IT\u2019S hard trying to win a race against Mother Nature, Lachlan knows that only too well.<\/p>\n
The building contractor can find himself anywhere on a job site in the Toowoomba region on any given day.<\/p>\n
On one particular afternoon this year, he could see the storm clouds building and made a mad dash for home in Withcott, a small rural town in the nearby Lockyer Valley.\u00a0 He missed victory by a whisker.<\/p>\n
\u201cI tried to race home to beat it but didn\u2019t quite get there,\u201d Lachy said.\u00a0 \u201cI was about to get home and just before I was able to park in the garage, I had to pull over because I couldn\u2019t drive or see. \u00a0I was only a few kilometres away \u2013 in Withcott.\u201d<\/p>\n
While Toowoomba City was relatively unaffected by the storm, below the range was pummeled \u00a0with golf ball-sized hailstones.<\/p>\n
\u201cThat\u2019s the way it goes most times,\u201d Lachy said.\u00a0 \u201cA lot of people in Toowoomba had minor damage, but once it hit the bottom of the range, a fair few people suffered from it. The Lockyer Valley definitely got it.\u201d<\/p>\n
It was only in the light of day next morning that Lachy could see the extent of the damage to his 2018 silver Toyota Hilux 4WD Ute.<\/p>\n
The vehicle had suffered hundreds of dents \u2013 in the door pillars, bonnet and roof but also hard-to-get-at places including structural parts of the roof.<\/p>\n
Except for behind the headboard on the tray, virtually the whole Ute was damaged.<\/p>\n
\u201cWhen I looked at it, I thought it had to be a write-off. But it\u2019s incredible what specialists can do these days,\u201d Lachy said.<\/p>\n
Lachy made the call to his RACQ vehicle insurer at 9am the day after the storm.\u00a0 By lunchtime, an assessor from Platinum Hail Management Solutions <\/strong>(PHMS) had been out to his job site to inspect the Hilux.<\/p>\n The remainder of the repair work was just as smooth and efficient.<\/p>\n He said, \u201cI had an email from RACQ that it was all good to go. There was an address in Toowoomba where I had to drop the Ute off and it was fixed within two days. \u00a0They (PHMS) got every single dent out, I\u2019m really happy with it.\u00a0 In under a week (from the storm), I was back driving again. I\u2019ve known of a lot of insurance claims and none of them have been this good,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n Just like the building game, strong foundations and attention to detail have made PHMS an industry leader in hailstone repair solutions.<\/p>\n \u201cOverall, I was very impressed with everything,\u201d Lachy said. \u00a0\u201cEveryone I spoke to was exceptionally helpful. \u00a0Even waiting times: you don\u2019t have to sit on the line to get on to (PHMS). It\u2019s straight away. It\u2019s fantastic. \u00a0That makes the process so much more straightforward.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" IT\u2019S hard trying to win a race against Mother Nature, Lachlan knows that only too well. The building contractor can find himself anywhere on a job site in the Toowoomba region on any given day. On one particular afternoon this year, he could see the storm clouds building and made a mad dash for home […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":173,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"default","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[15,4,17,9,16,18,14,13,3,6],"yoast_head":"\n