Insurance = Not Fair

[sir-gomer]

Hi guys

So annoyed about my car! I got reversed into the other night by a guy in a huge 4 x 4. His tow bar smashed into my rear quarter panel on my immaculate Yellow VTR and has caused 3 big dents, the panel to crease and the paint to part and chip away, showing bare metal. The guy didn't even apologise and seemed taken aback that I even asked for his insurance details. He reversed blindly out of a space in a car park...I was stationary in a queue behind him...how could he be in the right?!

Anyway, the quotes are about £600 including labour to make the panel look like new again and blend everything back in professionally. My car has done 87k miles and has been looked after from new. It has had services, everything repaired when it needed to be (professionally, with receipts) including cambelt. Interior is spotless with not a mark on any of it. The outside of the car hardly has a mark apart from stone chips and shines up beautifully and easily. I have never had any trouble with reliability or breakdowns. I considered it a brilliant buy and a brilliant, standard VTR.

After telling you my life story I can ask...how is insurance fair? I will now have to somehow prove that my car is worth repairing or lose it? They reckon the fact it was immculate before the incident in every way will count for something but, how much? I am almost certain it will be written off. Though the damage is purely cosmetic it will cost a bundle to replace :wall: and so why shouldn't the person who hit have to pay for it no matter how old my car is??

Not fair...rant over. lol :p

[GolfJay]

Just wait until they write it off and offer you next to nothing for it...

[sir-gomer]

Just wait until they write it off and offer you next to nothing for it...

Tell me about it...

[stupotvtr]

Buy it off insurance company when they write it off?

[Prickle]

Any pics..?

[griff_106]

Buy it off insurance company when they write it off?

You can do that, but it'll still be marked as a Cat C/D write off which will detract from the value of the car. Insurance sucks mate - it's just part and parcel of the 'fun' of motoring unfortunately :n:

[mlawlan69]

life's not fair.

[sir-gomer]

I mean like, fair enough if we as the policy owners crash the car and its our fault. If they turned round and said we aren't paying for that then thats different. But in the case of us getting hit by somebody else we are being punished due to other peoples carelessness?

[jones91]

Sounds like it's going to be a cat c tbh, i know it's shit, but it's probably just best if you take the money the insurance offer you and buy something else tbh, it won't be worth spending £600 fixing it when it won't be worth any more than that after its written off

[sir-gomer]

I mean if they paid it on the guy who hit me's insurance then its different...i would get it repaired. Obviously, as you say jones91, no point repairing if it gets written off as all the value is lost anyway. Trouble is VTR's of this age, mileage and type are going for £1000-£1100 trade which I know is high end but its relevant!

[0rang3peel]

get it written off then buy it back, don't agree to their valuation, ask them to find another yellow vtr (should be pretty fucking hard)

various ideas

[blackie_2k5]

Too much to read :n:

So ill state the obvious.. Wrong section :y:

[GolfJay]

get it written off then buy it back, don't agree to their valuation, ask them to find another yellow vtr (should be pretty fucking hard)

various ideas

DONT do this.

This is exactly the same problem I had. They couldn't find another to value the car to so they wanted to pay bottom money.

[0rang3peel]

DONT do this.

This is exactly the same problem I had. They couldn't find another to value the car to so they wanted to pay bottom money.

what the fuck, they can't find a similar car so they give you a bottom end price!? unbelievable!

[Scott]

This maybe a myth but you can demand that his insurance company return your car to its previous state. As I say possible urban myth

[Manu]

Most likely a write off (that's unfortunately a classic with 106/saxos), don't accept the first offer and have them to match used market prices. My brother got 800 for a 106d with 120 kmiles on it after the boot got hit.

[GolfJay]

what the fuck, they can't find a similar car so they give you a bottom end price!? unbelievable!

Yep. They have to find a MINIMUM of two cars as near as possible in condition/spec etc... to yours. They add the price together and divide by how many they find. Thus giving them an average price.

With mine, they could only find one so wanted to pay bottom end money. Took me a week of arguing with them before they offered me more.

[mechsman]

Non fault accident = DEMAND that your vehicle be returned to the condition that it was in before the incident occurred (hope you have pictures). You can do this almost irregardless of cost. They won't like it, but they cannot refuse to do so in the case of a non fault incident. Be prepared for a fight though.

[chinkostu]

I wrote a fellas saxo off by scuffing the bumper. I warned the lad it would happen and I would sort it, now he's pissed off as he got offered naff all!

[mlawlan69]

The problem is, they WANT these cars off the road.. If everyone was driving round in 62 plate mundane shoot me now focuses, kias and daewoos they would have less injury/death claims to pay out on etc as these cars are safer than a 12 year old tin citreon.

To you its a rare car but to them it means fuck all, I've just gone through the same hassle and my car got cat c recorded; but I'm not so fussed as I'm keeping it anyway and they paid me out just £200 less than I paid for it 2 years ago :)

[stimsonlee]

I actually feel for you mate, its shit when this happens...I had the same problem when someone gouged a key all over my classic jdm impreza down to the metal (every panel) :(. It got classed as a write-off because the spray job was too much :(

[MuZiZZle]

annoyingly even though it was his fault, your insurance WILL go us as you've claimed

[hellonpluto]

Life = Not fair...grow a pair of bollocks

[0rang3peel]

The problem is, they WANT these cars off the road.. If everyone was driving round in 62 plate mundane shoot me now focuses, kias and daewoos they would have less injury/death claims to pay out on etc as these cars are safer than a 12 year old tin citreon.

To you its a rare car but to them it means fuck all, I've just gone through the same hassle and my car got cat c recorded; but I'm not so fussed as I'm keeping it anyway and they paid me out just £200 less than I paid for it 2 years ago :)

if insurance companies are paying out more for people like us driving these cars who do you think foots the bill for that?

the insurance company?

no it's the consumers next time renewal comes!

[devilsadvocate]

life's not fair.

This.

You can't expect an insurance company to trawl through all your paperwork and look at pictures of your car to see what's its actually worth.

You don't have to accept their first car but in reality its a French tin can worth very little, irrespective of how long you have spent cleaning it each week.