nothing that they can help us do to deter the insurance from stalling.

Donna checked on availability and pricing to rent a bike
since it doesn't look like we will have one any time soon at the rate they are going.

Would you believe $750.00 a week plus $35.00 a day for rental insurance

Now can't yas just see us driving into our local bike hangout in a cavalier lol.

They also said that "reasonable" is determined by court
and that the insurance company is breaking no laws.
Well the law sure sux!

to request that our insurance coverage on the bike be reduced to comprehensive only back to June 17th since we obviously cannot drive a wrecked bike and we don't feel that we should have to be paying for collision insurance.

They said they can only cancel it and that they do not offer a comprehensive only policy.
and once this is over they can refund back to the date of June 17th but only if the bike is totalled.

So until they settle with us,

it means we have to keep our insurance in case something were to happen to our wrecked bike for the bank note.

Day 34 Wednesday July 20th No Word from Progressive

Well we hadn't heard a word from The Good Ole Boys at Progressive in the last 9 days
so Donna gave them a call at 2:44 PM today.

Someone at Progressive named Jim told Donna ALL they are going to pay us for the total loss we have undertaken is
$21,474.65  PERIOD.

Donna wasn't going for that figure and told him that, and that we found that my boots are also damaged besides the helmets which we just happened to notice today since I had not been able to wear them and just saw the damage,  he said that he would check into it.

Well on the upside at least now we know its totalled so
in the mean time we started checking NADA and comparable used resale prices.

What we found was the price Progressive decided our bike is worth and is offering to us is
WHAT A BASE ULTRA SELLS FOR ON AVERAGE.

That's one without the upgrades our bike had on it such as the two tone paint, wire wheels, security system, Vance & Hines Exhaust pipes, adjustable driver seat back and the other things we had added to it since we bought it.

Day 36 Friday July 2nd No Word from Progressive Donna called Matt another adjuster at Progressive to get his Fax number so she could fax our findings to him.

Day 37 Saturday July 23rd No Word from Progressive

Day 38 Sunday July 24th No Word from Progressive

Day 39 Monday July 25th No Word from Progressive

Today we found out that
the Extended Warranty on our bike we paid $904.00 
hard earned bucks for plus tax

is not transferable to another Motorcycle.
"It's only transferable to another person who bought our Motorcycle"

That means we're out even more moneys than we thought.

Day 40 Tuesday July 26th No Word from Progressive

Today we went on the NADA site
and did our own fill in the blanks version.

The NADA site isn't very clear so we just clicked every box that had anything to do with any of the equipment our bike had.

Well that came up with a price of $19,800.00 but according to a conversation I had with Matt the adjuster from Progressive he says you can't add in all that stuff because all Ultras come with that stuff on it already.  Now if you really look at it it does give something for the high performance exhaust of $165.00 and it also notes a tour pak with rack for another $95.00  Now everyone knows that the tour pak comes with a rack installed on top of it right from the factory don't they? not! lol

At any rate if you look at it in black and white and don't check any of the boxes the base bike itself comes up starting at $18,500.00 for the bike plus tax which adds another $1,375.00 making it a grand total of $19,875.00.

OK well if we can buy one for that so be it but! for some strange reason we can't find a dealer that will give us that other $1,622.89 worth of accessories plus the no good bums won't eat the $315.00 for the 4.5 hours of labor it takes to install it all either.

CAN YOU IMAGINE THAT!

It's just another $1,937.89 plus Uncle Sam's share of 119.25 which only totals up to a meager $2,057.14

Humm let see that makes it all add up to $21,932.14 doesn't it?

Dang that comes out to $457.49 more than Progressive's offer of 21,474.65 Doesn't it?.

Then there are those other expenses they are seem to be forgetting about or perhaps trying to dupe us out of that come to $1,385.82 that we have had to take out of our pockets during all this absolutely unnecessary haggling and put offs Progressive has put us through all the while knowing we were too banged up to be bring in a paycheck during the majority of this.

