Advice needed please? re car accident possible dispute?

watson1312

thanks so much in advance for anyone taking the time to read this. My partner was involved in a minor accident tonight, basically whilst driving in the left hand lane of a roundabout another car from the right hand lane came flying over to the left hand lane hitting my partners car door and smashing the window, nobody was hurt thankfully. My partner (like myself) is clueless when it comes to cars/insurance/proceedures in these circumstances and didn't quite know how to react or quite what he should do, I also think he was in a slight state of shock and therefore wasn't thinking quite straight. The driver who ran in to him suggested that they should settle between themselves as it's only the car door that is damaged...(to be honest, our car is a banger......so we're not precious about it, but it's all we have at the moment and we need to get it sorted asap )
my partner just assumed that the driver accepted responsibility as the accident was so obviously the other drivers fault ( he swerved over lanes to try to exit the roundabout but left it too late, therefore hitting our car ) Anyway, they swapped details and both went on their way. On returning home my partner then called our insurance company (for some advice) who have stated that as it was the other drivers fault it's up to HIS insurance company to sort it out, fair enough.....
My partner then phoned the other driver to discuss things at which point the other driver denied that it was his fault and stated that he will pay for a new door as long as it's not too much money!!!! the cheek of it!!!
I know that this must all sound very naive and it's true, we are naive when it comes to these things and neither of us is very assertive.
As things stand now my partner is having to take the day off work tomorrow to go and look for a new door for our car which the other guy is supposedley going to pay for, but I am anticipating that the other guy is gonna be awkward about it and wanted to get some advice from you good folks on here beforehand.
people often settle car damage from minor accidents without involving the insurance companys, i am wondering what the "proceedure" for this normally is?
Any advice would be so much appreciated! many thanks in advance.

Alias_Omega

It would all depend on your car insurance cover. If you are TPO, TPFT or Full Comp.

If you were Full Comp, then you would ring up your own insurance, who would provide you with a car, take your car, repair it and return it to yourself. Take the excess straight away, and if its not your fault. Return the excess.

If you were to be TPO, TPFT, then you would need to ring up his insurance and claim from them. You probably would have to provide your own hire car, and claim this back from them. If you ring his insurance and they dispute that it was his fault, then you could be in for a struggle to get your car repaired easily.


You say that your car is an old banger, how much is the car worth.?

The cost to replace / paint a door could be £300-400 at a rough guess (£100 for door, £200-£300 to paint door, wing, quarter panel to blend in). Add in the costs for a new replacement door window (£90 fitted) then your onto £500.

My guess is that he may have a £200 excess or around that range, so a little bit more and he saves his NCB.

Only you can make the choice, though if he offered me £500 and i could get a 2nd hand door from the scrap yard / eBay complete then i would have that fitted for the cheek of it...

Just to be nosy, can you take some pictures and post them up here for us all too look at. Its boring without pictures.

Good luck,

Regards,

Alias

Wig

Your insurer will be looking for your proof that you recieved a full settlement from the 3rd party, so that this can be recorded as a "non fault" accident and then it shouldn't affect your premium too much.

If you want to settle with him that's ok as long as he does pay up, you give him a quote for fixing (scrap yard sourced door fitted by scrapman or local small garage perhaps to keep costs down?)

Is it just the door that is damaged? no scratches on any other part of the car?

When he pays up, you get a receipt from him, and ask him to sign it, something like

"Ex gratia payment in full for repairs to vehicle XXXXXXX as a result of accident which occurred on XXXXX at XYZ roundabout. Without admitting liability. I consider this payment to be a complete and final settlement for all claims and damages resulting from this accident and I will not seek to recover any costs for repairing my vehicle YYYYYYY nor any other damages of any kind from mr Jones the driver of XXXXX (your vehicle) or his insurer.
Signed
Mr "Driver of the other vehcle"

Your note to him
"Received from Mr Driver, the sum of £££ in full and final settlement for all damages/claims arising from accident on the xxxx at the xyz roundabout."

which means you won't be making any more claims against him.



