Amphicar Transport Nightmare

P

portlandamphicar

Guest
Hello Everyone!

I recently purchased a freshly remodeled Amphicar (1967 Red) and was
having it transported to me in Portland, Oregon. En route it was
evidently dropped (!) off the top deck of a semi, severely damaging
the entire right side of the vehicle (if not more).

I haven't seen it yet, but I received a call from the moving company
(a very large, national car moving company) letting me know there was
an "accident" and that they would have an appraiser look at the
vehicle (it is insured up to $50,000 while in transit).

My question: Does anyone have any advice on how to best handle this
whole situation? I am going to insist that I have an independent
appraisal as well, but I was wondering if anyone had a suggestion for
an extremely well qualified appraiser in the Portland area. Any
other suggestions?

From their phone call, I don't think the company realizes how
expensive most Amphicars are. Is there some way to demonstrate how
expensive parts and quality repairs are?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Charles Lewis
portlandamphicar@yahoo.com
Red 1967 (I hope)
 
W

WB6WSN

Guest
----- Original Message -----
From: portlandamphicar
To: amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2003 8:21 PM
Subject: [amphicar-lovers] Amphicar Transport Nightmare


Hello Everyone!

I recently purchased a freshly remodeled Amphicar (1967 Red) and was
having it transported to me in Portland, Oregon. En route it was
evidently dropped (!) off the top deck of a semi, severely damaging
the entire right side of the vehicle (if not more).

I haven't seen it yet, but I received a call from the moving company
(a very large, national car moving company) letting me know there was
an "accident" and that they would have an appraiser look at the
vehicle (it is insured up to $50,000 while in transit).

My question: Does anyone have any advice on how to best handle this
whole situation? I am going to insist that I have an independent
appraisal as well, but I was wondering if anyone had a suggestion for
an extremely well qualified appraiser in the Portland area. Any
other suggestions?

From their phone call, I don't think the company realizes how
expensive most Amphicars are. Is there some way to demonstrate how
expensive parts and quality repairs are?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Charles Lewis
portlandamphicar@yahoo.com
Red 1967 (I hope)


I would suppose that your bill of sale would be an obvious indication of the
value of your Amphi. But look at your moving contract's very, very fine print,
and see what it has to say about the mover's limits of liability. There may be
some way that they might try to avoid some of the burden, possibly claiming the
loss was caused by a structural failure on the Amphi. Remember that the mover's
insurance "representative" usually isn't a disinterested third-party, and may
very well try hard to minimize their responsibility and their exposure.

You might consider retaining an independent insurance adjuster. These guys are
not well-liked by insurance companies (for the obvious reasons). In complicated
loss situations, such as a home burglary with arson to cover the scene, having
your own adjuster is often invaluable, as they know how to prove loss and press
your best interests (at a time where you may be emotionally vulnerable).
Further, they often work on a contingency basis.

This all brings up an interesting question; how do car collectors set a value on
an extremely rare vehicle? And what is the value of a "totaled" Amphi? Can an
Amphi ever be considered to be a total loss (in that you can sell any Amphi item
on eBay that hasn't been completely reduced to a cinder or a puddle)?

Ed
El Cajon
67 Rust Guppy


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
 
B

Bill Connelly

Guest
Charles,

I'm very sorry to hear about your transport mishap. Apart from the other
sympathetic and helpful advice you already have received and likely will yet
read on this List, I thought that you might want to take a look at the
"Canadian Movie Cars' RE: 1962 AMPHICAR, Auto Appraisal Page" at
http://www.moviecar.com/cmcstarcarsept98.html . It's a webpage of a company
that rents special vehicles to Canadian movie crews that has taken what
looks like an insurance assessor's report for its Amphicar, added a few nice
shots of the car and turned it into a webpage/advertisement. I just thought
that it may be useful as an example of such an insurance assessment report.

Once again, my condolences on your loss, and I hope that all will turn out
well in the end.

~Bilgey~




----- Original Message -----
From: portlandamphicar
To: amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Thursday, November 20, 2003 11:21 PM
Subject: [amphicar-lovers] Amphicar Transport Nightmare


Hello Everyone!