At any rate in black and white that all adds up to $23,316.96 then kick in the $ money for the two tone paint $810.00, the $450.00 wire wheels, the $275.00 security system, along with the money for the $970.00 extended warranty we may or may not get back plus 7% sales tax and unless we made an error in our addition on our chart it will add up to exactly what's on the paper we sent to Progressive.

The Total we come up with	$26,543.72
The Total Progressive is offering	$21,474.65
What we're loosing if we take their offer	5,069.07

Heres another tidbit about the NADA site. If you look close near the bottom of the page it says

Notes
DUE TO CUSTOM FEATURES SUCH AS CHROME, PAINT, ENGINE MODIFICATIONS, AND MARKET CONDITIONS,
SOME VALUES MAY INCREASE BY AS MUCH AS 10%-30%.

and it also says

Average Retail Value - An average retail unit should be clean without obvious defects.  All rubber and cables should be in good condition.  The paint should match and have a good finish.  All lights and switches should work properly.  The mileage should be within or slightly higher than the average range.  This unit should also pass any emission inspection.

Humm let's see what it would be worth if we use that NADA Chart to the letter with all the loop holes it has.

Ours was Above Average, Had Low Miles and in Perfect condition and had additional chrome and hell lord knows the market conditions are just about as high as they can be for a Nice Harley especially and Ultra so let's just use that NADA addition of 20% because of the chrome and high market conditions.

If we added this up right our bike would itself if it were a base model
without the security system, two tone paint and wire wheels and the extended warranty would work out to

NADA Base price	$18,500.00
+ 20%	$3,700.00
Sub Total	$22,200.00
Sales Tax 7% = $80.00	$1,634.00
Grand Total	$23,834.00

Anyways using that NADA site we come out $41.73 in the hole on the deal but we still have to contend with that extended warranty thing which adds another $904.00 plus 7% sales tax  of $63.28 which now brings our total up to $24,801.28

This NADA thing isn't looking so bad at the moment,

now all we have to do is add the money we spent out on the expenses and it all comes to $26,449.19 as opposed to the $26,543.72 figure we came up with and we only stand to loose $52.80 and it saves us from having to barter over all the add ons we had.

We really don't feel we should have to
but at this stage of the game it would be alot easier to just eat it the difference.

 
At any rate "Were" going deeper in the whole every day and
we still haven't heard a word from Progressive since July 21st

so at 12:30pm Donna sent Progressive another fax in living color of the price of our bike on the NADA site complete with our estimate of the on going expenses we've incurred so far.

9 Days later we finally got another response

Matt,  adjuster number 2, from Progressive called US today about our claim once again telling us

they wouldn't pay any more than $21,474.65 on our total claim.

That's the bike, the accessories we had installed on it, and all expenses incurred by us to date.

We have no idea how they came to that conclusion meaning what the breakdown looks like they are figuring it from because they have yet to send us any written information.

He says that's the current NADA on our bike.  When I brought up the add ons we had on our bike he said they may pay us for the helmets and boots above that price but all the other items included in our list he says will be denied for what ever reason they can come up with.

I asked him to come by so we could go through it on a line by line basis together but he declined to do so.

One item of discussion was our Vance & Hines oval slip on mufflers we had added because he says we originally had factory pipes that were just fine and we could just put them on the next bike we bought. Then he babbled out something to the order of paying us the difference between what the factory pipes were valued at and what the Vance & Hines mufflers. Wow what a loop hole huh?

He then said they would pay for things the bike came with from the factory like the wire wheels, security system, but not for upgraded mufflers and other things we had on our bike even tho there is a special provision in our own policy that states it covers up to $1,000.00 for add on accessories.

This was all new to me because if you go back and look at Progressives other two estimates they sent to us when they were going to repair our bike it has an allowance printed in black and white for the mufflers but now they are saying they aren't going to pay to replace them.

Now here's a real glitch in all of this,

OUR POLICY hasn't anything to do with this because it is supposed to be being paid for by the persons Insurance company that hit us -  RIGHT!

Anyway you look at it they owe us a set of mufflers and all the other things we had on our Scooter.

Just prior to ending our conversation with him on the phone I once again told him

all we wanted to do in this situation
was to come out of it in as good a of a condition or better than we were before it happened.

