swalker
Very helpful member
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2014
- Messages
- 1,576
- Reason
- DX MND
- Diagnosis
- 07/2014
- Country
- US
- State
- CO
- City
- Vail
Many who frequent these forums will know that on our Thanksgiving trip to Texas last year our wheelchair van was stolen with my favorite wheelchair still inside. The thieves could not figure out how to operate the EZ Lock, and really tore up the wheelchair while trying to get it out of the van. Little did they know the wheelchair was worth far more than the van. Probably because they could not get the wheelchair out of the van, they ditched the van and we were able to recover it due to the publicity it received on facebook and the local news. The thieves stole many items from the van and extensively damaged the van, and wheelchair.
The damage to the van was covered by our auto insurance and the damage and loss of contents were covered by our homeowners insurance. It has taken a very long time to get everything sorted out (and there are still a few loose ends), but I think we are finally getting close to resolving this matter. As part of that, I took delivery of a new wheelchair today to replace the one damaged in the theft. All told, insurance has paid out about $60,000 for the claims.
The insurance folks first requested an estimate to repair and a separate estimate to replace the wheelchair. Based on these estimates they would decide what to do.
As you can imagine, getting either of those in the convoluted US healthcare system is neither quick nor easy. After 4 months of effort, we finally got both of those to the insurance folks. The estimate to repair was substantially cheaper than the estimate to replace, so the insurance folks decided to move forward with repairing the wheelchair.
The first attempt at a repair was performed during May and the wheelchair was delivered to me on early June. Unfortunately, my go-to mechanic that has worked on my wheelchairs for several years left NuMotion during this time, so did not participate in doing the repairs. When the wheelchair was delivered, it was obviously not useable. When coming to a stop, the wheelchair would stop completely and them move again in a seemingly random direction. This made it impossible to control in close quarters. Everything else was working just fine, though.
So, NuMotion came out to inspect the wheelchair at the end of June. Their conclusion was that there was a problem, but they did not know what the problem was. They said they would try to replace the motors under warranty (they were replaced as part of the initial repair), but had no confidence this would fix the problem.
Meanwhile, the clock was ticking and I was running out of time. The insurance folks said that I had to have all bills submitted to them within 1 year in order for me to be reimbursed.
After a week of talking to the insurance folks and letting them know the long lead times are for procuring a wheelchair, they decided to replace the wheelchair. That was a pleasant surprise and came without any prompting from me. At first, they wanted me to refund all the funds spent on repairing the wheelchair. I suggested that was not fair and after a bit of back and forth they agreed with me! So, they paid for both repairing the old wheelchair and replacing it with a new one.
That started a 6 week process of working with NuMotion to get a new wheelchair ordered. They wanted me to get measured for a wheelchair again (I have not grown any since I last got a wheelchair through them, but whatever!).
We made the trip to NuMotion and got me all measured up. A week later I get the new quote for the wheelchair. It was the wrong quote. A week later, we got the correct quote, except it was missing a headrest (it did include the headrest hardware, just not the headrest itself). We got that sorted out and a new quote was issued that was missing the Roho seat cushion. We finally got that sorted out as well.
It took a week or more between quotes, so this really drug things out. But, last Monday, we finally got a quote I thought was correct. It was for a wheelchair with all the equipment I need with a carbon fiber trim kit (the old one was red). I placed the order and paid for it last Monday.
Last Tuesday, they said it would be here today! Only a week to get a wheelchair! So, today I got the wheelchair. Of course, it had a hideous orange trim kit instead of the cool carbon fiber one I wanted (my apologies to orange lovers of the world). Other than that, it was the wheelchair I had ordered.
NoMotion took deliver of the wheelchair at about 10:00 AM today. I spent three hours at NuMotion today while they set the wheelchair up for me. I should be receiving a carbon fiber trim kit in the mail sometime in the future.
So, I now have a brand new Permobil F5 wheelchair with the high speed motors, lights, headrest, Roho seat cushion, seat elevate, and power tilt, recline, and legs, We made a few changes to the programming so that it accommodates my needs and desires.
I still need to spend a few days getting all the adjustments just right for me, but it is pretty reasonably set up for now. I am too tired now to take a picture and post it, but will do so when I get a chance.
My fleet is currently up to 6 wheelchairs and we either need to move to a bigger house or pare down the fleet a bit. Nine months ago, insurance told me if they replaced the wheelchair they would pick up the old wheelchair. I have not heard anything about that since then. If they let me keep it (or buy it for scrap value), I will probably keep it for spare parts and donate one of my other wheelchairs to our local ALS association. I won't be able to make a decision about that until things are well and truly wrapped up with insurance, which could take until the end of this year.
