How to Take the Proper Photos of a Damaged Vehicle

We at Auto Claims Direct have a certain photo protocol, we need on every claim. Today, I'm going to show you the required photos and how it should be done. So come on! Let's go ahead and take a look at a van. The first thing you want to do is you want to do an overall view of the vehicle. What we are going to do is take a four-side photograph. We want to be able to get the left and right side and encompassing both the left and right to make sure that any other prior damage noted. So take photograph there. Then we're going to go over hit it from this side, the left side and the rear, encompassing that, to about this far out and as you can see we notice some prior damage to the vehicle right here in the left before the panel area. There is also some prior damage to the left side door, you can see that. Then we go back and take the photograph from the front encompassing the left side. Notice some prior damage to the left to front bumper and to the hood. As we come over here now we can get a shot of the vehicle like that. This is the area of the loss. We're going to come back or we're going to focus on this a little bit later. The next photo we want to take is we want to take the administrative information. The proper administrative information we must get on if we claim will consist of the VIN number. There are VIN numbers located on the door. However, if a vehicle was in a prior loss and they replaced the door with the used door for example, you're going to want to make sure you get it from the actual windshield area, less likely for it been replaced. So you take a photograph here which is a requirement and if you also want to get a shot of the vehicle down here, this will also have the production date and a lot of the other pertinent information to the vehicle. Another important photograph is you want to get a photograph from mileage. These documents the mileage at the time of the loss, and then while you're in that vehicle, you always want to take a photograph of the interior showing the radio area and then you want to take it -- shoot the vehicle from back further out showing the condition and then also take some from the inside to show the vehicle, in case of this a total loss, in case you need to reference later on when you're doing your report. Once you do the inspection, you've covered the mileage, you've covered the VIN number, you do want to get a shot of the plate number. It also verifies with the view. Now you've got all four corners, you've got plate number, the VIN, the mileage, and then the interior. Now what we want to do is focus on the actual area of the damage. So go ahead and grab your tape measure, which is a requirement and go ahead come on over. Starting point to get a photograph of the vehicle with the tape measure, the reason to start is you want to know if you need to compare the height of the damage to another vehicle that was in the loss. You need to get at least two or three photographs of the measurement in valve. For example, this shows that it's 2ft and 1 inch. Now we take one photograph with it touching the ground like that and get photos from different angles. So it's really, really good for the adjusted. Now once you've taken two to three with the measurement in it, focus on now taking photographs to show the depth as a date, take from above, take it from the front, and even consider taking it from the side here like this to really show the extent of the damage. Now as I stated before we did photograph some prior damage. We don't need to necessarily go back and re-photograph it as long as you pointed out it in your notes. That's just a sampling of the proper photographs we need on every claim. However, feel free to take more photographs. I am a believer in taking as much as possible. With today's digital cameras you can take 30, 40, 50 photographs. If you feel you need more photos to document the loss, take more; more is better. But these are the required photos you require on every claim.