From what you have said, it may notbe easy to show it was his fault. For example what were you doing on the roundabout for him to be able to hit your drivers door? You are supposed to give way to traffic from the right. Was he just driving too fast and was not there when you joined the roundabout, but appeared soon after? Any witnesses?

atrixblue.-MFR-.

Wig wrote: »

Your insurer will be looking for your proof that you recieved a full settlement from the 3rd party, so that this can be recorded as a "non fault" accident and then it shouldn't affect your premium too much.

If you want to settle with him that's ok as long as he does pay up, you give him a quote for fixing (scrap yard sourced door fitted by scrapman or local small garage perhaps to keep costs down?)

Is it just the door that is damaged? no scratches on any other part of the car?

When he pays up, you get a receipt from him, and ask him to sign it, something like

"Ex gratia payment in full for repairs to vehicle XXXXXXX as a result of accident which occurred on XXXXX at XYZ roundabout. Without admitting liability. I consider this payment to be a complete and final settlement for all claims and damages resulting from this accident and I will not seek to recover any costs for repairing my vehicle YYYYYYY nor any other damages of any kind from mr Jones the driver of XXXXX (your vehicle) or his insurer.
Signed
Mr "Driver of the other vehcle"

Your note to him
"Received from Mr Driver, the sum of £££ in full and final settlement for all damages/claims arising from accident on the xxxx at the xyz roundabout."

which means you won't be making any more claims against him.



From what you have said, it may notbe easy to show it was his fault. For example what were you doing on the roundabout for him to be able to hit your drivers door? You are supposed to give way to traffic from the right. Was he just driving too fast and was not there when you joined the roundabout, but appeared soon after? Any witnesses?

from what i gather the op is trying to say that they were aproaching the roundabout in the same direction when the other driver changed lanes to turn left off the roundabout and suddenly hitting their car as they were allready in the left lane. thus being the other driver fault for viering accross the lane into OP's car.

if he hit the door with force then the door pins and hinges may be bent and if he also hit the pillar this may need attention, also take your car to be looked at/inspected as it may not be as simple to just change the door over if pins and hinges are bent.

if from what you say this guy is getting ratty and denies fault/blame is his then if your fully comp i would instruct them to take the matter on you may lose your car through it being written off at the end of it but will have a curtesy car while matters are being processed.
if TPFT or TP then contact the insurance company he provided to you give them his reg and tell them the situation.

mikey72

No witnesses, there is a good chance you will be held at fault.
My wife had the same.
She swears she was going straight over an island, using the left hand lane, following it round, and the car on her right drove into her, and damaged both offside doors.
That'll be the first island she hasn't gone "straight" over then, as she usually drifts into the lane on her right, and straightens out the curve.
The insurance company usually see it that way too.
Take the money and run.

andygb

My missus does the same thing Mikey, and I have noticed that quite a few drivers cannot be bothered to follow the course of a curve, preferring to turn it into a straight line.
We have a roundabout near us, which is the top of a slip road from a motorway, and it seems to cause problems for - women drivers (I hate to say this, but it is true). They do not seem to know that you have to give way to traffic on your right, or more importantly to traffic which is already on the roundabout. It has now happened three times, where I am on the roundabout, and someone has failed to give way, and I have been forced to do an emergency stop. The last time it happened my missus was with me, and I followed the other driver. She stopped her car at some shops and I got out and questioned her. She maintained that I was in the wrong lane, and she thought I was going around the roundabout. There are only two exits on this roundabout (plus the one, in the unlikely event that you want to go back where you came from), so the traffic giving way from the left can clearly see cars in the left lane turning left, and cars in the right hand lane taking the second exit.
There are a lot of drivers nowadays, who have no idea of the rules of "right of way".

atrixblue.-MFR-.

mikey72 wrote: »

No witnesses, there is a good chance you will be held at fault.
My wife had the same.
She swears she was going straight over an island, using the left hand lane, following it round, and the car on her right drove into her, and damaged both offside doors.
That'll be the first island she hasn't gone "straight" over then, as she usually drifts into the lane on her right, and straightens out the curve.
The insurance company usually see it that way too.
Take the money and run.

held at fault? OP has stated that her OH was in the left lane car from right hand lane changed lanes from being in the wrong lane to turn left who's to blame here? OP's OH for being in the correct lane or other driver for hitting their car being in the wrong lane not checking his mirrors and that the left lane was clear to manouver.

