Anyone had a good experience with Nationwide Repair Centres?

terryya

I've just found out that the insurer's authorised repair centre near me is a Nationwide Crash Repair Centre and after a bit of searching have found nothing but bad reviews. I know people are more likely to report a bad service so wouldn't if anyone on here has used them and been totally satisfied.

The alternative is to use a body shop of my choice which will result in an extra £200 excess.

I've already quired part of this claim on the insurance board but thought this, seperate, question would be better on here.

CheeseCat

In my experience, I would say they are an absolute sham and would avoid at all costs!

I took my car in to have the brakes done, they told me I also needed new discs (and showed me this but tbh I have no idea what a good/bad disc looks like and they probably knew that so thought they could convince me of their 'honesty' by showing me)

I paid to get the pads and discs replaced and when I went to pick the car up they told me that my front bearings had gone and said (quite patronisingly) 'If you don't pay to get them done love, your wheels might fall off when you are driving on the motorway and surely you don't want that?' :eek:

I didn't know anything about bearings and was worried about forking out until they dropped in that they could sell me some sort of insurance (around £50~) package (can't remember the name) that guaranteed my MOT pass (due the next month) and that if i bought that with them and also paid for a service they would pretend they didnt know about the bearings, and when I bought my car in for the MOT I could get it done through the insurance as a 'new problem'.

I instantly smelt a rat (why would they do me such a favour?) they obviously wanted to sell this insurance crap and guarantee I'd go back for an MOT/Service too. I took my car to another garage who told me there was nothing wrong with my bearings and I would be able to hear a noise whilst driving if there were anyway.

Sorry for the long post but basically AVOID AT ALL COSTS!

(This was Nationwide Autocentre Stockport, by the way)

triticale

A couple of years ago they failed my car's MOT, wanted nearly £200 to repair it to pass. I told them I would have to phone up my then husband to discuss what to do, when I came off the phone they suddenly said that a £1.50 lightbulb would be enough, and passed it.

That was the last time I used Nationwide. Lying sods.

michaelvintner

You people are mixing up Nationwide Autocentre

http://www.nationwideautocentres.co.uk/

with

Nationwide Crash Repair Centre

http://www.ncrc.co.uk/

Don't know if the two companys have any links anywhere.

Anyway when Nationwide Crash Repair centre fixed my car after a minor accident I can say that they were no problem at all. Picked up my car and delivered it back to me. Online tracking was a bit plain but usefull and I had no problem getting through to them. Work is also guanteed for a year I beleave.

People are alway more likelly to leave bad reviews than good ones (as you mentioned) but how many of these people have unrealistic expectation and expect an almost total write off to be repaired in 3 days flat and then start constantly ringing up Nationwide wanting to know when their car is going to be repaired while the people trying to fix it are still trying to figure out what car it is from the almost total wreckage.

malah1de

My experience with the so-called approved repairer (not Nationwide) used by my insurance co, is that they were a bunch of cowboys. Had to be refinished when lacquer began to peel. Paint expert I brought in said they had used incompatible materials, and failure was inevitable. If you know someone reputable/competent I'd insist. I don't think they can make you use theirs, but the loan car issue might be a pain. This is where legal costs insurance can be worthwhile - to claim back any excess, and more importantly, to act in your interests rather than the insurers bonus fund!

terryya

Thanks for replies. As mentioned by michaelvinter this is crash repairs not autocentre.

Anyway I've 'done the dead' and Nationwide are picking it up on Monday. Once I get it back I'll let people know what I thought of the service.

Kilty_2

I've heard a lot of bad stories and based on them I'd be telling my insurer to take the car a bit further to another approved repairer.

Woby_Tide

Well after ending up in a dispute (still ongoing) with one local 'approved' repair centre we kindly had someone smack in to the back of us aswell and got given NCRC Bournemouth as our approved repairers for this second 3rd party claim. And the verdict is, utter !!!!!!. I thought no one could get worse than Seward repair centres in Dorset. This lot want to match it though. I urge anyone who is unemployed and looking to work to apply to be a Quality Controller at any of these repair centres as their appear to be zero requirements, certainly not vision anyway. As long as your bumper looks to be attached to the car the fact that it can be unhooked and moved off it;s mountings using your thumb is perfectly OK. I can only assume the mountings are better designed to cope with 30mph crashes and above so the force can clip them into place first.

So now that's 2 third party claims, 2 disputes. I dread to think what they can both conjure up next as they both attempt to fix their botch jobs

Woby_Tide

so the car came back from NCRC for the second time today. After the initial botch I did wonder how they planned to resolve it and suspected Loctite may play a part in it. So it re-appeared today. One side is now actually clipped on the. The other side(which was the side of impact) was still out of shape. The bumper was a bit more solid but after exerting the pressure of a single thumb I broke the inevitable loctite seal and it was in the same state as previously.

So back it went. I can now only assume that the car is somehow out of shape on the impact corner hence the repairs are harder than they want to pay for. Spoken to both the third party insurer and garage and am awaiting their next steps. The amount of time(off work) and effort it;s taking is whats really p!ssing me off now, plus the fact that we've a 5 year old car that blatantly is looking repaired so most buyers will be knocking us down as soon as we arrive. Right pain in the @rse

chrisash32

avoid at all costs!!! Someone reversed into the rear wing on my car last year when i was at work. The person was kind enough to leave me their insurance details in an envelope on my windscreen. However their insurance co took my car to Nationwide Accident Repair in Salford.. What i pile of !*!*!*! Firstly they send a guy to pick it up from my place of work.. Being quite a sporty car he decides to show of to his mate that dropped him off by red lining my car in every gear on the road outside our office. I then checked on my tracker and they took it for a lovely drive doing some VERY excessive speed... they stole equipment out of my car, including a memory stick full of music that was plugged in my glove box, took my optional extra space saver spare wheel and swapped it for a can on tyreweld.. I was fuming and they just shown my the handover contract when i complained, which states anything left in my car is done so at my own risk!!
Not only that but the job was AWFUL! and i mean awful, under street lights the colour did not match and it looks like an orange peel! In the end i was fedup with it looking so bad i took it elsewhere and paid to have the job done properly!
It went to KC Autos and the car came back looking as new!

Take it somewhere else, avoid Nationwide!!!

taker920

There was a story a few years back about our local NRC, they couldn't get a good paint match for a front wing - no bother, they just resprayed the whole car without telling the owner.

But don't let the negative reports put you off :rotfl: