car door dented in car park..claim or not?

sam1970

this morning i parked my one month old car in a supermarket car park for some shopping...I always park away from busy areas to avoid irresponsible people damaging my car. came back an hour late and the passenger door was dented with clear evidence of paint from the car parked next to me. I was furious as the other driver did not bother putting an apology note...I left him note saying that i will report him to insurance company and I recorded his car details. I contacted my insurer who straightaway booke my car in a body shop tomorrow and arranged a courtsey car. they said that they will recover costs from the other driver insurer so i dont have to pay excess and the claim will not affect my next year's quote. I have some questions please:
1- I was surprised at my insurer response as i thought that they will need to contact the other insurer and that the other driver needs to admitt liability before they can do any thing!!!what people think?

2- I dont think the car needs respraying as it is only a small dent but I am sur the garage will do that to milk money. how can i convince them just to repair the dent which although small is very annoying on a new car.

3- what if i go with the repair and then the other driver denies responsibility?????

can you advise me please

hethmar

Oh sam, thats sickening for you. If youve got fully comprehensive insurance with protected NCB you would get it done anyway on your cover. If its a dent they may use that sort of sucking out system thing which removes dents on cars.

Im sure someone more knowledgeable will come along and help you, I just wanted to sympathise as my 6 month old motor has a tiny dent on the passenger door too and it made me so annoyed, know just how you feel.

Hope it gets sorted for you.

sam1970

thanks for your reply...it is very annoying..my wife thinks i am silly and i should not bother repairing it but i cant..i know where it is and un intentionally i keep looking at it. Regarding my insurance i do have excess of £150 which i have to pay if i do it on my own insurance and i dont want to do that because i know it should not cost more than £50 with those dent remoing mobile services...i really do not want to spray the whole door

tonycarew

hi Sam, first of all you have my upmost sympathies it really does sting you when someone dents your car especially when you've gone to the trouble of parking out of the way in the first place.
I think I would be tempted to contact your local dent remover,(I had one removed from the rear nearside wing of my car which cost £50) rather than go down the insurance route as even though your not at fault it can be held against you by insurers in the future (the mere fact your vehicle was invoved in a reported accident)
Best of luck
Tony

Kilty_2

Wouldn't you rather pay £150 and have it done properly than have it bodged for £50? (worst case scenario, since they will try as hard as they can to pursue the other driver anyway)

sam1970

tonycarew wrote: »

I think I would be tempted to contact your local dent remover,(I had one removed from the rear nearside wing of my car which cost £50) rather than go down the insurance route as even though your not at fault it can be held against you by insurers in the future (the mere fact your vehicle was invoved in a reported accident)
Best of luck
Tony

thanks...my insurer said that although i will have to declare this claim in the future it will not affect my premium as i am not at fault!!! but i cant understand how they are prepared to proceed with the repair before even speaking to the other driver insurer or hearing the other driver side of the story!!!what will happen if he denies everything after they repaired my car?will they record the claim on me and ask me to pay the excess?

sam1970

Kilty wrote: »

Wouldn't you rather pay £150 and have it done properly than have it bodged for £50? (worst case scenario, since they will try as hard as they can to pursue the other driver anyway)

not really...it was quite costly, to me at least, to buy the car and it will be more painful to fork £150 and have a claim recorded on my policy just a month after buying the car when i have not done any thing wrong.

Kilty_2

Maybe worth speaking to a dent remover to see what their opinion is then - I did this with a courtesy car that someone reversed into and they said that it wasn't worth trying to do by smart repair.

tonycarew

!!!what will happen if he denies everything after they repaired my car?will they record the claim on me and ask me to pay the excess?[/QUOTE]

This is what would worry me too.
Also just to say the repair I had done for £50 worked perfectly considering it was a very noticeable dent.

sam1970

Kilty wrote: »

Maybe worth speaking to a dent remover to see what their opinion is then - I did this with a courtesy car that someone reversed into and they said that it wasn't worth trying to do by smart repair.

I can but insurance will only pay for their body shop garage who will rip them off and will most definitly spray the door...if i use a dent removal service i will have to fork out the money.

dorisday

Get it done yourself, if the other driver doesnt admit liability and this is where witnesses come in handy, you will be reliable for the excess and it will put your premium up next year and it can go up quite a bit.
It happened to me and I ended up paying more in the long run. Next time it happened I knew not to contact the insurance company and had it done myself costing me £70.