Insurance companies are not on your side. They are in it to make money. You do have to make sure things are done correctly as it is your car and they just want it fixed. Usually to the lowest bidder. The claim adjuster will evaluate the car and so will the body shop.
Do yourself a huge favor and see what body shops they offer and then look them up in the BBB. They should give you a couple choices. Choose the one with the best review.
I'm not sure if the law is different in other states- but in WI the owner has the power to take their car to whatever shop they want to. Insurance companies do have "preferred" shops though- and if you use one of them often the process is a lot more streamlined.
When I needed a new hood on my 2016 Accord, I went with a shop that wasn't "preferred". Instead of dealing with the shop directly, State Farm sent one of their employees out to inspect the damage (from a freak accident where concrete fell on my hood at work from the roof above) and then they created an estimate based on the extent of the damage and wrote me a check. I then could go to any shop I wanted.
When the car was totaled a few months later, I just used one of their shops because I figured that I wouldn't be getting the car back anyway. That time, State Farm took the word of their shop in terms of the damages and would have paid them directly if they would have deemed it repairable. Since the repair would have cost almost as much as the car was worth, State Farm just totaled it.
I'm sure that someone bought it at a salvage auction and was able to fix it for a lot cheaper than what than what the estimate was for though.
www.crutchfield.com