 
His Reply was to laugh and say that we were in no way going to come out of this better then we were before so we might as well give up on that idea.

Once again I told him we didn't expect to but
we absolutely do expect to come out of it as good as we were.

Well that pretty much concluded our conversation as we were just going around in circles and
in his own words he said that he had better things he could be doing with his time and that it wouldn't be until sometime next week before he would have the time to review the situation again.
so we said our goodbyes to one another.

This is a form we faxed to 18 dealers looking for a replacement bike like ours was.

This is a list of the 18 dealers we faxed it to.

 Searching for a replacement bike equipped like ours we found this one.

They sell for a bit more in the real world than they do in Progressives.

Searching the Internet Donna and I found this almost exact duplicate or our bike miles and all,
less the options and add ons we had on ours.

The Bike you see in the photo above was selling yesterday (July 26, 05) for $19,795.00 +Tax, Tags and Tittle fees
which if we figured it correctly would add another $1,465.65 dollars to it.

That would mean this bikes total sale amount out the door would be $21,260.65 all by itself.

This bike is A BASE MODEL and it didn't have
the, security system nor the wire wheel option, the Vance & Hines pipes or any of the other of the add on goodies we had not to mention the extended service plan at a value of at least"$904.00" bucks we had.

 
It doesn't take a rocket scientist to see that if we did buy it and added the things we had on our original bike in question
the price would far exceed the what Progressive is offering us

 
and that's just the actual bike itself and doesn't include the other items we have went in the hole on since the wreck like towing, estimates, books, helmets,boots, insurance, payments we have been making on a dead bike and etc.

At any rate we gave John Saffran a call as soon as we found it but unfortunately it had already been sold.

 Please feel free to call or email me Monday-Saturday (Off Thursdays), if there's anything I can help you with!
John Saffran (262) 860-2060
john.saffran@halshd.com  
 2004 Ultra Classic® Electra Glide® in Sierra Red & Silver 
Specifications 
Price $19,795.00 
Stock Number 8475A 
Mileage 4,736 miles 
Bike Color Sierra Red/Silver 
Engine 1450cc 
Transmission 5-speed 
Year 2004  

1925 S. Moorland Rd.
New Berlin, Wisconsin 53151
Phone: 262.860.2060
Fax: 262.860.2067
Toll Free: 800.966.4443
info@halshd.com

©Copyright 2005 Hal's Harley-Davidson. All Rights Reserved.

Day 42 Thursday July 28th No Word from Progressive

Day 43 Friday July 29th No Word from Progressive

These are Faxes exchanged between us and one of the folks at Killer Creek Harley in Roswell, GA.

The purpose is to see if we can get a refund for the Extended warranty we paid the $904 bucks for.  Matt, the adjuster, said that we can get it refunded but we can't seem to get a definite answer from anyone.  Donna called the warranty people at Harley and they said that we had to talk to the dealer we bought it from.  So she called Matt Gibby at Killer Creek Harley and he said that they prorate it somehow.  That didn't make sense because our factory warranty has not been used up so we haven't used any of the extended warranty time yet.  Anyway he said that we have to fill this form out and send it in and then Harley will refund what we are due but he can't say how much for sure.

Well we got to thinking after we got the fax that we can't do this until we settle with Progressive.

What if they end up not totalling our bike?  Then we wouldn't have our extended warranty anymore.  Actually the salvage would be worth more anyway with the transferred extended warranty and besides all that we're tired of trying to figure this all out and we shouldn't be having to since we didn't get ourselves in this mess to start with.

We've decided to just leave it alone for now and let Progressive worry about it, we've had enough stress over this whole deal and don't think we should be the ones who have to deal with it.

If the cost truly can be refunded Progressive can go after the 6 to 8 week process (we've been told) themselves.

New total as of
6/29/05

Below is our new total as of today and several bikes we found for sale which most are only 1 color, more have more miles, and none have everything we had on ours.  As you can see by the examples below our bike is worth alot more than Progressive is offering us.

