Smash repairs take anywhere from a couple of hours for a small dent, to a week or more where structure is damaged or a part has to come from overseas. That is the honest range for a car crash repair, and nobody can narrow it from a photo. The date comes from the assessment, once someone has the car in front of them and can see what sits behind the damage. Parts, insurer authorisation and paint curing move it from there.
How long smash repairs take is a planning question as much as a repair one. You are off the road, working out whether to arrange lifts, keep the hire car another week, or tell work you will be late back. If your morning normally means Punt Road and a car park, a week without the car needs planning.
Repair time follows the kind of work the car needs, not how bad the damage looks from the kerb. The bands below are categories of job rather than any one car, and they are typical rather than quotes.
| Kind of work | Indicative time | What sets it |
|---|---|---|
| Paintless dent removal | 1 to 3 hours | Whether the paint is intact, and if the dent can be reached from behind |
| Light bumper scuffs and touch-ups | Same day, up to a few days | How much of the panel needs refinishing, and whether it comes off |
| Cut and polish | About half a day | How deep the marks are, and how many panels |
| Spray painting | 1 to 2 days | How many panels, and the blending either side of them |
| Medium panel beating | Up to about 3 days | How many panels come off, and whether parts are on order |
| Major or structural repairs | A week or more | Chassis straightening, several panels, and the checks that follow |
An assessment is a proper look at the car with the damage in front of the assessor, and it is where the date is set. A photo shows the outside of a knock. The time is set by what is behind it.
A picture shows none of the three things that decide it: which panel comes off first, whether the part is in a Melbourne warehouse or on a ship, and whether an insurer has to authorise the scope. Anyone giving you a firm date over the phone has seen none of them. A real date later beats a wrong date you have already built the week around.
A date given over the phone is a guess. A date given after the assessment is a plan.
Where a claim is involved, your product disclosure statement, or PDS, sets out what the policy covers and how the claim runs. Read that rather than going on what you have been told. If you are still deciding, whether a small repair is worth claiming on is a separate question.
Delays are rarely about the panel work itself. Five things move a date more often than anything else.
None of that is idle time, and the car moves through stages the whole way. What happens during a smash repair sets out what those stages are.
A moved date is usually a part or an authorisation. It is much less often a sign that something has gone wrong with the car.
You are entitled to ask what changed, and to get a specific answer. Ask what moved, whether it affects the whole job or one stage, and what the new date is waiting on. One question covers most of it.
“Which stage has moved, and is the new date waiting on a part or on an approval?”
A good answer names the thing and the next checkpoint: the quarter panel is on back order and the supplier confirms stock on Thursday. A vague answer is ‘we’re chasing it up’. The first gives you something to plan around, the second leaves you where you started.
Most of the wait sits outside your hands. Some of it does not.
Being without a car is the real problem underneath all of this. There is a courtesy car, free of charge and insured under the company policy. Ask about it when you book the assessment rather than assuming it.
It depends almost entirely on whether the damage stopped at the paint. Paint-only marks are among the quickest work a panel shop does. Once the cover comes off and a larger area is brought back, plan on a few days.
Often, yes, though the extra time is administrative rather than mechanical. Every claim needs sign-off before work begins, and a second sign-off if the job grows. Those waits sit between the stages rather than inside them.
That is a safety question rather than a scheduling one, and the answer turns on what was damaged. Whether a car that still drives after a crash is safe is worth reading before you decide.
Usually a part or an approval, rather than anything to do with the panel work. An early figure is a shape of job, and it firms up as parts are confirmed and the scope is signed off.
Ask at the time you book in. One is offered at no cost and covered under the workshop’s own insurance, but confirm it for your own dates rather than assuming.
Get the car looked at, either by booking it in or sending photos through. Then take the date that comes from someone standing next to it, not from a phone call. Smash repair at Automotive Panel Service is quoted and booked off that assessment.