Car Insurance claim questions

Funfair

A Lady hit my 10 Saab 9-3 today totally her fault and she's admitting full liability, however her insurance company Royal Sun Alliance (RSA) have offered me a Fiat Panda as a temp replacement, yes you read it right a ****ing Fiat Panda

On top of the Panda, they are also only offering it for 3 days only even though they told me my car definitely won't be fixed till the end of next week at the earliest. (Front wheel totally buckled and front wing smashed).

Do I have to accept a Fiat Panda or should I be entitled to a similar car as the one that was damaged through no fault of my own?

The RSA are sending it to what I would call a “back street garage” to get my car repaired, have I the right to send it to a Saab main dealer or do I have to accept who they decide?

Murphy’s law… my car was sold last weekend to a neighbor of mine, he was buying it the end of the month (has to give a month notice to get his money from bank account thingy ) and we agreed a price and shook on it.

I informed him today and he obviously pulled out of the sale when he heard the front wheel was hit so hard it buckled to the point it wasn't sitting on the road. He said he heard of cars being written off after being hit there. Any truth in that?

Obviously this crash will affect the price of my car in the future, should I be looking at compensation for this and how would you calculate the amount?

Thanks in advance and sorry for a long story..

Cuddlesworth

Rent a equivalent car yourself. Give them the bill. If they give any trouble, get a your own loss adjuster. I'm advising that to anybody who gets into a accident now. Simple things like only signing a contract which states that you accept the money until further problems, loss of time, phone charges, car rental and the fact that the insurance company cuts out 99% of the crap.

MidlandsM

A few points OP -

Tell RSA to fcuk off and demand a rental car equivelant to your SAAB, or tell them you'll hire one yourself and get the rental co to invoice them.
Also, you are to have the car for as long as you are without yours.

Re; who fixes your car - again DEMAND that an approved SAAB dealer carries out repair, settle for no less, YOU CAN DEMAND THIS and RSA has no choice but to do it.

Also, you'll be entitled to depreciation on your car, you need to be compensated for that.

At the first hint of them not towing the line with you, tell them your getting a solicitor to deal with them.

That'll knock them into shape, they hate solictors getting into them - kick up a stink OP!

Funfair

MidlandsM wrote: »

A few points OP -

Tell RSA to fcuk off and demand a rental car equivelant to your SAAB, or tell them you'll hire one yourself and get the rental co to invoice them.
Also, you are to have the car for as long as you are without yours.

Re; who fixes your car - again DEMAND that an approved SAAB dealer carries out repair, settle for no less, YOU CAN DEMAND THIS and RSA has no choice but to do it.

Also, you'll be entitled to depreciation on your car, you need to be compensated for that.

At the first hint of them not towing the line with you, tell them your getting a solicitor to deal with them.

That'll knock them into shape, they hate solictors getting into them - kick up a stink OP!

Thanks midlandsM for that... when the Rental place told me RSA were only offering a panda for 3 days it was 5pm, when I rang the RSA to complain, the office was closed till 9am tomorrow.Only waiting to get stuck into them in the morning. The Rental place said they had a Ford Galaxy available but RSA won't pay for that. They asked for the cheapest car in stock :mad:

MidlandsM

they're ****.........you are TOTALLY entitled to what you want, on all angles, the rental, the repair centre, the depreciation, everything......

best of luck

MugMugs

You're obliged to mitigate loss and reduce claim quantum. In saying that, if you justifiably require an equivalent vehicle while yours is off the road then that's what you should get.

Call the RSA. Make it very clear to them that you are the victim and not to be treated like one of their policyholders who are bound by terms and conditions.

Tell them that if they don't play ball then your claim will become very expensive very quickly. Your next stop after that should be Hertz, SAAB and a solicitor. Also inform your own insurer. You're bound to do so under the terms of your policy irrespective of your intent to claim from them or not. You can also claim that you will suffer bias from the SIMI when you trade your motor in. They ask "has the vehicle undergone structural repairs" in turn you can claim for depreciation as an uninsured loss.

Cuddlesworth

All good points, a crashed vehicle is now worth less and you should be compensated for that regardless of repairs. You can claim for car rental from the day you were crashed into even if you didn't get a car. Rent your own car and add it to the bill. If its justifiable RSA can't say no.

Funfair

I forgot to mention I'm also insured with RSA full comp with all the extra's e.g. no claims bonus insured,allowed 1 or 2 claims? in a 3 year period etc.. however they told me on the phone that what I have doesen't matter as your claiming through the other person's insurance and not mine.

