talk of write off

[markeyszoo]

I was involved in an accident today. Sideswiped by an ambulance who was trying to get out of the way of a blue light police car.

Minor ding and scuff on front wheel arch but when i spoke to my insurers they were quick to say 09 reg, old car,  could be a right off.

Is there is no end to the insurance companies greed.

I see a battle looming.

 

[mk_lon]

The same thing happened to a friend of mine a couple of years ago. He was driving a E46 BMW coupe. He contacted the insurance company and managed to buy the car off them and repair it privately for £800. Kept the payout too. 

[McShmoopy]

Similar thing happened to me, swiped rear drive side door with dents and scuffs, my insurers tried to write it off but other parties insurer (Motabiltiy) approached me and advised if I got a repair quote they'd pay me out directly for the cost, they knocked an amount off £3.3k for the estimate but got £2.5k and no write off and did a private repair myself 

[zoricib]

same on my 06 - very minor scrape by someone in a car part (luckily they left details) - respray cost was £250, payout was around 2k. Got to keep the car, no category etc. Would involve a free claims management company, maybe they can push for a bigger payout. 

[markeyszoo]

it just got worse. my renewal premium starting next week, just got increased by £151 for newly reported accident

[Linas.P]

18 hours ago, markeyszoo said:

I was involved in an accident today. Sideswiped by an ambulance who was trying to get out of the way of a blue light police car.

Minor ding and scuff on front wheel arch but when i spoke to my insurers they were quick to say 09 reg, old car,  could be a right off.

Is there is no end to the insurance companies greed.

I see a battle looming.

First thing - get yourself a Claim Management Company. You did a right thing, you informed your insurance as per the policy, end it here, you don't need to speak with them ever again, because you only thing you going to get is that you going to get shafted by them.

Writing it off, may not be a bad thing if they offer you fair deal. For example I have written of my 2008 car with 200k miles on the clock, but that was because they gave me Cat-N, I kept the car for £700 and they paid me £3,850 and then sold the car for £2,700. So basically I made £6,000 from the car that was worth half of that. And also I could have just kept it for £700, because it was just a scratch on the bumper. The year prior I did exactly that - they wanted to write it off-offered me maybe £2500, I said "no car is worth more, repair is does not cost £2800", they ended-up paying £1,400 for repairs and I kept the car without any record of it being involved in the accident. Basically, it got repaired. But all of that was only possible because I have leverage via Claims Management Company. In my case, both times CMC "pre-authorised" the claim, meaning I got paid right away, not freezing of excess, no waiting for TP insurance to pay out, I got brand new BMW to drive around whilst my car was being fixed (not shaitty tiny car insurance companies usually give) and I had a say in what my car is worth and what I want to be paid for it. If you dealing directly with insurance it will literally take months, sometimes years, especially if you disagree with their estimate it always takes extra 6 month every time you go back to them. With CMC it was simple - they got car appraised within days, then sent me the valuation, then I was like - "nope such cars is not £2875, this is SEL, this has sun-roof, this has ML etc. I want minimum £4000, here are few links from autotrader"... same day I got response "okey, we checked our database and for this model we have valuation spread between £1485, to £3850, so we can do £3850"... fine... done. Insurance company didn't even get any say in, the valuation was simply sent to them and they had to take it... and Car rental of £250 a day is ticking for them... so within 2 days insurance company accepted it. The case was solved within 1 week, car was repaired and on the road in 2 weeks.   

4 minutes ago, markeyszoo said:

it just got worse. my renewal premium starting next week, just got increased by £151 for newly reported accident

That sucks... I is probably not right, but I would have tried to accept renewal before reporting the accident, as such it would not have impacted you for another year. But yes Insurance companies sucks like that - regardless if it is your fault or not, the insurance will increase!

[Spock66]

No doubt this is also why insurance premiums are increasing across the board, writing off a car that just needs some relatively minor body repair.

