Had a minor rear end shunt yesterday-- crease to plastic bumper.
Other party say they will pay without going via insurance, although I have not yet got any prices.
Should I inform my Insurance Company, even though I do not intend to make a claim?
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If the other person seems pretty reliable about paying up then I wouldn't tell your insurance company just yet. Because once you have informed them that you have been involved in an accident you will have to declare it for the next five years or so (whether it was your fault or not), and no doubt as a consequence your insurance premium will suffer.
I would hold back for the time being and only get the insurance company involved if they won't cough up. I think its going to make life a lot easier if you can sort the matter out between you, rather than involving insurance comapnies and having all of the associated hassle.
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You are required to tell your insurance company regardless of whether you claim through them. It is classed as material fact.
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\"Nothing less than 8 cylinders will do\"
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Simon, the premium loading for a non-fault rear end shunt for which there was no claim will be absolutely minuscule, if there is any at all, which I doubt.
As I see it the poster has little to lose and very much to gain by informing the insurer. Failure to inform promptly may mean that they may be less enthusiastic about pursuing a claim when the driver at fault finds out that it will cost rather more than he was expecting; alternatively, they may decide that he is less credible as a witness due to the delay.
If he reports promptly but requests that the insurer take no action in the meantime, he has none of the risk associated with a delayed report or failure to inform of a material fact, however slight that risk may be - and if the repair proves more expensive than expected, the insurer will be in a better place to extract payment from the other driver.
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Get it looked at ASAP as a "minor shunt" on my son's Peugeot many years ago cost £1100 to fix - bumper etc was not too bad but there were creases in the floor of the boot that required replacing.
Why no insurance? -
Are you sure the chap (or chappess) that hit you is genuine (and has ability & willingness to pay)
Has the other driver got insurance or are they trying to hide that matter?
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Tell your company now. You are one small atep away from a "he reversed into me" role reversal scenario
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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the only reason you arent telling the insurance company doc is so thet you are looking after the 3rd party,get a firm quote first thing in morning and get back to people paying ,sound them out with the bill and take your decision then.
ok.
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get a firm quote first thing in morning and get back to people paying ,sound them out with the bill and take your decision then. ok.
And don't let them persuade you to have the car repaired by a friend of theirs who will "do it cheap". Insist that it is done by a reputable and competent bodyshop.
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L\'escargot.
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All insurance companies are crooks! They'll screw you if you tell them, and they'll screw you if you don't"
My car was parked, legally, by the side of the road. It was scraped by another vehicle attempting to park next to it. As there were witnesses, the driver had to stop and leave his details.
I thought it would be a simple case of phoning my insurer (as you MUST inform them of any accident!), passing of the details of the other driver, and waiting for the car to be fixed.
How wrong I was!! My insurer said "Thank you very much for informing us of the accident, however you need to claim directly from the other party. We are unable to help". I'm only TPFT (the car is only worth about £1000), so they weren't interested in helping (I'd have thought they could have claimed their costs back from the other party).
So I had to get in touch with the other parties insurer, and sort things out with them. Not easy, as insurers like to make things difficult so you take as low an offer as they can get away with. Its no wonder there are "ambulance chasing lawyers" out there! If insurers didn't mess us around, we wouldn't need to get legal help to get what we are entitled to have - namely to be put back into the situation I was in before the accident!
What happens when my insurance comes to renewal? It goes up as I have had to make a claim - even though the claim was against another insurer, not my own!!
Rip off Britain is alive and well!!!
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Colin-E
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I'm only TPFT (the car is only worth about £1000), so they weren't interested in helping (I'd have thought they could have claimed their costs back from the other party
Colin-e me old fruit. Thats what TPFT means. You are insured only for the damge you cause to others. You are not insured, and do not pay for any cover or assistance for your own losses. Thats why its cheaper. In this case you are getting what you pay for.
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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Thanks for the comment TourVanMan.
The point I was making was that even if if you tell your insurer about a no fault accident (which you have to do), your insurance goes up.
Heres an experiment for you all...
Go to one of the online insurance brokers, get a quote for your own car, and in the section on any claims in the last five years - leave it blank. Note down the cost of the quote.
Now go back and add a claim - make sure its a no fault one, where costs were obtained from the other party. Note down the cost of the quote now.
Let me know what you find!!!
