Rear ended, settlement too good to be true?

DrScotsman

I got rear ended Tuesday before last, no one was injured, just my car; the nearside rear bumper was smashed in and the plastic cover on my lights was smashed off. If the bumper weren't rubbing against the tyre then I think it'd be drivable. I'm insured Third Party Fire and Theft with Endsleigh, and I'm completely new to the whole process and quite dumb about it. I phoned up Endsleigh (well, "Drive Assist"), they got me a hire car and appointed solicitor to claim back any costs.

On Monday Drive Assist sent someone to look at my car, their assessment estimates £1050 to fix it. On Wednesday the person who smashed me's insurers had a look. Today they phoned me up and told me it was too uneconomical to repair, so they offered me £1800 and I get to keep my car. (Haven't accepted it yet, but I think I will today)

Now I am really confused about this, the offer seems too good to be true (bought my car for £1700 last July, and I haven't lied about its value to anyone), so surely the £1800 has to cover some of my expenses? Well Drive Assist and the solicitors told me that the expenses (namely the hire car) will still be claimed back. Even the people who gave me the offer told me that Drive Assist would still be able to claim the hire car costs back. Does this really sound right? Will I not be held liable for solicitor's fees or anything?

Thanks for any advice

1984ReturnsForReal_2

"Even the people who gave me the offer "


Who were they?

Lum

I've heard good things about Drive Assist, but they basically operate the same as Help Hire (who I have used, but have gone a bit crap recently), in that they are basically no-win no-fee lawyers. When you engage their services then they will be on your side.

They claim back their costs directly from the person they are sueing, namely the other guy's insurance company, so if they tell you that the settlement offer is £1800 then that's what you'll get.

The key figure here is "market value" and used car prices have gone up as of late. You should look for a car similar to yours on autotrader to determine if this is a fair price

Personally I'd advise you to get a new car and sell off (or keep) the parts from the old one rather than repairing it.

dacouch

Interesting to hear you have heard good things about Drive Assistn Lum as they featured on BBC Watchdog a while ago for unfairly treating customers on existing damage. There is a quite long post on MSE (Plenty of other posts on other internet forums) about them with the majority of people reporting the same type of problem that Watchdog took them to task on.

I personally would give Drive Assist the big swerve.

Lum

dacouch wrote: »

Interesting to hear you have heard good things about Drive Assistn Lum as they featured on BBC Watchdog a while ago for unfairly treating customers on existing damage. There is a quite long post on MSE (Plenty of other posts on other internet forums) about them with the majority of people reporting the same type of problem that Watchdog took them to task on.

I personally would give Drive Assist the big swerve.

Trying to find that watchdog article, but the archives only go back to October 2008.

Got any links. I'm curious as I was considering using them rather than HelpHire if I get hit again.

dacouch

Everyone is trying to find the actual clip of it. I remember it well, they basically had lots of customers who had cars delivered by drivers who are in a rush to get away. Often the car if dirty or low on petrol or has existing damage. Some of the customers notice this and point it out to be told yes its already been noted...sign here. The customer signs their PDA.

When the car is collected with no further damage, the correct amount of petrol, cleaned inside and out the driver will check the car with a fine tooth coombe and then drive off. The customer will normally get a bill for between £150 and £350 a few weeks later with DA telling them they will debit their card.

That is what happened on the Watchdog report and DA went on their and said they were bringing in new processes to stop it. Have a look on these forums to see if you think they have stopped doing it...

http://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/showthread.html?t=552905&highlight=drive+assist

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/community/forums/t/drive-assist-need-to-be-stopped-21411.aspx

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/community/forums/t/drive-assist-problem-27677.aspx

http://www.moneysupermarket.com/community/forums/ShowThread.aspx?ThreadID=14606&Source=MS;

Helphire are okish, if they are claiming back a large amount for you eg injuries they are quite quick. If its just your excess they appear not to treat them with much care (Maybe because they earn very little on excesses but loads on injuries) and it normally takes ages and ages for just excesses.