In the meantime, I won't know the disposition of my Permobil C500 wheelchair damaged by Southwest airlines until the end of September.
I am really glad to have the new wheelchair and to be close to closing out nine months of dealing with insurance!
Steve
The damage to the van was covered by our auto insurance and the damage and loss of contents were covered by our homeowners insurance. It has taken a very long time to get everything sorted out (and there are still a few loose ends), but I think we are finally getting close to resolving this matter. As part of that, I took delivery of a new wheelchair today to replace the one damaged in the theft. All told, insurance has paid out about $60,000 for the claims.
The insurance folks first requested an estimate to repair and a separate estimate to replace the wheelchair. Based on these estimates they would decide what to do.
As you can imagine, getting either of those in the convoluted US healthcare system is neither quick nor easy. After 4 months of effort, we finally got both of those to the insurance folks. The estimate to repair was substantially cheaper than the estimate to replace, so the insurance folks decided to move forward with repairing the wheelchair.
The first attempt at a repair was performed during May and the wheelchair was delivered to me on early June. Unfortunately, my go-to mechanic that has worked on my wheelchairs for several years left NuMotion during this time, so did not participate in doing the repairs. When the wheelchair was delivered, it was obviously not useable. When coming to a stop, the wheelchair would stop completely and them move again in a seemingly random direction. This made it impossible to control in close quarters. Everything else was working just fine, though.
So, NuMotion came out to inspect the wheelchair at the end of June. Their conclusion was that there was a problem, but they did not know what the problem was. They said they would try to replace the motors under warranty (they were replaced as part of the initial repair), but had no confidence this would fix the problem.
Meanwhile, the clock was ticking and I was running out of time. The insurance folks said that I had to have all bills submitted to them within 1 year in order for me to be reimbursed.
After a week of talking to the insurance folks and letting them know the long lead times are for procuring a wheelchair, they decided to replace the wheelchair. That was a pleasant surprise and came without any prompting from me. At first, they wanted me to refund all the funds spent on repairing the wheelchair. I suggested that was not fair and after a bit of back and forth they agreed with me! So, they paid for both repairing the old wheelchair and replacing it with a new one.
That started a 6 week process of working with NuMotion to get a new wheelchair ordered. They wanted me to get measured for a wheelchair again (I have not grown any since I last got a wheelchair through them, but whatever!).
We made the trip to NuMotion and got me all measured up. A week later I get the new quote for the wheelchair. It was the wrong quote. A week later, we got the correct quote, except it was missing a headrest (it did include the headrest hardware, just not the headrest itself). We got that sorted out and a new quote was issued that was missing the Roho seat cushion. We finally got that sorted out as well.
It took a week or more between quotes, so this really drug things out. But, last Monday, we finally got a quote I thought was correct. It was for a wheelchair with all the equipment I need with a carbon fiber trim kit (the old one was red). I placed the order and paid for it last Monday.
Last Tuesday, they said it would be here today! Only a week to get a wheelchair! So, today I got the wheelchair. Of course, it had a hideous orange trim kit instead of the cool carbon fiber one I wanted (my apologies to orange lovers of the world). Other than that, it was the wheelchair I had ordered.
NoMotion took deliver of the wheelchair at about 10:00 AM today. I spent three hours at NuMotion today while they set the wheelchair up for me. I should be receiving a carbon fiber trim kit in the mail sometime in the future.
So, I now have a brand new Permobil F5 wheelchair with the high speed motors, lights, headrest, Roho seat cushion, seat elevate, and power tilt, recline, and legs, We made a few changes to the programming so that it accommodates my needs and desires.
I still need to spend a few days getting all the adjustments just right for me, but it is pretty reasonably set up for now. I am too tired now to take a picture and post it, but will do so when I get a chance.
My fleet is currently up to 6 wheelchairs and we either need to move to a bigger house or pare down the fleet a bit. Nine months ago, insurance told me if they replaced the wheelchair they would pick up the old wheelchair. I have not heard anything about that since then. If they let me keep it (or buy it for scrap value), I will probably keep it for spare parts and donate one of my other wheelchairs to our local ALS association. I won't be able to make a decision about that until things are well and truly wrapped up with insurance, which could take until the end of this year.
In the meantime, I won't know the disposition of my Permobil C500 wheelchair damaged by Southwest airlines until the end of September.
I am really glad to have the new wheelchair and to be close to closing out nine months of dealing with insurance!
Steve