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My insurance claim nightmare....trust nobody!!!!

2K views 24 replies 20 participants last post by  jaydepleted 
#1 ·
Here's a shortish version of whats been happing to me so far........

November 2005
Guy crashes into the front of the golf, (nice genuine guy) admits liabilty gives me his phone number and address. Phones me back the next day to tell me that its a company car and his boss will sack him if he finds out that he's used the car when he shouldnt have been, so could he pay for the damage. i agree to do this as its nearly crimbo and dont want to cause him probs.

I got a quote got back to him and he said give me a few days to get the money. Left it a few days and then phoned him back, still no money. I said that the garage would accept credit card but he said he didnt have one and didnt know anyone who would lend him the money. By this point 2 weeks had passed and my car still hadnt been fixed and i didnt have any money from him so i decided to go through the insurance.

December 2005
Paid my ?275 excess and car was repaired.

January 2006
Still no progress with claim

February 13th 2006
Phoned my insurance company to find out when i'll be getting me excess back. They inform me that the 3rd party's boss (policy holder) (WHO TURNS OUT TO BE THE BLOKES DAD!!) has phoned my insurance company to tell them that his son wasent insured on the car and he left the country at christmas and not heard a word from him so i wouldnt be ablr to claim on his commercial policy. (Bit stange as the bloke who crashed into me had wife kids and house and to leave the country at short notice seems bizarre to say the least). My insurance company have taken the BLOKES DADS version of him not being insured as gospel so where going to go through the motor insurance beura to claim their costs back and i would LOSE my ?275 excess.

Phoned his insurance company today!!
I phoned the third partys insurance company to find out if the person in question was insured. They told me that they had been notified of a claim in november and had received details but the third party had requested that he would deal with the claim and pay for the repairs himself instead of going through his commercail car policy. COMPLETELY DIFFERENET TO WHAT HE TOLD MY INSURANCE COMPANY!!

I asked the third patys insurance company if the guy who crashed into me was insured on the particular day in question and they said he was!!

So ive got back in touch with my insurance company to tell them what ive managed to find out and they have been in touch with his insurance company again and are sending him a letter giving 14 days to pay up or they will go through his insurance.

Now a few major points to take into account!!............

I trusted the guy. He lied to me about his boss sacking him. His boss is his dad for gods sake!!!

I gave him 2 weeks to pay up....... he didnt pay up!!

Now his dad is lying to my insurance company claiming his son has left the country and he wasnt insured on his policy to get out of a claim on his commercial car insurance policy

Why the hell are my insurance company giving this T*at a further 14 days to pay up????? id just go through his insurance company anyway as he's already tried defrauding me and my insuarnce company!!!! (hopefully it will put his premium up by loads)

Would all this lying by the policy holder be classed as fraud???

To sum it all up ive been bitten b4 by giving people the benefit of the doubt,....... so my advice to you all is always go through your insurance as there are alot of nasty theiving lying scum out there!!
 
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#2 ·
Tell your insurance company that your going ot the police to have them charged with fraud

cos thats what it is plain and simple

you could have lost your excess AND your no claims, prob one of the reasons your insurance company was so quick to roll over an accept it as they stood to gain from YOU not him
 
#4 ·
I'd write a letter of complaint to your insurance company - and mark it a complaint at the head of the page - outlining the time and effort you have put into this and quering why they have not unertaken any of these enquiries. Ask them what they intend to do to resolve the matter. And copy the letter to the Insurance Odbudsman.

It's amazing that you had to do all the legwork and pay your insurance company your excess!
 
#5 ·
im with everyones favorite...... greenlight[:(] 1st time ive been insured with them.

TBH i dont blame greenlight, its the non fault claim company they use....ONE CALL!! (meaning they only make 1 call to the third party for you[:mad:])

Ive found out more in 15 minutes of ringing round than they have and if i hadent i'd be looking at loosing my ?275 and having a claim on my insurance.

Im more pi**ed at the guy and his dad lying through their teeth and making it a t*at to get my ?275 xs back.... i need the money, of on holiday in april
 
#7 ·
The bloke and his dad are total b**t**ds. I had a similar experience many years ago when a van smashed my front wing. "I'll lose my job, can I get you a new wing and write you a cheque" he squealed. I was young and naive and fell for it..........the cheque bounced.
 
#8 ·
Sorry to hear about all the trouble. But unfortunately you can't trust anybody and i'd of gone straight to my insurance company within a few minutes of the accident and told the bloke tough! His fault, if he think he'd loose his job then he must of done it before....

For future reference ANYTHING that is said by the third party to you should be reported to your insurance company when you contact them, which is why even if it's your fault you should never admit liability. Also no comunications should be done between your self and the 3rd party once the insurance company has taken over. It's up to the insurance company to do the work, thats what you pay your premium for in the first place.