I recently purchased a freshly remodeled Amphicar (1967 Red) and was
having it transported to me in Portland, Oregon. En route it was
evidently dropped (!) off the top deck of a semi, severely damaging
the entire right side of the vehicle (if not more).

I haven't seen it yet, but I received a call from the moving company
(a very large, national car moving company) letting me know there was
an "accident" and that they would have an appraiser look at the
vehicle (it is insured up to $50,000 while in transit).

My question: Does anyone have any advice on how to best handle this
whole situation? I am going to insist that I have an independent
appraisal as well, but I was wondering if anyone had a suggestion for
an extremely well qualified appraiser in the Portland area. Any
other suggestions?

From their phone call, I don't think the company realizes how
expensive most Amphicars are. Is there some way to demonstrate how
expensive parts and quality repairs are?

Thanks in advance for your help!

Charles Lewis
portlandamphicar@yahoo.com
Red 1967 (I hope)
 
W

WB6WSN

Guest
----- Original Message -----
From: Bill Connelly
To: amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com
Sent: Wednesday, November 26, 2003 6:18 AM
Subject: Re: [amphicar-lovers] Amphicar Transport Nightmare


Charles,

I'm very sorry to hear about your transport mishap. Apart from the other
sympathetic and helpful advice you already have received and likely will yet
read on this List, I thought that you might want to take a look at the
"Canadian Movie Cars' RE: 1962 AMPHICAR, Auto Appraisal Page" at
http://www.moviecar.com/cmcstarcarsept98.html . It's a webpage of a company
that rents special vehicles to Canadian movie crews that has taken what
looks like an insurance assessor's report for its Amphicar, added a few nice
shots of the car and turned it into a webpage/advertisement. I just thought
that it may be useful as an example of such an insurance assessment report.

Once again, my condolences on your loss, and I hope that all will turn out
well in the end.

~Bilgey~




With the caution that the valuation of their Amphi was in September of 1998.
According to the inflation calculator at:

http://www.westegg.com/inflation/infl.cgi

that would be almost $25k in 2002. Projecting linearly, this would be $27k in
2004. And this isn't taking into account any increase in demand.


Ed
El Cajon
67 Rust Guppy


[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
 
J

John Friese

Guest
Hello Charles,
I read about your horror story last night and since I've had both my
Amphicars shipped I couldn't get it off my mind all day today. Today
was a nice day in Santa Barbara and I just came back from a swim with
my Red 67 Amphi. It's about a twenty minute drive to the local lake
and all through the drive I was thinking about how badly you must
feel. I know I worried while my cars were enroute and I would have
been really upset if they had been damaged. I hope that the damage
isn't too bad and that the car can be brought back. Although I'm not
too close by, let me know if I can be of any help. At least I'm West
of the Rockies and I've done two cars so I'm pretty familiar with them.

John Friese
Santa Barbara, CA
67 Red
67 White

jfriese(at)mindspring.com


--- In amphicar-lovers@yahoogroups.com, "portlandamphicar"
<portlandamphicar@y...> wrote:
> Hello Everyone!
>
> I recently purchased a freshly remodeled Amphicar (1967 Red) and was
> having it transported to me in Portland, Oregon. En route it was
> evidently dropped (!) off the top deck of a semi, severely damaging
> the entire right side of the vehicle (if not more).
>
> I haven't seen it yet, but I received a call from the moving company
> (a very large, national car moving company) letting me know there was
> an "accident" and that they would have an appraiser look at the
> vehicle (it is insured up to $50,000 while in transit).
>
> My question: Does anyone have any advice on how to best handle this
> whole situation? I am going to insist that I have an independent
> appraisal as well, but I was wondering if anyone had a suggestion for
> an extremely well qualified appraiser in the Portland area. Any
> other suggestions?
>
> From their phone call, I don't think the company realizes how
> expensive most Amphicars are. Is there some way to demonstrate how
> expensive parts and quality repairs are?
>
> Thanks in advance for your help!
>
> Charles Lewis
> portlandamphicar@y...
> Red 1967 (I hope)
 
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