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Dealing with a Cracked Windshield

Have you ever wondered how to deal with a cracked windshield. I hadn't. Before three weeks ago, I had never called our insurance agent in the 11 years he’s serviced our account. In fact, I hadn’t filed an insurance claim for any reason since I was 17—and we are not going to discuss how long ago that’s been! Three weeks ago, when one little psychotic “rock on a mission” smacked my windshield as I drove my middle little one home from Irish dance class, I literally looked through the glass in amazement that the tiny little rock had hit with enough impact to create such an impressive little chip and radiating crack....I was most concered about that radiating crack radiating further across my entire windshield!



Well, now, what exactly does one do to repair a cracked windshield? My first thought involved some un-lady like cursing—then, the mom mentality moved in and I wondered how much of a pain, and an expense, that little one inch rock was going to create in my mama’s world.

I called the husband to break the news and seek his advice. Aside from a tree that fell on his car in college (not kidding—it would be funnier if I was joking), he had never made an insurance claim either. I was on my own to figure this one out since it was technically MY windshield.

I tried to call our insurance agent’s office the next morning, but they were backed up with storm claims (a tornado had touched down in the agent’s southern Ohio local area the night of the rock mishap), so I called Nationwide Insurance directly. The representative was so nice—an oddity in many of the direct CSR contacts I have most days. She asked a few questions (the how did it happen, when did it happen and how big is the chip in the glass style questions). It turns out that since the radiating crack was less than four inches (it was about an inch at most), it was an easy fix—and was covered completely by our insurance plan! Whew. Talk about one big mom sized sigh of relief!

Did I have a glass repair company in mind? Um…no. I couldn’t name a valid. local glass repair company if held at gunpoint. Luckily, Nationwide offered an affiliate, SafeLite Auto Glass, and transferred me directly to schedule a repair appointment. I was literally off the phone in less than 15 minutes—and Safelite was scheduled to repair my window the next morning. (They could have done it sooner, but my Wednesday afternoon schedule required a mom friendly mini-van in 1 hour increments throughout the day!)

The SafeLite technician phoned ahead on the morning of the appointment, arrived on time and even tolerated the stray cat and a four year old meandering through his workspace! In less than 40 minutes, the SafeLite resin compound filled my cracked windshield—and the technician even cleaned my passenger window of the streams of doggie drool that Max the Foxhound had left behind on our most recent outing to the dog park.

It was a super easy, busy mom friendly experience. I could only hope that every screwy mishap would prove to be such an easy fix! Thank you, Nationwide and SafeLite!

**Disclosure: I was not compensated by either Nationwide or Safelite for this post. Nationwide is my personal homeowners and auto insurance carrier--and my personal experiences with Nationwide and their agreement with Safelite created my dialogue for this post.

 

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