A bit of a downer today.....

[HighlandJohn]

On the way back from my usual hospital clinic [when things weren't as efficient as they usually are] today, I noticed that there are TWO cracks radiating from the bottom of the windscreen which, although not YET MOT fails, will only spread. 

I suspect they happened on a stretch of carriageway which is currently being resurfaced with ramps at the beginning and end of the roadworks where the limit is currently 30 mph. Can't prove it was there though, as they aren't seen from the driver's seat until the light hits them at a certain angle..... My concern is it's a bonded windscreen with rain sensor - I'll be watching/carefully checking during and after replacement. I'm assuming it won't be a genuine Lexus screen but an 'aftermarket' one by a reputable manufacturer.

No pics as it's dark out now. That'll be £100 excess on my policy, then. Oh well, it's only money.... Bad day all round really.

[steve2006]

I feel being bonded windscreens are more liable to shock damage as unlike the old rubber ones there is no cushioning between the car frame and glass.

Obviously insurers have already noticed this given the rise in the windscreen excess which has gone from around £50.00 to £75.00 and now into three figures.

[Linas.P]

Sorry to hear that...

Regarding Insurance - don't forget windscreen cover still counts as claim on your insurance, so it is worth doing some math to see if it is worth claiming it from insurance or just paying for it upfront. 

[Mr Vlad]

That's a bum@mer John. Chipped windscreens are so common nowadays. Have a word with your insurance company and chat with them about how a claim for a new windscreen affects your no claims bonus and quote. 

[J Henderson]

Does a screen replacement also not require something else - such as the plastic trims either side of the glass, or some clips or whatever to be replaced too?

I'm sure I've read on here about people having issues when a windscreen was replaced and the old stuff was re-used?

In any event, John. Check your insurance policy details. You might be able to insist on a Lexus windscreen being fitted. I know my policy has a separate excess payment for a "non approved" glass replacement.

[steve2006]

I would assume that insurer “approval” is gained on the price they pay and not the quality.

I notice that some Lexus windscreens may have 3-4 different tints so is this also taken into consideration with an exact replacement or do these “approved” suppliers only do clear glass?

[madasahatter]

4 hours ago, J Henderson said:

Does a screen replacement also not require something else - such as the plastic trims either side of the glass, or some clips or whatever to be replaced too?

I'm sure I've read on here about people having issues when a windscreen was replaced and the old stuff was re-used?

In any event, John. Check your insurance policy details. You might be able to insist on a Lexus windscreen being fitted. I know my policy has a separate excess payment for a "non approved" glass replacement.

It is clips along the pillar which are replaced.

[HighlandJohn]

Appreciate all the expressions of sympathy and sound advice, replacement booked with Auto Windshields for 10th April which was the first available date.  They're the approved repairer for the Insurance, it being included in my Comprehensive cover subject to the excess as outlined above.

I appreciate it won't be a Lexus screen but will have to be by a good manufacturer like Pilkington.  Done on site so I'll be watching like a hawk, and subsequently checking for water ingress and wind noise.

Here's a pic of the damage, the one to the left isn't as visible as the major one to the right [I have NO idea who the random chap tying his lace is....  ]

 

[LenT]

1 hour ago, HighlandJohn said:

I have NO idea who the random chap tying his lace is....

Well, it’s not me.

I hope that helps to narrow it down. 😊

[zoricib]

17 hours ago, HighlandJohn said:

Appreciate all the expressions of sympathy and sound advice, replacement booked with Auto Windshields for 10th April which was the first available date.  They're the approved repairer for the Insurance, it being included in my Comprehensive cover subject to the excess as outlined above.

I appreciate it won't be a Lexus screen but will have to be by a good manufacturer like Pilkington.  Done on site so I'll be watching like a hawk, and subsequently checking for water ingress and wind noise.

Here's a pic of the damage, the one to the left isn't as visible as the major one to the right [I have NO idea who the random chap tying his lace is....  ]

 

Any idea if they'll replace the exterior clips on a typical windscreen replacement? Mine has been done before (I think) and it has lots of micro-pitting so I was considering putting a claim in (and a hammer through the windshield to qualify 😅) but the external clips don't look great & know they're quite expensive to replace.