If you do get a car from drive assist make sure you read what they get you to sign and check the car very very throughly and note every single bit of damage even really small scrathes as when they collect the car they will

DrScotsman

1984ReturnsForReal wrote: »

"Even the people who gave me the offer "
Who were they?

Yeah I know, I don't like it when people don't name and shame either...and considering I'm not even shaming But something stopped me from doing so. Broker Assist gave me the offer, they're acting on behalf of Royal Mail - it was one of their vans that hit me.

Lum wrote: »

Personally I'd advise you to get a new car and sell off (or keep) the parts from the old one rather than repairing it.

Someone else is telling me to do that...my Dad however suggests I just get someone to cut off the bumper so it's not scrapping the tire, which obviously wouldn't cost as much.

I think I'm going to phone up and accept their offer (well, I mean get the terms of the settlement). Thanks for your advice guys

Lum

dacouch wrote: »

If you do get a car from drive assist make sure you read what they get you to sign and check the car very very throughly and note every single bit of damage even really small scrathes as when they collect the car they will

Aha, that's something I do anyway, and on most of the car forums I hang about on people are similarly cynical when it comes to hire cars. I go over the cars very closely whether I'm hiring from "Honest Dave" or from the likes of Hertz, Avis etc.

Also if the car has wheeltrims I take them off and keep them in the boot for the whole journey because there was a time when the local (Liverpool) branch of one major car hire chain (I won't name them because it was only an allegation that was going around, but lets just say it's very easy to hire a car via their website) were getting someone to go around, nick a wheeltrim from your car, charging you the full price for a wheeltrim which they then just replaced with the one they'd nicked.

DrScotsman wrote:

Someone else is telling me to do that...my Dad however suggests I just get someone to cut off the bumper so it's not scrapping the tire, which obviously wouldn't cost as much.

If you are planning to just bodge the repair with an angle grinder and don't care how it looks, then that is a different matter. Pocket the cash, stick it in a high interest savings account and if the car starts to show any further symptoms down the line which make it fundamentally unsafe and/or too costly to repair, you still have the cash available to replace the car.

The advice I gave was more if you were planning to spend a large chunk of the money getting the car repaired properly only to then find that something else was broken and now you don't have enough money left to get it sorted or buy another car.

DrScotsman

Well I just gave my hire car back...£75 for a scratch on one of the hubcaps. It wasn't "so small you couldn't see it" and I do remember touching the kerb a bit on that side with that wheel so I just admitted to it. In light of the £1800 I just don't have the energy to complain. Please no one tell me that a new hubcap is less than that, and no one mention the Unfair Contracts Act. I'm not in the mood

Lum, yeah I realise you were originally talking about a full repair. As you said, given this offer and Drive Assist's estimate of £1050 I think it's either between new car or cheap repair. However much that'll cost...anyone able to venture a guess?

Lum

Without seeing the damage it's hard to tell.

If you honestly don't care what the car looks like and the only fault is the bumper rubbing on the tyre then £50 (maybe less in Scotland!) to a guy with a hammer and an angle grinder should sort it You'll need to replace that light cluster too, depending on the car, probably about £30 from a scrap yard.

I had a big dent in the door on my Volvo when I bought it (for it's scrap price), got a mate to fix it, a process which involved securing a bottle jack to the inside of the door and jacking it up so it pushed the dent out to roughly the right place. Then a couple of self tappers to secure the trim. It passed an MOT and I can wind the window down. Job done.

DrScotsman

Lum wrote: »

(maybe less in Scotland!)

Sadly I live in Coventry at the moment .

You'll need to replace that light cluster too, depending on the car, probably about £30 from a scrap yard.

I wasn't entirely clear, the first layer of protective plastic has been cracked, however the second layer is still fine (i.e. the lights are still coloured and the bulbs aren't exposed). Is the first layer required to be road legal? Image:

http://i62.photobucket.com/albums/h115/DrScotsman/thwack.jpg