A Rock Hit Our Windshield!

It was bound to happen, and I am honestly surprised it’s the first time since we started traveling full time, and this is our 3rd year traveling.

It’s inconvenient when it happens to anyone, but we had just pulled onto the main road out of our campground and had a long travel day ahead. Lucky for us, it wasn’t a huge crack, and it didn’t spread throughout the day, but we wanted to get it taken care of so it wouldn’t get worse.

Having had glass repair and replacement claims in the past, we knew what to expect. We had one on a road trip in 2016 when a rock smashed our windshield while in Canada, but we waited until we got home to get it repaired. We never thought about it being dealt with on the road!

I know insurance can vary, as can coverage. Florida is our home base, and we have comprehensive and collision coverage on our truck, which means we have glass coverage, and windshield damage is $0 deductible. Unfortunately, we weren’t in Florida and weren’t due back for a couple more weeks, but we didn’t want to wait. We figured, if nothing else, we could file the claim, then schedule repairs when we returned, like we did in 2016.

Our insurance is with USAA, and I have their app. I had never used it for a claim before, we don’t really make many of them, but I gave it a try. It was super easy, just followed the onscreen prompts, answered questions, and even picked a day and time window for repairs. Lucky for us, they repair out of state, and had a company with appointments that could come to our campground around our plans. I was glad to get it repaired before our next travel day and not have to wait to return home.

On the day of our appointment, I got a reminder email and information on who my technician would be, along with a photo (I love this safety aspect of knowing!)

I also stopped by to let the campground office know the technician was coming, just to make sure there weren’t any issues being at our campsite–some parks don’t like to have work done at campsites, so it never hurts. Apparently, this is not an uncommon thing and she told me it was no problem, that the Safelite guys know the park and she’d direct them to our site when they came in.

Our technician called during our appointment window to let me know a more narrowed down time. I also got a text when he was on his way, right on time. He was prompt and efficient completing the repair. Luckily he had a tall ladder since tall!

Sadly, the impact mark was pretty deep, so, while it won’t continue to spread across the windshield, it is still pretty noticeable. So, next steps will be to communicate with our insurance company about a full windshield repair. This will depend on several factors and may be covered in full by insurance, or we may have to pay part of it. Since replacing a windshield can be a lengthier process from our experience, we will worry about that when we will be home for a bit this month.

If you aren’t sure of your policy details, or haven’t looked lately, now is a great time for a policy review! Check your policy coverage, deductibles, premiums, and other benefits on your policy to make sure you have what you need in this season of life, and aren’t paying extra for things you don’t need. Also, if your company has an app, be sure it is downloaded and set up now, and get familiar with it. You can change coverage, deductibles, download proof of insurance, make payments and claims right in the app for many companies! Safety reminder: set up that MFA (multi-factor authentication) if they have it, and use a secure password that is not the same as other sites to keep your info safe!

All in all, it was a pretty simple experience. Repairs are never convenient, and this was just like anything else–at least it wasn’t as catastrophic as the tires we had in June!