Just bear in mind, we have five other vehicles - any suprise I haven't informed those insurers of the claim!
A legal question - can I claim the increased cost of insurance for the next five years, from the insurer of the guy who hit my car?
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Colin-E
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Now go back and add a claim - make sure its a no fault one, where costs were obtained from the other party. Note down the cost of the quote now.
Risk, its all about risk. You park, drive, live, whatever in situations where you have been involved in "incidents" - that makes your risk higher than someone else who hasnt.,
A legal question - can I claim the increased cost of insurance for the next five years, from the insurer of the guy who hit my car?
Its worth a try, if you can prove a material loss which is the tricky part, you would have to get the insurance company to disclose thier risk management/pricing policy which of course they wont. Dont forget tho in any claim your expenses, time and other losses.
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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All insurance companies are crooks!
Insurance companies are staffed by ordinary people who are no more crooked than any employee in any other industry.
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L\'escargot.
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Thanks for all the replies.
I have now told my insurance company about the accident and that I do not wish to claim at this stage.
I have not contacted the other party yet, but have today got a quote for £436 ( rear bumper, rear beam, paint and labour)
I think this may well turn out to be an insurance job after all!!
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wait to see if he pays out.If you inform your insurance co. it will still count against you,even though its not your fault(I know as I got hit twice in three weeks)
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That can't be right, if the accident was not your fault why should your premium be affected?
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That can't be right, if the accident was not your fault why should your premium be affected?
Applying logic to insurance premiums is not effective :-)
A friend wrote his bike and another vehicle off - his premium went DOWN because his insurance co. reckon he will now be a safe bet. I've not heard that one before.
WRT this claim - your car could well be off the road for 3 days while the bumper is repaired and sprayed. Include the hire car etc in your costs.
I would not inform the insurance co. ONLY if I was sure that I was going to be fully re-imbursed by the other party AND I was sure there were no injuries.
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That can't be right, if the accident was not your fault why should your premium be affected?
A number of insurance companies do not now differentiate between fault and non-fault accidents.My car was hit twice in three weeks.At renewal time two large insurance companies(a red telephone! and a "lucky" dog) declined to insure me due to those claims even though they were not my fault.(I have had protected no claims for over ten years). I am with an insurance company who do differentiate between them.
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My daughter made a slight dent in her trombone when she dropped it, we thought it would need a repair so I rang the insurance co for a claim form. In the end the damage wasn't enough to pursue the claim so we forgot about it.
At renewal time the premium had gone up significantly so I rang to find out why and was told "You had a claimable incident!" So, even though I'd not made a claim they expected me to pay more, you can imagine where I told them to put their insurance. As I'd not made a claim I could truthfully answer the next company that I'd not made any claims in the last 3 years (or whatever).
Rediculous behaviour!
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Insurance is all about risk management. If you have "incidents" it is an indication that your "risk" is higher. An incident this week means a claim is more likely in the future.
Switch insurance companies every year. As long as you have no claims, your risk is reset to a base assumption level, plus you get the introduction bonus every year!
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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Cribbage Crisis-I have heard a similar tale from one of my mates with his contents insurance.
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>>Should I inform my Insurance Company, even though I do not intend to make a claim?
I would. The risk is that you do not tell them, the other guy strings you aalong, or doesn't pay up, or doesn't pay the full amount and when you try to pass it to your insurer at that point they'll refuse to deal with it.
To pick up on the other points;
It is true to say that insurers believe that a series of non-fault accidents will indicate that your risk is a higher risk. That might not be directly related to you, it could be the time of day you drive, where you drive, the types of road you drive on or the fact that you live next to a bunch of muppets - whatever the reason you are perceived to be a higher risk. Tifference between insurers will be their definition of "a series". - is it 2, 3 or a squidrillion.
I hear these stories abotu "I had one non-fault accident with a value of £0.50 and they loaded my premium by a million poiunds. I tend to put them in the same bucket as "I was nicked for driving at 30.01mph in a 30mh limit". Maybe it happened, I doubt it. If it did happen, then it doesn't happen often. It has never happened to me.
Insurance companies are in business and are no more nor less honest than any other company. People don't like them because they don't understand the insurance that they've bought and then get upset when it doesn't cover a risk they haven't paid for
I would also point out that "protected NCD" is a myth, largely like NCD (or NCB) is. What matters is the net premium. A 10% discount on a gross premium of £100 is better than a 50% discount on a gross premium of £1,000.
