Auto body repair & detailing: Auto paint / clear coat and detailing, minor scratches, swirl marks

Question
Greetings... Thx for taking time to look at my question.  I recently visited a local body shop and asked about have the dulled paint on my Black 93 Miata professionally polished.  The paint was in relatively good shape with a few stone chips in the nose, minor scratches on the hood and trunk lid and I found the finish rather dull with lots of swirling in it from numerous coats of wax.  The paint on my car is the original factory paint with no clear coat (rags are black when the car is waxed).  They told me they could make it look like a mirror and get most if not all imperfections out by wet sanding then by machine polishing it several times.  We agreed on a price and scheduled the work.  Day 2 of the job and they called to say that it would be best if I clear coat the car while it was sanded.  I had never heard of this but I am also not a car person,  I trusted their professionalism and we agreed on a price.  Now a week late my car was finally ready.  I picked it up and noticed a few "fish eyes" in the paint.  When I finally had time to really look it over I noticed it was not just a few... "fish eyes" they were every where.  During my closer look I also started to see that the clear coat was not even either, actually looked like some places had been missed completely.  There are a number of places on the car where you can see a distinct difference between the smooth and the "orange peel" finish and I can see the clear coat peeling at the top of the doors.  In the proper light there are more swirl marks now than there were originally and there are even paint drips on left nose and rear spoiler were too much paint has been applied.  In short in just 3 weeks they have made a total mess of my car.  My question to you is... as there are already areas where I can see the clear coat is flaking... will this clear coat just give me problems in the future?... do you think that the clear coat is properly bonded to the paint?  Would you have applied clear coat to a 12 year original paint car? This is not a back yard operation but in fact a local "reputable" body shop.  He has indicated he will make it right but I want to educate myself on the clear coat issue as I am uncomfortable about it.  If he does not fix it to my liking and if required I will consider legal action to have the clear coat removed and have the car polished as originally agreed.  If he cannot do this then I will demand that he repaint the entire car.  I would appreciate your comments and advise as an entirely independent opinion of the situation.  Thanks in advance … Tony

Answer
You can clear coat over old paint by scuffing the whole cars painted surface. But if the clear is peeling already that means that the area has not been scuffed well enough and this peeling will probably only get worse. As far as the runs and dry spray in the clear this comes from a poor spray person or a bad day at the office for him. If the shop will fix the problem and gives you some kind of warranty that the clear coat will not peel give them the chance to fix the problem before you resort to legal action.