Bike #2 $20,995 +TTT 10,000 miles 1 color only acc looks like backrest (not sure if adjustable) Bike #3 $20,995 +TTT 5800 miles 1 color ACC= luggage rack Bike #7 $19,250 +TTT Miles 4400 1 color Acc=alarm, spoke wheels, luggage rack, ws bags Bike #8 $22,995 +TTT 15,084 miles 1 color Acc=appears to have less than ours

Bike #1 $21,500 +TTT Miles  1 color base bike Bike #6 $19,850 +TTT 5589 miles, 1 color Acc=lace wheels, luggage rack Bike #7 $19,995 +TTT, Miles 3743 1 color,  Acc= luggage rack Bike #8 $19,.900 +TTT Miles 2000 1 color Acc=alarm, luggage rack, ws bags Bike #9 $21,500 +TTT 3500 Miles 2 color Red & Silver Acc=backrest (not sure if adjustable), pipes

$20,000 +TTT 2100 Miles  Red & Silver Acc=just mufflers $19,300 +TTT 5961 miles 1 color Acc=stock bike

$23,827.20 +TTT Miles ???? 1 color stock bike $19,795 +TTT 4736 Miles Red & Silver Acc=Stock bike

Page 1 of 3 $23,495 +TTT 3963 Miles 2 Tone-Teal & Silver Acc=Has laced wheels, Security system & luggage rack

Page 2 of 3

Page 3 of 3 It's Purty but for what it costs we would rather have something in a color we liked.

Out of all this shopping we could only find 3 comparable that were two tone ranging in price from as low as 19,795.00 to 23,495.00.

The only Two Tone that has the spoke wheels option is selling for

$23,495.00

Selling Price	$23,495.00
Extended Warranty	The dealer that has it says around $1,074.00
Sub Total	$24,569.00
Sales Tax 7% = $80.00	$1,799.83
Grand Total	$26,368.83

This out the door price still doesn't reflect the rest of the things we had on our bike which will add about $800.00 and it doesn't reflect the higher cost of the interest rate we will have to endure on financing a used bike which all by itself will add greatly to our overall cost.

 
To get it to where we were, there is "no doubt it will cost us even more".

 
We didn't focus on the highest priced bike we found, we focused on the one closest to what we had and we're assuming that's what ours would sell for since it's the only comparable bike we have found.

Heres another glitch in the plan we come upon.

If we buy a used bike from an individual and it doesn't have an extended warranty with it already
the only way we can buy one is

1.  IF we finance it through Harley Davidson Finance
2.  It gets checked out in a Harley Davidson Dealer at a cost of ??? at $70.00 an hour


Adding up the higher cost of an HD financing rate on a used bike, a new bike is 7.5 %
and you know a used one is going to be at an even higher % rate.
plus the service check cost
plus the cost of the warranty itself
would be much greater the the $904.00 we paid on our bike.

The Bottom Line is

At this point from our perspective if we take Progressives offer there isn't any way we are going to come out of this without being in the hole

on the base bike all by itself.   Much less with the added expenses, the accident and the aftermath of it have caused us to incur.

Unless Progressive gets off their duff and plays fair
and puts us right back where we were prior to the accident at what ever it costs in the real world.

Anyway one looks at it we can't help what it costs, it costs what it costs PERIOD!

Day 46 Monday August 1st No Word from Progressive

Today we received a quote  on Dial Browns 2005 Ultra today from Knoxville Harley.

  Dial's bike equipped up to what we had with the exception that it didn't have the wire wheels or any of the labor to install the accessories we had was $26,600.19 out the door, a far far cry from what Progressive is offering us for our 1 year older bike that I'd be willing to say was in better condition.

The salesman told Donna that adding the wire wheels and labor to install them along with labor for installing the other accessories we had would be at least another $1,000.00 plus tax!

Humm 27K plus Yup we're pretty sure Progressive is trying to bone us.

Day 50 Friday August 5th No Word from Progressive

Day 51 Saturday August 6th No Word from Progressive

Day 52 Sunday August 7th No Word from Progressive

In all this time Progressive's adjusters have been dragging their rear ends we had alot of time on our hands and were learning more and more about the big picture of all this.

Since the only bike we have found for sale that is comparable to ours is going to cost us alot more than Progressive says it is we are going to have to make a new cost sheet that reflects the real world prices.

