My car got bumped on the freeway here in So Cal (Orange County), not my fault, and the guy who hit me admitted it was his fault. So far so good. Not much damage at all, really, just the passenger side front fender. The insurance end of all of this went just fine, it was when I went to get a rental car and to get my car fixed where things got interesting.
First the car rental. I prearranged with the chick at Enterprise to get a subcompact, the smallest, most miserly, fuel sipping car they had, because I was going to Sequoia National Park that weekend, which is about 270 miles one way.
I got to the Enterprise office, and lo and behold, they had reserved for me a Toyota Avalon. Sweet! The Avalon is a big floaty land shark of a six cylinder car. I told them this would just not do, and they said hey, it's Friday, that's what we've got. Awesome! The guy who walked me out to it tried to sell me on it, told me what a sweet ride it was, with the leather and the power every goddam thing, but I was pissed at this point and having none of it. At that point though, the deal was take it or have a nice walk home. They did, however, end up telling me that they'd keep a lookout for small cars and would deliver one to my door when one showed up, and at least they were good on their word. Later that day they dropped off a brand new Prius. The whole time though, the mindset of these young Enterprise workers was, "what, don't you have enough money for gas? It's not that much more. My F-150 gets 12 MPG."
Then I get an email from the body shop with the estimate for the body and paint work. Keep in mind, the damage was just to the passenger side front fender. The estimate included the doors, the rear quarter panel, front and back fenders, the mirror, and more. There was some mention of the roof of the car, I believe. The total was almost $3k. I called them and told them there was some misunderstanding, and I rode my bike :-) back there to get it straightened out.
The body shop estimator guy and I went to my car, and he showed me that he had included scrapes to the rear passenger side quarter panel and rear bumper to the estimate, as well as both passenger side doors and front bumper. I informed him that only the fender damage was related to this claim, and both he and the office manager told me, "dude, the insurance company has okayed this, you have the green light for the whole thing. I told him that making the other guy's insurance carrier pay for something that wasn't his fault isn't how I roll. Neither of them could believe it. They thought I was just dumb.
So, what does this have to do with "Mustachianism"? Well, it seems to me that MMM's posts talk not only about being frugal, but doing the right thing--financially, morally, any way you want to analyze it. I've never seen him write anything about benefiting from unfairly taking advantage of someone. All I can say is, when I'm lying in bed tonight I'll know I did the right thing. That's worth way more to me than a pretty bumper.
BTW, it turns out that a small part of the front passenger side door and the front bumper were actually scratched when this guy hit me. I totally didn't notice this but it's true. You can't paint part of a bumper or door, so the front bumper and door are legit (barely) and will get fixed. Some karma right there.