[HighlandJohn]

^^  No idea, but I'll check when the fitter arrives - to be honest I have been aware of the "exterior clips" until they were mentioned here.

[Linas.P]

On 3/27/2024 at 12:38 AM, Mr Vlad said:

Have a word with your insurance company and chat with them about how a claim for a new windscreen affects your no claims bonus and quote. 

It does not affect NDC, but it is counted as any other claim on your policy, insurance company will never tell you how it would affect your policy. So you can simply go to make a quote, making 1 declaring claim and other one without and see the difference. The rule of thumb ~30% increase for next 3 years.

On 3/27/2024 at 1:19 AM, J Henderson said:

Does a screen replacement also not require something else - such as the plastic trims either side of the glass, or some clips or whatever to be replaced too?

Usually they include moulding around the windscreen, but it is questionable quality and not colour matched, just matte black plastic. As I had black car that was fine for me.

2 hours ago, zoricib said:

Any idea if they'll replace the exterior clips on a typical windscreen replacement? 

As above - they usually do, most of the time mouldings break when they remove them and clips ALWAYS break, so it is kind of impossible to replace windscreen without replacing them. 

19 hours ago, HighlandJohn said:

Done on site so I'll be watching like a hawk, and subsequently checking for water ingress and wind noise.

Water ingress and noise should be alright, they doing those windows every day, so I am sure they know what they are doing. In my case automatic wiper also worked just fine, but one thing that didn't work was windscreen heater. To be fair they gave lifetime warranty for work and guy came like year later to check it and told me that if I want I can book replacement, but to be honest I never bothered to replace screen again just because of windscreen heater. 

[normski2]

21 hours ago, HighlandJohn said:

 Done on site so I'll be watching like a hawk

 

 

Might I suggest having a good look [when the old windscreen is removed] and noting where any dash clips are located. There may even be some that look like a wee roll of felt or 6mm foam that may have been fitted at a later date to stop the 'dashboard rattle' that so many spoke of a few years back. Perhaps take a few photos for reference.

Found the pic below in my info folder ... it may be of use.

Also, check that the rain sensor for the wipers is working, they will need to bond the pad to the screen so that all is held securely.

A watering can will start the necessary action!

[zoricib]

5 hours ago, Linas.P said:

Usually they include moulding around the windscreen, but it is questionable quality and not colour matched, just matte black plastic. As I had black car that was fine for me.

As above - they usually do, most of the time mouldings break when they remove them and clips ALWAYS break, so it is kind of impossible to replace windscreen without replacing them. 

Thanks Linas! Mouldings was the word I was after, not clips😄 

5 hours ago, HighlandJohn said:

^^  No idea, but I'll check when the fitter arrives - to be honest I have been aware of the "exterior clips" until they were mentioned here.

 

[H3XME]

On 3/27/2024 at 12:27 AM, Linas.P said:

Regarding Insurance - don't forget windscreen cover still counts as claim on your insurance, so it is worth doing some math to see if it is worth claiming it from insurance or just paying for it upfront. 

I can confirm this isn't always true, although majority of the time it is. Really depends on your insurance company because I made a claim last year, £50 fee and when renewing this year there was no problems, no questions etc. I did also ask before I claimed it if it's going to affect anything, they said nope.

On 3/28/2024 at 8:33 AM, zoricib said:

Any idea if they'll replace the exterior clips on a typical windscreen replacement? Mine has been done before (I think) and it has lots of micro-pitting so I was considering putting a claim in (and a hammer through the windshield to qualify 😅) but the external clips don't look great & know they're quite expensive to replace.