You do not have NCD, you cannot transfer NCD, you cannot protect it. - or at least not in any real way.
What you have is a number of years of driving and insurance record. Differing insurance companies will treat that record in different ways. If company a says your NCD is protected and then you have an accident, that company will continue to preserve your nominal discount, albeit that they may well weight the gross premium. Go to another insurer and tell them that you have protected NCD and they will ignore you. They will look at how their rules treat your driving record and tell you that the level of meaningless discoutn that they will give you is x%. Which may or may not be protected.
However, this country is full of insurance experts and one of the many things that they *know* to be correct is that the absolute level of discount is important. They're wrong, and they don't understand, but at least they're secure in their knowledge of what must be.
When will people learn? - look at what you premium ACTUALLY pay and study what cover you ACTUALLY get - and ignore the hype, meaningless discounts and anything else.
And then you won't have to complain about "crooked" insurance companies when what you actually mean is that you didn't understand and you didn't read.
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Are you an insurance broker or a loss adjuster?
I know what I paid for when I took out my insurance. In order to take responsibility for my actions as a motorist I am LEGALLY OBLIGED to have insurance.
What I object to is being treated like some kind of sub-species for daring to make a claim for an accident that wasn't my fault.
Risk management? Stuff happens!
What I do expect is to be put back into the situation I was in before the accident - without having to jump through hoops to get what I'm entitled to.
Insurance companies need to learn a lesson - treat people nicely and with respect, and they only claim for what they need. Treat them badly and they'll take as much as they can get to compensate for the hassle and stress.
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Colin-E
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Colin-e
You are third party. Your insurance entitles you to nothing, absolutly nothing when someone else damages your car. youaint paid for and you dont get it.
Further more, you expect your insurance company to keep your premiums down and provide good value. You know how they do this? by being very vigilant in how they treat risk, and very vigilant in keeping claim costs down.
Dont get me wrong, I am no insurance company lover, and voted with my feet when my home insururer tried to extract the pee. And took great delight in telling them that I have the same cover, considerably cheaper and you are still the underwriter sunshine. so the risk is still yours HA!
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TourVanMan TM < Ex RF >
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There seems to be some confusion...
I wasn't expecting MY insurance to cover the repairs to my car. If I was fully comp, not just TPFT then I would have.
I was however entitled to demand that the other parties insurer put me back into the position I was in before the accident. That's why EVERYONE has insurance - to fix problems they cause when they screw up when driving!
Maybe I was naive to expect my insurer to help - I know better now - and I shall not be renewing with them!
Anyway - rant over!!!
Calm and relaxed!!!
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Colin-E
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>>Maybe I was naive to expect my insurer to help
And what had you paid for that service ? Where in your policy was that cover defined ? Or did you just assume that they'd give you a freebie ?
>>I shall not be renewing with them
Next time check that you have the cover you want BEFORE needing it.
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Are you an insurance broker or a loss adjuster?
No.
I know what I paid for when I took out my insurance. In order to take responsibility for my actions as a motorist
No, you really didn't. You might have intended to, you might have tried to, you might even have believed that you did, but you didn't.
>>I am LEGALLY OBLIGED to have insurance.
Not Third PArty Fire and Theft you;re not. Although I take your point and it is a failing. However it is not a failing of the insurance company. In some countries the legal minimum of insurance is provided at a distributed cost rate by the government and any additional cover purchased from an insurer. This insurance is then in with the road tax. It minimises uninsured drivers, it does mean that the legal minimum insurance is cheaper although it substantially distrurbs the economic and business model for remaining insurance so isn't entirely good.
What I object to is being treated like some kind of sub-species for daring to make a claim for an accident that wasn't my fault.
I think you'll find that all they did was charge you a higher premium. In what way did they "treat you like blah blah blah"
Risk management? Stuff happens!
What I do expect is to be put back into the situation I was in before the accident -
But that's NOT what you paid for !
>>treat people nicely and with respect, and they only claim for what they need.
Not true. Insurers and the Taxman - even otherwise honest people do not see taking money from them, or avoiding giving them money, as dishonest. It is a major issue.
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Anyone considering buying insurance should get a copy of the terms and conditions of the policy, read it and make sure they understand it before signing on the dotted line. Sadly, not many people do this.
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L\'escargot.
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