Why am I being charged a 'salvage cost' to get my written-off car back from the insurance company?

First of all thanks for your reply recently, where my car was written off and the insurance company sent it to salvage with out informing me and refused to give me the car back. With your advice I managed to force the insurance company to give me the car back.

Now the problem is that they have offered me £5600 for my car and want £1568 from me to get my car back, which they say this is the salvage cost. Can please you advise me if that salvage cost is too much or not?

Asked on 20 July 2010 by rizwan

Answered by Honest John

The insurer will have done a calculation. The cost of paying you the estimated write off value minus the salvage it can get for the car against the cost its repairer has estimated to fix the car. In this case the repairer must have estimated more than £3,992, which is why the car was written off. If you want the £5,600 settlement, you have to fork out the £1,568 salvage cost.

Tags: legal and consumer advice accidents write offs claims

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