They have to replace the clips. They are not re-usable. They tried (and did) to do this on mine because I wasn't there when they were doing the work on my driveaway. They re-used the clips, put the plastic trim back and I could hear the wind blow when at speeds over 50mph. The trim didn't sit flush with the window because of the clip and it ended up flying up and bending backwards when I was on the motorway. Luckily it didn't completely fly away, but it bend and crack the trim/moulding. I called National Windscreens, made a complaint and went back to their HQ to get it replaced. Unfortunately for me, Lexus didn't have any in stock so I ended up having to wait 3 weeks before they could get the new clips and driver's side trim. All sorted in the end, but yeah, those clips must be replaced with the windshield, but moulding/trim doesn't if removed carefully.

[gji25]

On 3/27/2024 at 12:27 AM, Linas.P said:

Sorry to hear that...

Regarding Insurance - don't forget windscreen cover still counts as claim on your insurance, so it is worth doing some math to see if it is worth claiming it from insurance or just paying for it upfront. 

i wont effect your insurance if you have protected no claims

[Redefined]

Sorry to hear that @HighlandJohn on my LS430 which I run on a shoestring budget I've a hole (literally) right in the drivers view. The hole is at least 2mm which is where someone previously must've done a shoddy repair job.

Had the windscreen people out many many months ago without disturbing my insurance. Cost was in the £200s but when he attended he said it was suitable to be able to give me a warranty. The repair is still going strong and the 3 cracks either side of the hole haven't gotten any bigger.

Anxiety causing indeed. Hope your replacement goes well...

[Redefined]

Oh... and he refunded me in full due to the lack of warranty issue. 🙂

[RONNIE W HODGEKINSON]

On 3/27/2024 at 2:58 PM, HighlandJohn said:

Appreciate all the expressions of sympathy and sound advice, replacement booked with Auto Windshields for 10th April which was the first available date.  They're the approved repairer for the Insurance, it being included in my Comprehensive cover subject to the excess as outlined above.

I appreciate it won't be a Lexus screen but will have to be by a good manufacturer like Pilkington.  Done on site so I'll be watching like a hawk, and subsequently checking for water ingress and wind noise.

Here's a pic of the damage, the one to the left isn't as visible as the major one to the right [I have NO idea who the random chap tying his lace is....  ]

 

He,s Spotted the 10P  Dropped on The Forecourt..Only Pretending To Tie His Shoelaces..

[Linas.P]

On 4/3/2024 at 3:41 PM, H3XME said:

I can confirm this isn't always true, although majority of the time it is. Really depends on your insurance company because I made a claim last year, £50 fee and when renewing this year there was no problems, no questions etc. I did also ask before I claimed it if it's going to affect anything, they said nope.

Usually this comes to bite when you go to different insurance company. Perhaps in my case it was highlighted as I had another two non-fault accidents and then when I got RC my existing insurance company told me they cannot insure me at all. And when I asked why, they told me that I have 3 claims. I was like "what you mean 3 claims, I had 2 accidents where other people crashed into me which was not my fault and what is third", the lady on the phone told me it does not matter who was at fault - accident is accident and the third one was windscreen cover. Point is - they DEFINATELLY have this on their records, depending on insurance broker and underwriter they may or may not count it towards total number of claims/accidents.

On 4/5/2024 at 1:10 PM, gji25 said:

i wont effect your insurance if you have protected no claims

It has nothing to do with no claims bonus, only if you have accident that is your fault or let's say you have your car vandalised (where party at fault is not known), only then it will affect your NCB, if it is not protected.

However, if somebody else crashes into you, or you claim on windscreen, or missfuel, or key cover, this is considered "accident/incident" and that is what you have to declare next year when you quoting for insurance, for the question where they asking if you had any accidents in last 3 or 5 years. Also "notification only" reports counts for that, so if you call your insurance company and say somebody crashed into your car in the supermarket and you won't claim, but just want to update the record (as they require by contract), it will also count for next 3-5 years and you will pay more for insurance for being honest. So if you had say 8 years NCB, you still have 8 years NCB (also many companies now only accepts and protects only up-to 5 years), but now you also have reported "accident" on your policy which will affect the price. Also even if you won't declare it (as I didn't do for 2 years for my windscreen claim as I did not know this counts), your insurance price is probably affected anyway, that questions is more like "honesty challenge" and insurance companies basically just check if you honest and that gives them extra reason to invalidate the cover or inflate the price if you are not. When I asked what exact claims they have on the system and reported them all correctly my cover price actually slightly dropped. Also risk here - if you declare the accident incorrectly i.e. you had the crash on 1st of July 2023, but for whatever reason in insurance records it on the 5th, then their system will not recognise it as the same claim and thus you going to be doubly penalised during the quote - once for claim you declared "incorrectly" and once for one you have not declared.