So whens the 14days up? and what are your insurance company going to do about it? although with you entering into comunications with the 3rd party yourself over a number of days you might find you won't ever see your excess,

Could be a giggle telling your insurance company that your thinking of getting the police involved (to help them) if they don't sort it.

If you think your getting mucked about write to your insurance company and also contact this lot

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/
 
#9 ·
What an utter nightmare!! Shame that these sort of people are around, you sound like a decent guy and, unfortunately, someone has taken serious advantage of your good nature. I really don't know how some people sleep at night.

In terms of advice, I'd agree with what has been said here. If I were you, I'd take a trip to the local police station and ask for their advice as to your best course of action. Definately send a letter to your insurance company and explain the situation and copy to the ombudsman too.

Sorry this has happened to you. I just hope that you get your excess back and the other guy gets his punishment!

Good luck.
 
#11 ·
Had legal cover.......one call are the company that greenlight give you to sort out your claim and the legal side.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:eek:ffice:eek:ffice" /><o:p></o:p>

Update!!!<o:p></o:p>

Spoke to the third party's insurance again.
What a star the women on the other end of the phone was.

She told me the third party had informed them that his son (the guy who crashed into me) had broken into his dads yard and taken his car without consent (cough...b**locks), so he would contact my insurance company and sort the claim himself.

Explaind to her what had been said/happend so far and explained that my insurance companys legal side where utter cr*p

She informed me that she would personally be getting in touch with him to tell him to either sort the claim immediately or they (his insurance company) would sort it out on his behalf and that she would phone me back to let me know the outcome.<o:p></o:p>

She phoned me back at work 15minutes later and said she couldn?t get in touch but had left messages on his house phone and mobile for him to get in touch with her ASAP.<o:p></o:p>

She basically told me not to worry, I won?t loose my ?275 and if he didn?t sort it ASAP then they would. She too was amazed at the cheek of the bloke trying to fob my insurance company off and stating his son had left the country / wasn?t insured, but said he didn?t have a leg to stand on as it was his son driving the car, his son was insured to drive the car and he couldn?t say his car was taken without consent as he didn?t report it to the police.<o:p></o:p>

<o:p></o:p>

...... His insurance company seem to be more bothered about the claim going through properly than my insurance company does.<o:p></o:p>

I will be making a complaint and this goes to show that with insurance you get what you pay for. I?ve never had to do all the ringing around myself. My old insurance company (admiral) where really very good when it came to sorting out claims quickly with no hassle.<o:p></o:p>

<o:p></o:p>

As regards police, I asked the guy at onecall (1st time I spoke to them and they told me the guy wasn?t insured) if they would be getting in touch with the police about the uninsured driver and they stated that if someone has no insurance they do not bother contacting police as the police don?t do anything about it and so they never contact the police........ Which beggars belief really? Very much doubt they would bother contacting the police about the policy holder trying to defraud them/me either!!!

Thank god it'll soon be sorted... all thanks to the third party's insurer (zurich commercial)[:D]
 
#12 ·
oh dear, iam sorry to read this, you have to be so carefull now days as people will do anything to get out of paying, if the insurance approach doesnt work, you can always take them to the county court! it will cost you ?80, but you get that back when you win, which i can see no reason why you shouldnt and then it will cost them even more, and they cant sit there and lie infront of a judge either!! specially with the conflicting evidence!!
 
#13 ·
A similar thing happened to my wife, somebody rear ended her (oo-er!!),
she got their details (They wrote them down) but forgot to get the
vehicle reg. When she reported it to Tesco they said that they could
not do anything without the model and registration and wanted my wife
to go to his house and get them. Tesco were basically useless and it
cost my wife her no claims bonus in the end, luckily it was protected
but thats not the point.

Hope you get it sorted.
 
#14 ·
Oh yes these things are a nightmare. I'm still in the process of
a clam. Guy pulls out of a side road intothe side of my Fez
whilst I'm driving (wtf, how can someone be so crap at
driving?!). Anyway he was in his company car, admitted liability
at the scene. Then disputed it when his company had to pay a ?1k
excess for writing off my Fez. That was back in October. I
mean come on.. how can you dispute it if you are coming out of a side
road! lol. "I was trying to undertake him" is the answer to that
- yeah on a single carrage road... I don't thinkt hat possible unless
I'm on the sidewalk [:p]

My excess was ?400, still waiting for that - when I get it its paying for my new 18" RS6's!!

After I sent off my statment and piccys of the scene the 3rd part
insurance has no legs to stand on and I've been informed (this week)
that I'll be gettin my excess back within the next few weeks (yay!)