[Guest]

33 minutes ago, Linas.P said:

First thing - get yourself a Claim Management Company. You did a right thing, you informed your insurance as per the policy, end it here, you don't need to speak with them ever again, because you only thing you going to get is that you going to get shafted by them.

Writing it off, may not be a bad thing if they offer you fair deal. For example I have written of my 2008 car with 200k miles on the clock, but that was because they gave me Cat-N, I kept the car for £700 and they paid me £3,850 and then sold the car for £2,700. So basically I made £6,000 from the car that was worth half of that. And also I could have just kept it for £700, because it was just a scratch on the bumper. The year prior I did exactly that - they wanted to write it off-offered me maybe £2500, I said "no car is worth more, repair is does not cost £2800", they ended-up paying £1,400 for repairs and I kept the car without any record of it being involved in the accident. Basically, it got repaired. But all of that was only possible because I have leverage via Claims Management Company. In my case, both times CMC "pre-authorised" the claim, meaning I got paid right away, not freezing of excess, no waiting for TP insurance to pay out, I got brand new BMW to drive around whilst my car was being fixed (not shaitty tiny car insurance companies usually give) and I had a say in what my car is worth and what I want to be paid for it. If you dealing directly with insurance it will literally take months, sometimes years, especially if you disagree with their estimate it always takes extra 6 month every time you go back to them. With CMC it was simple - they got car appraised within days, then sent me the valuation, then I was like - "nope such cars is not £2875, this is SEL, this has sun-roof, this has ML etc. I want minimum £4000, here are few links from autotrader"... same day I got response "okey, we checked our database and for this model we have valuation spread between £1485, to £3850, so we can do £3850"... fine... done. Insurance company didn't even get any say in, the valuation was simply sent to them and they had to take it... and Car rental of £250 a day is ticking for them... so within 2 days insurance company accepted it. The case was solved within 1 week, car was repaired and on the road in 2 weeks.   

That sucks... I is probably not right, but I would have tried to accept renewal before reporting the accident, as such it would not have impacted you for another year. But yes Insurance companies sucks like that - regardless if it is your fault or not, the insurance will increase!

I had no idea about CMCs. What's the catch? Do they take a big cut? Or is it because you had a valuable / high spec car involved?  

I only ever had one claim in my first year of driving. Left the handbrake off, rolled slowly into someones new Kia Rio. They claimed £1200 out of tiny paintless repair level dents!  I got no call or asked for what happened at all from my insurer at a time, just the letter telling me it was settled against me at £1200.  Would a CMC have helped there?

[Linas.P]

Sorry - I have to take e few steps back to explain the premise.

Basically in one of the goverment acts (it may even be regulation from EU) something like "Insurance Act 2012" (don't quote me on that as I don't remember the details) there was provision that third party companies can manage the claim on insurance policy. This was specifically in response to the fact Insurance companies are kind of "marking their own work" when it comes to assessment etc. As such this provision was added that if you disagree with insurance company valuation, you can go to another company and as them to carry out the claim management for you. As part of that provision third party companies (basically CMCs) can charge the insurance company for management of the claim (because in theory they doing all the work, that insurance company doesn't have to do), so all the cost comes from Insurance Company, basically there is no catch. That is why Insurance companies absolutelly HATE them. Again don't quote me on that but I believe the limit was something like £840 for that management fee. You don't have to pay anything IF claim was not your fault.

As such if you in non-fault claim like OP, or like the two claims I had, then you can use CMC for free. If it is your fault then usually it isn't worth, because you have to pay the fees yourself for using CMC, unless the circumstances are expectational. So I don't believe it would have helped you in your case. Most CMCs that I know don't even take the claim unless they are non-fault.

Also I know they take cut from personal injury claims and that is usually 20-30% from settlement amount. So those are your typical "no win, no fee" cases, but you have to pay them from your claim amount. However, for car damages they have that provision as mentioned and they charge party at fault insurance company and not you.

Also - just one note, make sure you CMC is FSCS regulated, unregulated ones are borderline fraud. 