They told me that it will be very straight forward with both of us insured with RSA and the other person admitting full liability.

Amazingly the car that hit mine drove away with a minor enough dent in an allready claped out looking car.. she's basicly not put out at all.. mine had to be towed away and now I have a load of Aggravation coming my way..:)

She went straight through a Stop Sign without even slowing down and the guards said nothing to her. When she was gone the Guard said I (as in me) could prosucute her for dangerous driving.. I told him why would I want to do that? Up to you mate I'd have nothing to gain from that I said.. yeah I suppose he said.. and that was it...

MugMugs

That changes it slightly. They are attempting to keep their costs down while screwing you so. Ensure your claim is being made VIA her policy and not yours with a view to recovery from her when settled. The way you've described this as if they are treating it as a comprehensive claim under your policy and then recovering internally from her policy.

Delancey

While I agree that sending your car to a back street repair shop seems ' iffy ' it's worth bearing in mind that many ( if not most ) main dealers outsource crash repairs to these very places.
The fact that you and the other driver are insured by the same company may complicate things but I agree that they have a nerve asking you to accept a Fiat Panda as replacement.

I would expect that they would agree some sort of depreciation payment given the car is not that old.

MidlandsM

Delancey wrote: »

While I agree that sending your car to a back street repair shop seems ' iffy ' it's worth bearing in mind that many ( if not most ) main dealers outsource crash repairs to these very places.

a very good point. I'd only have the car go to a main dealer with their own bodyshop facilities.

R.O.R

MidlandsM wrote: »

a very good point. I'd only have the car go to a main dealer with their own bodyshop facilities.

They are very few and far between.........

teecee74

Hi

Apologies for the length of this email. Hoepfully some of it will be useful to someone.

I had a similar experience in July. A woman in an SUV drove into the back of my 06 Civic. Her car was slightly damaged, mine more so and I was shunted forward into the car in front of me and his bumper was a bit damaged.

The good points: She admitted liability immediately, gave me all her contact details and rang her insurers straight away. Her insurance company dealt with the bloke in front of me - I'd heard from others that I might have to compensate him from my policy and then claim it back from hers but I didn't have any of that hassle, I just had to give them his contact details.

The bad points: everything from that point on.

I brought my car to a main Honda Dealer. They said that my car was fixable but the value of the car and the cost of repairs would be almost the same (7,500 value, 6,500 repairs). They said that they wouldn't start the repairs until the insurance company sent out an assessor as my car might be written off as an Economic Write-off (it could be fixed and could be driven safely but not much point).

The garage also said that I could get an independent loss adjuster if I disagreed with the insurance company but (and I assume that the garage had more experience in this than me), LAs are independent contractors rather than insurance company employees. They tend not to disagree with each other. The garage also said that if my car was fixed I would not necessarily be compensated for the loss in value to my car if it was repaired. The garage stood to gain if I got the car fixed as I'd be getting them to fix it so I took them at their word.

The insurance company decided that my car was an Economic Write-off and then the really stressful part began. They offered me far less than I felt that the car was worth. This was dealt with by a company in the UK that a lot of insurers outsource to. They kept telling me that they could see similar cars on the internet for 6,500. As I'd be a cash buyer I'd be expecting 500 off and the mileage on my car had been higher so they discounted another 500 - they kept repeating the mantra that the process was not designed to give me a better car than the one I'd head as that would be unfair(!)- hence the discount for mileage. On the other hand, I wouldn't get 500 back for the new set of tyres I'd just bought.

In the end I did get the offer raised but it was a stressful 2 weeks, lots of phone calls and emails. The insurance company had given me a rental car for 2 weeks which does put the pressure on you to get something sorted within that period. However, I contacted them directly a few times to say I wasn't happy with how negotiations were going with the UK company (I may have cried on the phone) and they offered the rental car for another week.

No solicitor will handle claims negotiations for you unless you have a personal injury claim. I guess they figure that if they get an offer increased by 1/2 grand, there's not much of a margin in it for them given the number of phones and emails involved.

You are definitely entitled to get your car fixed at a garage of your choice - at most the insurance company can ask you to get 3 quotes from 3 garages you choose. There's not much joy in being compensated for the loss of value in your car - by repairing it, it's good as it was - even if that's not how the real world looks at it. If they decide, based on your quotes, that it's uneconomical to repair prepare for a battle - they'll be looking at your ten year old car with a very cold eye. Due to the scrappage deal, the value of older cars is really really low.