[/quote]:That'll be the first island she hasn't gone "straight" over then as she usually drifts into the lane on her right, and straightens out the curve.[/quote]

poor you bet you go through cars more times a year than you have cooked dinners if she aproaches every roundabout straight accross rather than following the lane.:rotfl:

"The insurance company usually see it that way too."

so all insurance companys assume everyone cuts both lanes on roundabouts do they? news to me!

eventhough there were no witnesses the insurance company cant "assume" anything they have to listen to both party's side of the accident and draw on a conclusion based on what information they have been given.

were not here to read into things or judge what may have happened but to advise on the information given. were not here to judge spelling mistake's either (for the grammar police were not in school).

kwikbreaks

If the roundabout is big enough to have two or more lanes then nobody should be driving across an exit on the left hand lane unless there are lane markings specifically showing that (and most roundabouts there won't be).

I will guarantee that the other driver wasn't swerving around on the roundabout - he was almost certainly taking the correct path and expected your other half to be taking the exit.

The only way to definately avoid getting wiped out when driving the entire way around a big roundabout in the left hand lane is to do it in an artic or a sherman tank.

Anihilator

Its one thats bound to get settled 50/50 if there are no witnesses.

Too many people don't understand roundabouts and both drivers probably think they are right. OP can you give details of the roundabout and arial pictures. might help.

watson1312

thankyou to all of you who have advised and given your opinion so far, this forum truly is a wonderful resource. However i feel i should just clarify the details of the road layout here as this thread seems to be turning into a debate on the correct use of roundabouts ( I agree with you by the way! it drives me nuts when people in the left hand lane of roundabouts cut over into the right hand lane rather than follow the road round )

the advice that you have given has been so helpful so far, just to get things back on track, i wrote in my initial message that this happened on a roundabout.... it wasn't on a roundabout but i was in a rush last night and knew that the road layout would be difficult to explain so opted for roundabout instead. i do apologize for this and it's a lesson learnt when asking for help/advice on forums to be as thorough as possible.... I will be in future, promise.....
here is a link that i have found to an ariel view of the place the accident occurred.

oops....not allowed to post with links.....


It actually happened on the flyover of a busy A road, basically there are three lanes, (a579) the left hand lane and middle lane go straight (from mid left to upper right on the pic, my partner was in the left hand lane going straight on)..... the right hand lane is for drivers who are wanting to turn right down the slip road onto the A road....just to clarify my partner and the other car were moth moving eastbound on the A579 from the left of the screen to right. The other driver was in the right hand lane as if he intended to turn right onto the A666 south, but as my partner passed the slip road for A666 north the other driver, realizing he actually wanted north and NOT south cut across at the last minute thus hitting my partners car.Sorry if I have not explained this too well! ( this is why i just said it happened on a roundabout last night as i knew it would be difficult to explain..sorry again for the confusion.

update, I havn't actually seen my partner this morning, but he has taken the car to the garage and they have looked it over and told him that they will sort it for £200 and that he needs to scour the scrapyards to find a door. My partner has relayed this to the other driver, who has been quite helpful........so it's looking like things might turn out ok. Just need to find a door asap.

Wig

kwikbreaks wrote: »

If the roundabout is big enough to have two or more lanes then nobody should be driving across an exit on the left hand lane unless there are lane markings specifically showing that (and most roundabouts there won't be)..

Exactly, that's what I imagined and the OP shouldn't have been in that positon for that to happen.

However now the OP has clarified everything and now its slightly clearer, still confusing but slightly clearer nonetheless