Case Study: Car-Damaged Shop - Lillywhite Property Maintenance LTD | Housing Maintenance

Imagine it’s a Saturday night; you’ve closed your shop for business and gone home. You’ve put your feet up, and are about to watch a film when you get a phone call. It’s about your shop…

All sorts of things run through your mind…

• Are you being robbed?
• Is the stock okay?
• Is it a fire?

You don’t imagine it will be a jeep ploughing through your shop window, and the driver being rushed to hospital. Yet, this is exactly what happened to  Buckles Butcher Shop, in Shenfield. The insurance loss assessor contacted us to survey the shop on a Saturday, which we did immediately. When it comes to shop repairs, the longer it takes to complete the job, the more money is lost. With this in mind, we knew we could complete the repairs within 14 days, ensuring the butcher’s shop lost as little trading time as possible.  The loss assessor loved that we got a quote over within 48 hours, and expedited the approval. Our quote was approved by Wednesday, and we were ready to start the next day…

The amount of damage to the shop was tremendous. There’s no way the shop could be open and trading, and every day the shop is closed is costing the Buckles. 

Repairing A Car Damaged Shop

The first step is to clear the debris. This isn’t an easy task. with glass and concrete everywhere, it’s very dangerous. But you can’t do another repair job until the area is cleared. 

The next step is to make the shop safe from any additional destruction from opportunists. This meant boarding up the premises and ensuring they’re safe.

The third step was is to rebuild the front wall so that the shop window can be fitted. The window can’t be glazed until the base is in place. 

The fourth step is to square off and build a stud work frame for shop’s front window, making 3 / 4 sections so glass units are easier to install, bead internally ready for glass units, stain and decorate. 

Next… We need to supply and fit glass units to create shop front windows and supply and fit UPVC windows with a ledge to the top of the brick wall. 

Whilst this is all taking place, our team are supplying and fitting sheeting to the rear of the shop to prevent dust and building waste from affecting the rear shop area. This is a temporary task, that’s essential to making the shop safer to work in and ensuring no additional damage. 

Then remove and dispose of the damaged tiled stud wall separating the front & rear shop area. We have to take it back to where it is stable and no longer unsafe.  Once that’s done, we can rebuild the stud wall, incorporating a hatch between shop areas.

Step eight is fitting the plasterboard, and then retiling the area with the same tiles with the same pattern as the damaged ones. Once this is done, we check the grout and seal. Perfect!

Step nine – Remove and dispose of a small, damaged stainless steel sink and water heater. Cap off and reinstate plumbing supplies to a small stainless steel sink. Supply and fit a replacement water heater.

Step ten – Replace missing tiles where necessary in the front shop area and replace where the wall behind is showing movement.

Finally – Decorate. Touch-ups on the decor where needed, and then provide builders clean on completion, ready for the shop to be open for customers.

Time Taken to Repair a Car Damaged Shop?

2 weeks from start to finish.

And the customer? Very happy to have their shop back looking as great as it did before the accident. They wanted the shop back up and running as soon as possible but didn’t think it would be possible, without a miracle, to repair so much damage in 2 weeks. The insurance loss assessor was thrilled with the outcome and invited us to quote for more repair work.

Our team at Lillywhites aren’t miracle workers, but they’re the next best thing! 

Need a quote for repairing your car damaged shop front? Give us a call on 0204 538 3560.