I reckon we'll be faxing this new one to Progressive Monday morning which will for certain cause them to take another week or two to respond to, we'll just have to see how it all goes.

This sheet reflects the price of
the only USED bike with two tone paint, laced wheels, security system and low miles
we have been able to find and were going to have to go on a "12 hour 776 miles" drive one way to Florida and back to get it which will add even more to our expense.  Using Progressive's logic I'm guessing that would fall under the mitigation part of the claim and fall on us.

The cost of putting us back
Almost exactly where we were
on this comparable used color we really don't like 2004 bike brings the real world total up to

$28,989.48

$27,177.41

This sheet is figured with the costs of a new 2006 bike with the same options we had on ours

and it would save Progressive $1,812.07 which is certainly cheaper

not to mention it would come with these 2 items which may not mean to much to someone else but they sure meant something to us.

<sigh>

Day 53 Monday August 8th Whoooop Here It IS! Progressive's Final Word On Our Claim They feel $21,474.65 is a fair price for our bike that's going to cost $27,341.57 to replace and feel they are not responsible for the rest of the expenses we incurred.

*	Progressive's Final Take It Or Leave It Offer	What our bike and items we're loosing sells for on the street
Price for bike as equipped	$19,995.00	$23,495.00
Price of extended warranty	0	$1,074.00
Tags & Title	0	0
Sales Tax	$1,479.65	$1,799.83
Our Accessories w/tax	0	$972.74
Out of pocket expenses	0	$1,705.18
Total Payout	$21,474.65	$28,989.48

WE LOOSE  $7,514.83

Now here's another part we have no idea what to do with

Along with this letter we received a check for reimbursement of the Harley estimate and the towing back to our shop by Clinton Highway Wrecker Service.

That little transaction Cost US $476.41

Progressive paid us back $419.14, with a check they know we can't cash

WE LOOSE ANOTHER $57.27 if we did our math right if we end up getting to keep this check

Our Expenses on this part of the deal

Harley Estimate and towing $344.14 Towing back to shop $75.00 Total of check they sent $419.14

Harley Estimate $401.41 Towing $75.00 WE LOST $57.27

There's no word at all in the letter regarding the salvage figure on our bike.

"Matt" one of Progressives adjusters who was more then likely lying his rear end off told me he had a bid on the salvage of $10,000.00

That means using Progressive's final payment figure they are loosing a total of $11,474.65 on this deal.  That's less than the cost of repair of our bike much less the entire replacement cost of it.

Unless I'm wrong if we add that up it means Progressive
will be making a profit gain on our loss just on the bike all by itself
not to mention the rest of the monies we are loosing on the deal.

One thing is for sure - Progressive seems not to care who they screw - they screw everybody!

Here's some interesting links for yas

This link takes you to posts made by actual Progressive employees. It shows exactly how Progressive pushes their people to screw not only their insureds but their employees too! http://jobvent.com If you go to the main page on this site You'll also notice that out of the 10 WORST Companys to work for Progressive rates # 8 with a score of -284

These are posts Primarily from agents that are UN-Happy with Progressive. http://www.insurancejournal.com

This one is a former insured telling his/her UN-Happy experiences with Progressive. http://www.chuckjerry.com/rants/progins.shtml

Posts from another UN-happy customer http://kyle.mindwarp.us/blog/archives/000006.html

Posts from more UN-happy customers http://www.progressive-stinks.com/

There are hundreds of sites all over the Internet that tell of Progressive's poor ethics.

We could just keep going and going but there isn't enough ink in this computer so we quit on these 5 sites.
One thing for sure is if you take the time you look at just a couple of these sites you'll know who not to buy insurance from
and who not to go to work for.

Day 55 Tuesday August 9th ON HOLD Today Clell met with our Lawyer again. After almost an hour long discussion on our scooter damage he decided to call them on our behalf and make them an offer of $25,000 to settle our claim which would still be giving in to them but like he said if we had to go to court with them on it he would have to add his percentage fee to it and we would be getting far less than Progressive's first offer of $21,474.65.  He said they would most likely come back with a middle of the road offer of around $23,400.00.  Their conversation ended with the James, one of Progressive's adjusters, saying that he would see what he could do and let us know in a few days. In other words their canned same chit different day answer. This day just as the last 54 days once again ended as it started, ON HOLD in wait and see what happens next mode Imagine that!

