Call Kurtis: Repair Reimbursement

"It was kind of a shock because all of a sudden this rock flew out of nowhere" says Marta Kravech about her broken windshield.

She was driving on Highway-99 south of U.S. 50 last October. Caltrans was in the middle of a major resurfacing project.

Marta says bits and pieces of road and rock was all over parts of the freeway.

"They could have cleaned it up a little bit better, and they didn't."

She paid the $392 repair bill out of her own pocket and submitted a claim to Caltrans and its subcontractor Windsor Fuel.

"It was pretty dangerous trying to drive down the road feeling like you had to do this the whole time," says Marta's friend Julie Theriault.

She did the same for damage done to her windshield on that same stretch of 99, but it cost her $492. Both were told it would take 120-days to process and cut their checks, but seven months passed with no checks.

They left multiple messages with Windsor Fuel; they were processing the claims for Caltrans.

"And they were completely unresponsive," says Marta. "It was very frustrating."

Marta was moments away from filing suit in small claims court but had two thoughts.

"Either gave up or got mad enough to call you."

She chose the latter. We began several rounds of emails and calls with Caltrans and over the next few months there were more delays.

In September we questioned Caltrans about the payments and Caltrans questioned Windsor Fuel. They found that both Marta and Julie's claims were finally approved.

They would be paid the following week.

"I was really surprised that they finally came through with it."

The checks arrived almost a year after filing their initial claims.

"[I'm] really grateful that you stepped in and were able to do this. I don't know that I would have gotten the check otherwise."

Caltrans told us it had received more than 2,500 claims which had cost them more than 1.5 million dollars. They said that's what broke their project budget and delayed claims payments.