The point is that they drag it out for so fekking long, I've no idea
how much I've lost in intrest from being overdrawn etc (Ovbiously I had
to get a loan out to buy my new car). Grr[:mad:]
 
#15 ·
When I was rear ended in my Rover the guy was all "lets sort it outside of insurance". I agreed and waited for him to contact - something he never did.

A quick call to him a few days later and he told me it was sorted and everything was ok. It wasn't as my car wasn't fixed and he got an earful. He wasn't ready to give any details so I just went to the Police station with his car reg number & phone number. A few minutes later and I had his insurance details, nice claim went in to fix my car and I was happy (used Helphire)

I got a call from him a few weeks later complaining I had nacked his no claims, I kindly reminded him he had, and hung up.

I wouldn't trust anyone nowadays, if they don't have insurance details - I call Police and get them to do a report on the accident with names numbers, addresses and reg numbers.
 
#16 ·
I had a woman drive into me in Nov 2003 I am still going through the claim, however that is because I have had alot of problems with my back and shoulder since the accident.

I am insured with Tesco and I can honestly say they have been spot on, they never even took excess off me because from the description I gave them of the accident it was not my fault so therefore claimed the excess of the third party. I would say stick at it and if need be take legal advice.
 
#18 ·
I agree completely with johng, get the police to the scene.

An artic pushed me off the motorway 2 years ago, driver admitted liability at the scene then changed his story 3 or 4 times cause it would affect his bosses no claims. We are in court in April to sort it out. I have had to request information from Highways dept on road markings and roadworks that were set up at the time just to prove I could not be at fault.
 
#20 ·
A good idea is to carry a cheap disposable camera with you in the glove box - ther only a few quid. If you are involved in an accident you should take as many photos as you can. Your car, their car, other cars involved. The direction you were going, the direction they were going, road signs, everything you can. You should also take photos of any passengers aswell as you hear the stories of 'mysterious passengers' claiming compensation for whiplash etc. You DO NOT need peoples permission to take their photograph!

Always get Reg number, make & model, name address - be cheeky and ask for ID as it easy to give a false name and address. Witnesses? Get phone numbers and addresses also in case it goes to court.

Basically get as much information as you can. Always report it to your insurance company and always insist it goes through the insurance company. Don't let the buggers get away with stitching you up.
 
#21 ·
Ok this is what you need to do m8.

Contact the MIB (Motor Insurers' Bureau), they will deal with both insurance companys to make sure they are acting according to FSA standards.

Even if you get the correct outcome now you should still contact the MIB, dont let these people get away with it.

Heres the details:

Motor Insurers' Bureau
Linford Wood House
6-12 Capital Drive
Linford Wood
Milton Keynes
MK14 6XT

DX : 142620 Milton Keynes 10

Telephone Number : 01908 830001

Fax Number : 01908 671681

E-mail : Enquiries@MIB.org.uk
 
#22 ·
I agree completely with johng, get the police to the scene.

An artic pushed me off the motorway 2 years ago, driver admitted liability at the scene then changed his story 3 or 4 times cause it would affect his bosses no claims. We are in court in April to sort it out. I have had to request information from Highways dept on road markings and roadworks that were set up at the time just to prove I could not be at fault.
As far as I'm aware, and I may be wrong, the Police will only attend when requested if there has been an injury.
 
#23 ·
I agree completely with johng, get the police to the scene.

An artic pushed me off the motorway 2 years ago, driver admitted liability at the scene then changed his story 3 or 4 times cause it would affect his bosses no claims. We are in court in April to sort it out. I have had to request information from Highways dept on road markings and roadworks that were set up at the time just to prove I could not be at fault.
As far as I'm aware, and I may be wrong, the Police will only attend when requested if there has been an injury.
Being in the police I can confirm there is no condition attached to being injured before the police will attend. A lot of the time if you phone in to report an accident they will say if you are happy to exchange details then you can. This saves them attending. If owing to the presence of a motor vehicle on a road there is damage to another vehicle, injury to a person, damage to property or injury to an animal (certain ones), this is classed as a reportable road accident. Technically in all of these circumstances the accident should be reported to the police. If you stop and provide your details at the scene you are complying with the law. Always insist they attend.
 
#24 ·
Hope you get it sorted mate,

I had a claim around august time, guy reversed into my rear bumper needed straighting out and re spraying

Guy demanded it went through insurance as he said i was in wrong for been in his way (long story i had pulled out of disabled bay as i had dropped grandad off and heading home (grandad blue badge holder)

Anyway i paided the costs of my repairs as it was cheaper than my excess and claimed the money back, his insurance company (Frizelle, part of liverpool victoria) admitted liability straight away, but getting them to pay up was a nightmare, took them 3 months almost!!

They didnt refund my other expenses either, eg camera development etc as they never asked me to take pics of the incident... wtf how was i supposed 2 know??!?!

Insurance companies do my head in [:mad:]
 
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