Can I dispute a care insurance claim?

lisyloo

Whether or not a "claim" ensued is immaterial.

It may certainly be material to the amount of NCD they have (if it wasn't protected).

If they would rather have paid £35 themselves rather than go through insurance, then IF they do win their claim then should they not be abl to claim back (via ombudsman or small claims court) the different in premiums caused by this issue.

I realise there are big IFs there, but assuming their complaint was upheld then why should they not be able to claim back any extra caused directly as a result of Esures failings. Of course they may have protected NCD and it MAY be immaterial (we don't know).

[Deleted User]

Just to clarify, I'm a named driver on my GF's policy, with NCD protection.

lisyloo

urely I am entitled to say 'yes, I caused damage to the car', but 'no, not the amount of damage you are suggesting'?

The fact is the claim paid out that figure.
Whilst I fully agree with your views you seem to be assuming that there might be a difference if you put down £35 rather than £1196.
I don't believe it will make any difference.
What will make the difference is that fact that there is 1 fault claim/loss/incident.
The difference between the 2 numbers is immaterial in terms of ball park.
They would be interested if it was £50K or millions but the difference here is immaterial.

Quentins point is that you have to declare it anyway regardless of whether it was an insurance claim of whether you paid yourself.
I think most ordinary people would honestly inocently forget to mention such a minor incident.
I have said you still might lose some NCB, so if this is the cae, I would estimate the cost and put it in with your complaint.

lisyloo

Just to clarify, I'm a named driver on my GF's policy, with NCD protection.

You should notify you GFs insurer and you may find her premium increases.
This happened to me on my husbands insurance. We both have NCD.

However Quentin saying you would have to claim this anyway even if you'd paid the £35 loss yourself as it's still a "fault" loss.

So whilst you are rightly annoyed.
You are not affected by this (assuming you didn't innocently forget to mention the minor mirror incident p- which I honestly belive many people would innocently do).

[Deleted User]

Thanks for your replies.

I'm quite an honest person - I could have driven off! - but think it's probably best not to 'innocently forget' as sods law will bit me on the bum I'm sure should something happen - and I understand that insurance companies would use this to wriggle out of it!

As it happens, we got the quote through to renew before the claim was settled and so managed to renew at a lower price than the previous year (bizarrely), but not sure whether next year will be a sharp increase in premium.

Quentin

Deleted_User wrote: »

Just to clarify, I'm a named driver on my GF's policy, with NCD protection.

In that case, the NCD won't be affected, assuming this is the only claim on the policy in this year.

Insurers don't usually pay out for uneconomical repairs, so it would do no harm to enquire why this small damage ended up costing so much - it could even be an admin error, and someone else's costs have somehow got entered on your GF's record.

[Deleted User]

And it's also taught me a lesson...!

You're right - I'm not really any worse off because of it - the premium went down (I'm presuming it would have gone down more had I not had the knock) so all's well that ends well. It's just one of those frustrating things that makes you feel a little sense of despair at humanity and how society has become a 'me me me' culture. The damage was superficial and yet they've pushed their luck. Good to them, in one way I supposed, but on the other hand, it's symptomatic of the culture we live in.

Anyway, thank you for all of your helpful replies!

Quentin

lisyloo wrote: »

Quentins point is that you have to declare it anyway regardless of whether it was an insurance claim of whether you paid yourself.
I think most ordinary people would honestly inocently forget to mention such a minor incident.
I have said you still might lose some NCB, so if this is the cae, I would estimate the cost and put it in with your complaint.

In this case the OP knows that the Insurer has the incident on record.

Even if his memory lets him down, this would come back and bite him in the event of another claim!

[Deleted User]

By the way, my understanding in all of this was that I shouldn't offer to pay the repairs myself as that invalidates my insurance?

Quentin

No.

What you shouldn't do is ever admit liability. Let the insurers sort this out.

Offering to pay for repairs yourself direct to the third party can be a minefield. (Unless you are very careful, it is taken as an admission of liability, and you can end up getting bills for hire cars/personal injury/lost wages/etc, as well as a much bigger repair bill than you expected - and how will you challenge it?).

You can always let your insurer deal with any claim. If they end up paying out to a third party (you'd like to think they would only pay the correct amount and turn down any betterment etc), you can reimburse the insurer to get your NCD reimbursed.

Though in this case there would be no point repaying the £1200 as the policy had NCD protection. No point paying for protected NCD and then paying out yourself!