Insurance is legal scam, which is enabled by government to rip of the drivers and that is what they doing. So when dealing with them always remember that - anything that you say will be used against you.

My calculation is rather simple - I consider claim to be 20% increase for next 5 years. So if you paying £400 for your cover, then it is well worth it for the windscreen. Say £50 excess for ~£400 increased premium due to claim is still cheaper than ~£600-800 for windscreen. However, if one is paying £1,200 for insurance then we can quickly calculate that it would be cheaper to simply pay for windscreen yourself, rather than having it on your insurance.

Finally, I guess it is more of an issue for younger drivers, as many insurance underwriters have extra rules for those under 25 and under 30 e.g. do not provide cover if diver has more than 2 claims, so it is not so much that you price increases, but more that you lose cheaper insurance option i.e. your cheapest quote would have been £800 from certain provider, but now you can't see it at all as they refuse to insure you for 2 non-fault claims you have, and the next cheapest underwriter who is willing to accept you is simply more expensive at £1200. It was always more expensive, it is just that you had more options before. Again for example when I was insuring my old IS250 (and also now) I get quote from maybe 70-80 providers, so of them stupid price of course, but a lot of brokers match their policy for me. When I had RC after having 3 claims, I would get total maybe 18 providers appearing on the search all together, so I was missing on maybe 50 providers who would not want to insure me. once one is over 30 it is much less of such requirements and it affects the price less.

[H3XME]

1 hour ago, Linas.P said:

you paying £400 for your cover, then it is well worth it for the windscreen. Say £50 excess for ~£400 increased premium due to claim is still cheaper than ~£600-800 for windscreen. However, if one is paying £1,200 for insurance then we can quickly calculate that it would be cheaper to simply pay for windscreen yourself, rather than having it on your insurance.

Again, depends on the insurance company. Some don't care about a windshield, that's not classed as a claim in everyone's books. It's not so black & white and that's what's so fkin confusing about car insurance in this country.

This week, I called 8 different insurance companies to get a quote on a 2013 Toyota Mark X G's (2GR lump, IS platform). All of them were import friendly. 4 of them refused to insure it because they don't have "tables" for this kinda car. Maybe that makes sense as there's less than 5 in the UK, I can see the logic, fair enough. The other 3 were happy to insure it but differed in quotes. £2100, £2400 & £1000. All policies included protected NCBs, modifications & 8000miles.

They make stuff up as they go. It's frustrating. Was considering a PCP deal on a facelift RC300h too, but the new Lexuses get stolen left right and centre, so the cheapest quote I got was £2700. Who would've thought that insurance would price me out of having a regular car at the age of 28. I pay £480 for my IS250 atm. It's brutal these days.

[Linas.P]

17 minutes ago, H3XME said:

Again, depends on the insurance company. Some don't care about a windshield, that's not classed as a claim in everyone's books. It's not so black & white and that's what's so fkin confusing about car insurance in this country.

This week, I called 8 different insurance companies to get a quote on a 2013 Toyota Mark X G's (2GR lump, IS platform). All of them were import friendly. 4 of them refused to insure it because they don't have "tables" for this kinda car. Maybe that makes sense as there's less than 5 in the UK, I can see the logic, fair enough. The other 3 were happy to insure it but differed in quotes. £2100, £2400 & £1000. All policies included protected NCBs, modifications & 8000miles.

They make stuff up as they go. It's frustrating. Was considering a PCP deal on a facelift RC300h too, but the new Lexuses get stolen left right and centre, so the cheapest quote I got was £2700. Who would've thought that insurance would price me out of having a regular car at the age of 28. I pay £480 for my IS250 atm. It's brutal these days.

