What Types of Parts Will My Insurance Cover?

Auto body repair parts, why are they important, and what I need to know about them. Most insurance policies will have verbiage to allow them to use Aftermarket, Salvage, LKQ, and Reconditioned parts in the auto body collision repair of your vehicle. The definition of these parts is, 1- AFTERMARKET = parts made by a source other than the vehicle manufacturer, usually made in Taiwan. 2- SALVAGE = parts removed from a vehicle that has sustained enough damage to be declared a total loss. No form of validation performed to know their integrity. 3- LIKE-KIND QUALITY = Not really sure who came up with this term, best guess is it supposed to be of the same quality, again no form of validation. 4- Reconditioned = An (OEM) part that has been damaged enough to require it to be replaced, then it is repaired or the fancy term reconditioned and sold to a collision repair shop to be installed on your vehicle. There are numerous auto body repair parts that insurance companies attempt to use that fall in these categories. (Example) Wheels, every vehicle manufacturer has a position statement against using a salvage, used, or reconditioned wheel. the position statement also says that the only repairs allowed to a wheel should be minor cosmetic finish repairs. There should be NO welding, machining, filing, grinding in the repair of a wheel, and yet all of these things that should NOT be done are required to recondition a wheel. Some insurance companies offer an OEM rider policy, if purchased you will get all OEM auto body repair parts in your repairs. If during the repairs of a vehicle and non-original parts are used, this can have an effect on the value of the vehicle. I will use a fender and hood as an example, let say an aftermarket fender and hood are used in a repair, they will not have the same fit as original parts, meaning the average person will see inconsistency in the gaps aligning to the adjacent panels. This will be an easy signal that repairs have been performed and that collision repair parts not made by the vehicle maker have been used. These panels are usually not considered safety-related parts. Therefore, using them on an older vehicle with low value may not be an issue. However, on a fairly new vehicle with a high value, this could have a large impact and diminish the value, especially if trading it in. Trust me, salespeople at dealerships are trained in what to look for if a vehicle has had auto body repairs performed. Click this link to read an article with two viewpoints on OEM vs aftermarket parts.