That must be a west coast thing or else the CO staff in EWR needs better training on what is the right thing.

This is meant as a general comment vs one that specifically addresses the OP's situation. As for the OP, I believe CO acted appropriately. There are so many unwarranted claims that anything less would not work.

I do think that CO should consider empowering repair centers to do inspections, but that might encourage people to deliberately (not talking about what the OP did) skip airport reporting and increase fraudulent claims.

So the right fix seems in situations like those experienced by the OP to pay transportation and parking expense. What was missing was the smile and the we want to help attitude. Too bad.