And the fact that none of this was your fault, that you've been inconvenienced/had to take time off work - none of that is factored into how you are treated by the insurers.

MugMugs

Loss Adjusters are instructed to act on behalf of the Insurer.

Loss Assessors act on behalf of the Claimant and IMO are sharks as they charge 10% of the settlement and one of the reasons costs in Insurance are going up.

But then again, I'm bias.

Cuddlesworth

I'm pretty sure the costs of insurance are going up because of the downgrades in credit ratings of their host country's coupled with the huge loss's in the markets recently which they were all heavily invested in.

MugMugs

Cuddlesworth wrote: »

I'm pretty sure the costs of insurance are going up because of the downgrades in credit ratings of their host country's coupled with the huge loss's in the markets recently which they were all heavily invested in.

"one of the reasons...."
Would you like me to simplify that statement a bit more?

Cuddlesworth

MugMugs wrote: »

"one of the reasons...."
Would you like me to simplify that statement a bit more?

Please.

Katekat

Most companies will accept that a claimant has right for a like for like vehicle... now this could be taken as the size of the vehicle. so if you have a medium size vehicle they should at least provide this to you. what they seem to be doing is treating you as an insured only claim as you are also insured with same company. is the vehicle reg 2010? if so you have a right to atleast 15/20% max for depreciation, this is calculated on repair costs and not the value of the vehicle. Its true that most dealers use outside garages to do the repair works so there is not much difference in where they would be sending you. Also approved repairers for insurers must maintain a high standard of repair quality or they would end up being removed from the insurers repair panel and if they had further works required the insurers would demand the costs back from the garage. The vehicle needs to be assessed by their motor assessor to agree the costs with the garage. you should be provided a vehicle for the time it takes to repair the vehicle, but bear in mind any delays on your end will not be their responsibility. ie if they tell you to book vehicle in on a thursday dont leave it till the monday as they will deduct these days. keep receipts for everything your out of pocket due to the accident eg credit for phone for calls etc. insurers will alway try to turn down any request for compensation due to lack of convenience. also if you have a child seat in the vehicle they also have to pay for cost of replacing this as child seat must be replaced after the vehicle is involved in an accident. keep reminding them that you are their Third Party not the insured, that way they cannot refer you to your own insurance terms and conditions.

Funfair

Katekat wrote: »

is the vehicle reg 2010? if so you have a right to atleast 15/20% max for depreciation, this is calculated on repair costs and not the value of the vehicle. compensation due to lack of convenience. also if you have a child seat in the vehicle they also have to pay for cost of replacing this as child seat must be replaced after the vehicle is involved in an accident. keep reminding them that you are their Third Party not the insured, that way they cannot refer you to your own insurance terms and conditions.

Yeah 2010 reg, I was told they will offer 10% depreciation but I was to try force them to 20% and then they will haggle you to 15% (Like I need all this Crap)

TIP: Rather then ringing them and shouting down the phone when they offered the Fiat Panda. I rang the offfice and just told them I have 3 children in Child seats and the Panda wouldn't suit They promptly upgraded me to a Golf. I have no kids in child seats

Katekat

Funfair wrote: »

Yeah 2010 reg, I was told they will offer 10% depreciation but I was to try force them to 20% and then they will haggle you to 15% (Like I need all this Crap)

TIP: Rather then ringing them and shouting down the phone when they offered the Fiat Panda. I rang the offfice and just told them I have 3 children in Child seats and the Panda wouldn't suit They promptly upgraded me to a Golf. I have no kids in child seats

If the vehicle is less than 12 months push for 20/25% depreciation, I know its a pain haggling but you need to get as much as you can right now. 20% is normally the limit for vehicle less than 12 months. This is also normally accepted in the courts as the given guideline. Just keep pushing.

Good going with the child seats and getting the upgrade!!

Funfair

Katekat wrote: »

If the vehicle is less than 12 months push for 20/25% depreciation, I know its a pain haggling but you need to get as much as you can right now. 20% is normally the limit for vehicle less than 12 months. This is also normally accepted in the courts as the given guideline. Just keep pushing.

Good going with the child seats and getting the upgrade!!

Cheers Kate..

CramCycle

Delancey wrote: »

The fact that you and the other driver are insured by the same company may complicate things

Happened to a guy I met (through boards oddly enough). Make sure the assessor (I think that is what he/she is called) notes it is all her fault as they will try and make a mint by boosting both your premiums. Under no circumstances allow them to assign the blame equally for convenience (and they will as they see it as a money maker in the long run).