The point I am making - it is definitely recorded on your file, it does not matter which insurance company you are with today, they will all record it in database, it may not affect you right aways, but it may affect you if you chance the insurance company. 

Exactly as it happened to me, I was with eSure on IS250, paying something similar to you, maybe £560, had windscreen replaced, no jump in price next year, but then an idiot crashed into me, car got written-off and I moved onto RC. Called-up eSure to tell them I have changed the car not expecting anything as I had maybe 2 months left on that policy, I thought if the price goes-up then it maybe £100 at most for remaining 2 months... The answer I got - "sorry sir, but we can't insure this car for you AT ALL, because of 2 claims" (had 1 two years prior as well, also non-fault)... And then when I shopping around I was told there are also 3 claims... and also I was told most ridiculous thing "yes £3000 insurance is justified for such powerful sports car for young driver"... I am sorry - who are you calling young?! I was like 2 month away from 30 back then and RC "power full sports car?" Who are you kidding, bog standard 2L turbo with 241hp... same as entry level BMW 320i... That it has 2 less doors doesn't make it neither powerful, nor sports. So my insurance for RC was like £1,600 in the end, but I found shorter policy, so basically got extra year of NCB in 10 months and also the first claim expired and then insurance went back to normal ~£800 for normal policy for second year.

Also it was brutal as long as I can remember - my first quote at 19 was £36,000 (thousand, not hundred) and I could not afford pretty much any car because of insurance until I was nearly 25, first IS250 insurance with black box was £2,600... I mean sure at that time I could get insurance maybe for £1000 for some Focus or Fiesta, but still...

[Malc1]

Linas hi …… and All

I think those brokers and insurers ….. all of ‘em ……. have a base point that they won’t insure you whatever,  being car, driver age and experience,  postcode 

When they do pass this “ test”, next comes the number of “ events “ on prior policies …… your fault or not, non physical even like glass claim events 

You may have a totally clean record with everyone else at fault BUT you have been involved and caused some insurer somewhere to open your file and spend time on it 

I can’t, and won’t even try to explain the totally incomprehensible and inexplicable and one just has to chase around finding an insurer that maybe just “ likes” you 

If there’s any insurer, broker or even Dan that can dispel my irreverent thoughts then GOOD …… let’s hear them eh ! 😂

Malc 

[LenT]

2 hours ago, Linas.P said:

my first quote at 19 was £36,000 (thousand, not hundred) 

Was that third party only Linus?

Could be a Guinness Book of Records entry….  😊

[Linas.P]

17 minutes ago, LenT said:

Was that third party only Linus?

Could be a Guinness Book of Records entry….  😊

I don't remember, I know it was cheapest policy available, likely it was fully comp. But even then, even today fully comp is about the same price as TPO and TPO+F, for many year fully comp. was actually cheapest for me as well... Some non-sense about "people who don't get fully comp. are considered more risky", or maybe other way around "people who chose third party only are more risky"... basically there was some excuse to price TPO higher.

I remember making mistake once and providing my actual phone number when comparing the quotes and it was few years later after £36,000 quote, so insurance probably was already like £16,000 or £14,000 by then... and I received the call from the cheapest quote provider asking me to confirm if "I want to proceed with the quote"... and I was like "seriously, have you seen the fffing price?!" and the guy on the other end was actually annoyed and said "OKEY, Jesus... if you don't want don't insure with us then!"... as if the price was somehow realistic for somebody to pay and my answer could have been anything but "ffff-off". To be fair - obviously it was not his fault that the price was the way it was, but also it was almost cheeky to ask if I want to pay £16,000 to insure £800 worth of Ford Focus LX 1.3L - "yeah sure... go ahead then, I am just going to pay 20x the price of the car".  Actually, on other occasion I have said that... and lady casually womansplained to me that "it is not about the price of the car, but is about the risk you as a driver may pose and thus is calculated to cover that risk"... thanks lady, I never thought about that... "now it totally makes sense why ~22 years old has to pay over £10,000 for insurance... simple - it is just about inherent risk they are".