Feb 2020 a daft old git hit the back of the Fabia, quite gently. We (learner and I) stopped gently at a mini roundabout, old git behind braked, almost to a stop, then released and gently bumped us. As we were turning left, and he right, he hit us just at the edge of the crash bar behind the bumper, causing a vertical split.
Insurance company and their bodyshop made a mountain out of a simple task. With such a gentle hit, it needed a bumper cover, nothing else. I thought, paint one, then call me in, I'll wait an hour while they fit. If there's been one the right colour on Ebay, I'd have done the job myself.
No. Bodyshop insisted it follow their 'production line' process, which takes a fortnight. (Actually took them 5 days)
Insurance company provided a dual-controlled hire car, which was a Citroen C3, with the non-turbo engine. It felt significantly less powerful than the Panda, horrid thing.
Collected the Fabia, arrived home to find one reversing sensor had started to disappear into the bumper. There's a plastic bracket stuck to the inside of the bumper with thin double-sided sticky foam. I drove back to them, 13 miles, and 15 minutes later all looked OK again.
A month later, it started to fall in again. No way was I going back to those clowns, so it went on the 'to do' list.
Five years later, bumper off to fit a towbar. Bracket is not broken, just coming unstuck. Peeled off, to reveal about a quarter of the sticky foam left on the bracket, but only a few remnants on the bumper. So they'd peeled off the original bracket from the bumper, and just pressed it onto the new one, with whatever stickiness was left. I guess the insurance company paid for three new ones.
A bit of cleaning, and the application of some sticky foam, and all is secure at last.
Bumper is not OE, as there's not a simgle VW Group marking on it, and no line for the cutout for the towbar.
Thankfully not a big crash job.