Sorry to hear about your accident bro, but it's good to know you didn't get hurt and the Z is fixable.
1) Do not listen to the autobody shop
2) Go to a shop that you trust, or the shops suggests by the insurance company, or the dealer.
3) Regarding the repair cost... here's the thing:
a) The shop will have to give a list to the insurance company of what parts has to be replaced and what has to be repaired.
b) The list of parts/estimation, have to state what kind of parts, OEM or aftermarket, and the cost/price of it.
c) the insurance company can only approve genuine parts because safety and warranty issue UNLESS genuine parts is no-longer available.
d) some body shop, like the one you are dealing with, will suggest you aftermarket parts aka mod-parts. how they do it? let say the insurance company approve the shop for an amount of money, instead of using the money to buy the parts on the estimate, they will use the money to buy whatever the parts you want or they want.
For example, an OEM intake cost $300, they let you to use the $300 to buy a CAI or whatever, as long as the total doesn't cost more than the amount of money they receive from the insurance company.
However, this is considered insurance fraud.
4) You, as the customer, has the right to ask for the list. The list must have:
a) Parts name and sku#
b) quantity
c) Price
d) # of hour(s) of each repair
e) total price of all the parts
f) total hours of repair
g) tax
h) grand total of the complete job
5) You can also ask the shop to show you the replaced parts after the job is done thus you know they have actually replaced the parts
6)
most importantly, communicate with the shop and the insurance company politely, remember, your Z is in their hand.
hope the above CAD$0.02 helps