Day 56 Wednesday August 10th ON HOLD	Day 57 Thursday August 11th ON HOLD	Day 58 Friday August 12th ON HOLD
Day 59 Saturday August 13th ON HOLD	Day 60 Sunday August 14th ON HOLD	Day 61 Monday August 15th ON HOLD

Day 62 Tuesday August 16th ON HOLD

Day 63 Wednesday August 17th   Our attorney called today around 3pm and said Progressive came back with the exact offer he said they would of $23,446.93 based on a bike they found in Michigan. He was told it was an exact duplicate of ours so he got the guys phone number so we could go buy it. Well we called that fellow in Michigan and got the real low down on exactly what he had for sale and what it really was was a base ultra with cast wheels, no security system. It did have screaming eagle mufflers which is an aftermarket muffler harley offers but they don't sound the same as what we had on ours so we would have to replace them. Along with the mufflers the fellow added he also had what they call a stage one kit which is a good thing I'm told if your a more power kinda guy.   1st off the engine computer is recoded to the type of mufflers installed and the 2nd part of adding a stage one kit involves raising the redline limit of the engine rpm which would allow it to have some 400 or so MORE engine rpm's before the bikes computer cuts out on you exceding the factory preset settings, in other words it allows the engine to be hot rodded.  If we thought it was a good idea we would have had it on our original bike and we didn't have it for what we feel is a very good reason.  This bike also had highway pegs which we didn't want and meant that the chrome crash bar would be marred up from where they clamped them on.  That means we'd have to buy a new crash bar or put up with the impressions/rust they put in the chrome.  Another thing it had was a shortened windshield which some folks think is pretty kewl but we don't so it to would also have to be replaced with a original factory sized one unless we wanted to eat more bugs and have less protection when we were riding in the rain. It did have an adjustable seatback which aside from the color was the only similarity to our bike.  The other two things it had ours didn't was chrome rings around the speakers and instruments.  They are pretty but when the you are riding with the sun at your back they sometimes shine so brightly that they will blind you so even though they came with it they would have been in the trash if we bought it. Here's a bit of a pecularity about this bike. The fellow says he bought it brand new April 28th of 05.  It was supposed to be a left over bike that layed dormant somewhere and didn't sell for over 20 months.  Our thoughts of why the bike was a year old when he got it are it was either a total, a demo, a rental, or at the very least one of those bikes the owner of Harley dealership ride for a year or so like Dial Brown does here. In reality these bikes are damn hard to find and the red and silver ones are the very first ones to go so there's something wrong somewhere. Anyways it didn't have the majority of our options we had and with all the anomolies we would have never bought this bike in the first place, but by playing build a bike Progressive came up with a price they could live with. Unfortunately it would still leave us in the hole costing us at least another $2,953.20 to bring it and us up to our original bikes level and value.  Making it even worse our attorney told us that they, Progressive, are expecting to pick up our bike as a whole which means with all the add ons we had on it as part of the deal and that he had no idea of what the salavage price would be.  At that point he told me to call Progressive and work out the rest and he stated that if he had to get involved in this any further then he already has, he would have to add his % fee because it would have to become a lawsuit. Well at this stage of the game we have an offer of $24,446.93 on the table.  Let's say in the end we got the $28,989.48 we should have in the first place. After our attorney took his 1/3 of it all we would be left with is $19,326.32 which as you can see is way less then we have already. Progressive is way ahead of us little people and knows we won't go that way and that's how they get away with screwing our brains out. The sad part is it's legal for them do do this to people. Sounds pretty easy doesn't it, well it wasn't.  My first question to Matt the ajuster was about the true price of the salvage of which we are supposed to have the first chance at buying back.  He said around $10,000 but would not confirm a definate price, in other words he began rambling around in circles and I never did get a direct answer.  The next question was about letting us keep the savagable parts from our bike since they weren't giving us any money for them. His reply was he didn't think so and he would look at it over and let us know in a few days, Where have we heard that before??? Once again we're ON HOLD

