Car slides and hits wall
Options
Flora_Poste
Posts: 123 Forumite
Please can you offer some advice here.
I parked my car outside my house as usual yesterday. Five minutes later the neighbour over the road banged on the door to say that my car was now embedded in her wall! .
Im absolutely sure the handbrake was on but its one of those new electronic ones and Ive had a few concerns about it being a bit unreliable (not always going on first time or going on then off again straight away). Anyway the estimate for the damage is £2500 plus the cost of the wall. I was going to pay it but had no idea it would be that much.
My question is how do I stand with the insurance. Ive never claimed in 30+ years driving and dont know much about it. I cant prove I put the handbrake on obviously but will that affect the claim. There was no one in the car at the time.
Thanks in advance.
I parked my car outside my house as usual yesterday. Five minutes later the neighbour over the road banged on the door to say that my car was now embedded in her wall! .
Im absolutely sure the handbrake was on but its one of those new electronic ones and Ive had a few concerns about it being a bit unreliable (not always going on first time or going on then off again straight away). Anyway the estimate for the damage is £2500 plus the cost of the wall. I was going to pay it but had no idea it would be that much.
My question is how do I stand with the insurance. Ive never claimed in 30+ years driving and dont know much about it. I cant prove I put the handbrake on obviously but will that affect the claim. There was no one in the car at the time.
Thanks in advance.
"A savoury muffin?? As if life wasn't disappointing enough!" Miranda
0
Comments
-
Handbrake on or off, there is no-one to recover the costs from. If there is a suspected faulty handbrake you can ask them to check to maybe claim via a warranty or manufacturer issue but this is highly unlikely.
The claim will go down as a fault against you.Save £12k in 2019 -0 -
Why not leave it in Park if an auto or in gear if a manual?
It wont roll away then.Censorship Reigns Supreme in Troll City...0 -
Flora_Poste wrote: »Five minutes later the neighbour over the road banged on the door to say that my car was now embedded in her wall! .
.
A car can't slide from rest spontaneously across a road?0 -
Contact your car insurance company and they will deal with it - this is precisely the sort of thing you pay them to deal with for you.
If you're worried that they won't pay out because you not have put the handbrake on then stop worrying. The third party element is there precisely to cover liabilities you incur to other people through carelessness on your part - whether that's by not looking where you're going and driving into the back of someone, or by forgetting to apply the handbrake when you park the car.
In theory liabilities to other people ONLY arise when there is negligence on your part. So if you could prove that you'd applied the handbrake properly and the failure was an out of the blue event that you could not have foreseen then in theory that would be when your insurer could refuse to pay out, and the neighbour would just have to accept his bad luck and fix the wall himself. However in practice there would probably be a presumption that there was some fault on your part (either by forgetting to engage the handbrake, or by not doing anything about your suspicions that it was faulty - which you sort of admit to); so your insurer will almost certainly pay.0 -
Thanks for your replies. I was worried they wouldn't pay out but they were lovely. Thanks for your advice x"A savoury muffin?? As if life wasn't disappointing enough!" Miranda0
-
Happened to me too, car just rolled backwards and hit the wall post in my drive. Tailgate smashed and had to be replaced. Contacted insurance company and they dealt with recovery, repair and courtesy car. Caused around £1800 s worth of damage. Premiums still went up by around £70. Just glad no one was behind.
Recovery guy said had quite a few similar incidents, weather was hot then and said brake prbably cooled and so was not held??
Now park in gear with a brick under back wheel, expensive lesson learnt!!0 -
!!!8220; Five minutes later the neighbour over the road banged on the door to say that my car was now embedded in her wall! .
.
Originally posted by Flora Poste !!!8221;
A car can't slide from rest spontaneously across a road?
Oh yes it can handbrake on , rear discs are hot, the disc cools down and contracts just enough to release brakes car rolls away
common fault on Renault Laguna few years ago But I think the handbrake was on front discs but same problem
My front wall was demolished in exactly the same way by an Alfa Romeo in exactly the same way0 -
Brother had the same in a Kia Rio, hand brake fully pulled on when we got back in the car to move it (which at that point was being stopped from rolling all the way down the hill by the car behind his had come to rest against). Only thing that could have happened according to the Kia garage was the brakes had cooled and therefore released enough for the car to move and to make sure he pressed the foot brake down 'that extra bit' before pulling on the handbrake!
Needless to say he avoided parking on hills from that point onwards until he got shot of the car as you just feel you can't trust it after something like that.0 -
Ditto in my situation. Handbrake was still applied when I got in the car to move it.0
This discussion has been closed.
Categories
- All Categories
- 343.3K Banking & Borrowing
- 250.1K Reduce Debt & Boost Income
- 449.7K Spending & Discounts
- 235.3K Work, Benefits & Business
- 608.1K Mortgages, Homes & Bills
- 173.1K Life & Family
- 248K Travel & Transport
- 1.5M Hobbies & Leisure
- 15.9K Discuss & Feedback
- 15.1K Coronavirus Support Boards