Our 2004 Honda Accord got damaged in a car accident with a decent amount of front damange (the bumper fell off, both the headlights are damanged, radiator damanged , hood damanged etc etc. We do have insurance and my first instict has been to go with the honda dealership to go with repair (first texas honda in Austin TX). This is the first significant car repair that I have to deal with and would like to hear from the experts if Dealership repair is the correct idea?
Dealerships don’t do auto body repair. They send damaged vehicles to a nearby auto body shop.
Tester
My experience is that dealers do not have body shops. They send the cars to a body shop and sell them the parts to repair the car. You could ask them which shop is it that they use or go out and find one on you own. The insurance company will probably inform you also of a good shop.
The dealers around here all have body shops and they’re pretty competetive price-wise with the independent shops. Often, they’re even cheaper depending on the repair.
It’s six of one, half dozen of the other in my opinion.
Thanks Everyone. The folks who own the dealership own the body shop. I need to figure out where to send the car off to. Given that the car probably has damange other than just body, does it still go to body shop?
That’s where it gets a bit sticky. The majority of body shop guys are not as mechanically astute as a general mechanic. Many do not know how to inspect suspension components or repair them.
About the best option is that the car go on a frame alignment machine. This can determine if things are bent or not. Depending on how they do things, they may do suspension repairs in the body shop or send it next door to the service dept. for that end of it.
Thanks again everyone. Landed on a shop that insurance recommended and who had really good citysearch reviews (wish cartalk had a body shop files also 
). In case anyone where looks up austin texas body shops again, Whitakers Auto Body & Paint in Lakeway appear to be decent folks.