Day 64 Thursday August 18th ON HOLD

Day 65 Friday August 19th ON HOLD	Day 66 Saturday August 20th ON HOLD	Day 67 Sunday August 21st ON HOLD
Day 68 Monday August 22nd ON HOLD	Day 69 Tuesday August 23rd ON HOLD	Day 70 Wednesday August 24th ON HOLD

Day 71
Thursday
August 25th

7 days later at about 10:30 Matt one of Progressive's henchmen called to say
that they will only pay the $23,446.93 and that's with them keeping our accessories too.

Donna and I had agreed that either way we would have to take their offer, which they obviously know, because it would cost us more to fight them than we would get in the end.  So we set up a time for Donna to meet him at our bank at 11:15 am to get the check and give them the title just to get it over with as soon as possible and get some closure.

Donna arrived there just after 11:00 am to make sure she knew where the title was located in the many offices of the 5 story building.  The nice folks Liz and Amy on the fourth floor in the title department of our bank explained the process they had to go through.  First they had to take the check to the teller on the first floor to pay the note off then go back to the fourth floor to the title department where

the adjuster will have to sign a guaranty not to stop payment on the check before they would give him the title.

The gaurantee form the bank made him sign

Progressive's check for our bike

Our Title that we had invested some $6000 to date toward owning someday that we feel we got screwed out of

One thing for sure is the people at the bank must have been here and done this before.

Maybe they have had prior dealings with Progressive before and that's why they did that with them, maybe it's some sort of trick they pull now and then because they to obviously didn't trust Progressive either.

In the big picture of things maybe it's just standard operating procedure with any insurance company under this type of situation, this being our first experience we really have no idea.

Matt, Progressive's adjuster, got there and they went to handle the money part then went upstairs to the title department where, while waiting on the title, Donna asked Matt about the other two checks we had.  We knew the $5,691.98 check was not to be cashed but wanted to make sure we got to keep the check for $419.14.  He said that they stopped payment on the $5,691.98 check and then said that he thought that they had mailed a check replacing the $419.14 check with a $915 check.   She told him that we hadn't received a check for that amount and he then stated that they probably sent it to our lawyer. This sounding like a line of BS prompted Donna to give our lawyer a call whom unfortunately wasn't there nor was his assistant but someone else looked in our file for it and for some unknown reason they didn't find a check.  So Matt then said that he "thought" they sent it but maybe not.  Sick and tired of the BS we have been through to date with them rather than drag it out any longer Donna went ahead and signed the title and gave it to him and commented to Liz at the bank about how she would just have to trust him on that.  He said that he would check into it and get back with us. In real world time that could mean a day to as much as another 2 or 3 weeks judging from our past experience with these people.

<Sigh>

After Donna got back to the shop she called Progressive's 1-800 number to cancel our insurance policy
on the scooter we've been having to pay for all this time and found out that
even with all they have done to us so far they weren't finished putting the screws to us just yet.

OK here  we go again, we paid $244.00 on our $468.00 a year policy and only used 27 days of it, Right?

They said that they would refund back to June 17th if the bike was totalled previously so figuring $468 divided by 365 times 27 days that would equal $34.62 we used on our insurance Right?  Take the $244 and subtract $34.62 and we figure we should get back $209.38 ... BUT NO they say we only get back $168!  She did the math for the guy and he kept saying something about a daily rate so in the end of the conversation she just told him to do whatever your going to do because your going to do it anyway and hung up on him disgusted.  At this point we are just over it!

A little later we got to wondering when they were going to come get the bike out of our way so Donna called Matt to check on what he found out on the other check and asked when they were going to come get it since we dropped the insurance and it ain't our baby no more.  Anyway he said that he would call and see if they could get it today or tomorrow.

This is a final breakdown of what said they will pay

$401.41 for the estimate
$75 for the tow bill
$109.14 for the helmets
$152.95 for the boots
Subtotal $738.23
Subtract the check for $419.14
He will bring a check Friday morning for $319.09