[normski2]

20 hours ago, markeyszoo said:

I was involved in an accident today. Sideswiped by an ambulance who was trying to get out of the way of a blue light police car.

Minor ding and scuff on front wheel arch but when i spoke to my insurers they were quick to say 09 reg, old car,  could be a right off.

Is there is no end to the insurance companies greed.

I see a battle looming.

 

They should not be writing off your car for such small damage. No doubt your own insurance company will instruct a claims management company. CMC's can be tiresomely slow in the extreme.

Stand your ground and be polite and firm.

You are not at fault therefore you can determine where your vehicle goes for repair. Do not let them 'shoe horn' you into having your car taken away on a low loader to goodness knows where. The phrase ' I know my legal rights and as I am not at fault here I wish exercise my right to choose my repairer for my vehicle' ..... usually gets their attention. 

Keep all correspondence in a file so you can refer to it. I'd keep that file stashed for about a year to be safe. Likewise with email correspondence .... keep it in a labelled folder so you don't delete it in error.

From my own experience it is highly likely your insurance company will pay out for the repairs and then will seek those costs from the other party's insurance company. This can be slow and protracted. It's a PITA, but it's how insurance companies work. They sometimes resort to threats of court action to get the money from the guilty party's insurer. I have experienced this myself just last year. My insurer said it was fairly common practice ... somewhat alarming!! They were on the point of paying me for my time to attend court. It got as far as me having contact with their firm of Solicitors. The other side then yielded and paid up.

Best of luck and good fortune to you.

[Linas.P]

47 minutes ago, normski2 said:

They should not be writing off your car for such small damage. No doubt your own insurance company will instruct a claims management company. CMC's can be tiresomely slow in the extreme.

From my own experience it is highly likely your insurance company will pay out for the repairs and then will seek those costs from the other party's insurance company. This can be slow and protracted. It's a PITA, but it's how insurance companies work. They sometimes resort to threats of court action to get the money from the guilty party's insurer. I have experienced this myself just last year. My insurer said it was fairly common practice ... somewhat alarming!! They were on the point of paying me for my time to attend court. It got as far as me having contact with their firm of Solicitors. The other side then yielded and paid up.

Don't take your insurance CMC... that is like worst thin ever.

Hire your own CMC who stands for you, basically you don't care about insurance company - you are their client, they work to make you happy. 

Now you are right - insurance companies can also assign their own CMC, that is particularly true if both cars are insured by same insurance company, meaning they have conflict of interest and I believe they are even required to step aside... and then they have like these "partner" CMCs that really are almost just another department within insurance company. Don't use them.  

47 minutes ago, normski2 said:

From my own experience it is highly likely your insurance company will pay out for the repairs and then will seek those costs from the other party's insurance company. This can be slow and protracted. It's a PITA, but it's how insurance companies work. They sometimes resort to threats of court action to get the money from the guilty party's insurer. I have experienced this myself just last year. My insurer said it was fairly common practice ... somewhat alarming!! They were on the point of paying me for my time to attend court. It got as far as me having contact with their firm of Solicitors. The other side then yielded and paid up.

And that is why you use your own CMC. I don't even get my own insurance company involved. Because quite often, you will have to pay your excess upfront and then they refund it when they get paid, which I just don't want to deal with and it could take months.

As I said in my experience, if there is no doubt about who is at fault the CMC even "pre-authorise" the claims... and you get paid right away... and they get that money reclaimed eventually, but that is not something you need to deal with.

[ColinBarber]

4 hours ago, CT200NI said:

I had no idea about CMCs. What's the catch? Do they take a big cut?

They take a cut and this is one of many reasons why insurance premiums continue to go up - everyone is making easy money.

[Linas.P]

2 hours ago, ColinBarber said:

They take a cut and this is one of many reasons why insurance premiums continue to go up - everyone is making easy money.

They do not take a cut from you in non-fault accidents. 

As for insurance premiums going up for everyone - yes I guess that is true, but what is the alternative, to get shafted by insurance company in accident which was not your fault and take a fall for everyone else?