car burnt out in freak accident insurance help

sassy_one

Years back when someone bumped my car, I made a claim on my insurance and they paid out and I was advised they would chase the other persons car insurer for the money

magpiecottage

I'm afraid DACouch is right.

The purpose of third party insurance is not to protect you but to protect the policyholder (or any other driver it covers) from claims by third parties (the first two parties being the policyholder and the insurance company).

You can only claim if you can prove that the owner of the car (or at least the last person to drive it) was negligent and the involvement of your car was a reasonably foreseeable consequence of that negligence.

If the handbrake cable was not on properly, then that would be negligence.

If it snapped then there might be an argument that it was not properly maintained.

I doubt, though. any court would accept that a car owner ought to have foreseen not only that his car should not have been parked where it was because somebody might decide to commit an arson attack on it AND that if they did it was likely to burn through the handbrake cable causing it to roll down and hit another vehicle.

It is upsetting of course but I am afraid that you will have to put it down to experience.

chalkie99

There is a term called "proximate cause" - basically liability rests with the party that caused the loss and that would be the arsonist because without their actions the other car would not have rolled into the OP's.

The OP's insurer would have to pursue the arsonist but that is not, in practice, going to happen because it will be pretty much a lost cause and the OP will need to get his excess back from the arsonist as well - presumably not easy!

Very unfortunate.

charlearose

Ok thanks for that still find it hard to get my head around though seem like i am being punished for something that isnt my fault in any way totally sucks think im gonna get the car finance paid out and then not bother with a car to much bloody headache

geri1965_2

charlearose wrote: »

Ok thanks for that still find it hard to get my head around though seem like i am being punished for something that isnt my fault in any way totally sucks think im gonna get the car finance paid out and then not bother with a car to much bloody headache

So is the neighbour though - he didn't set fire to his own car, why should he pay for yours as well as his own?

forgotmyname

Burn through the handbrake cable? Have you tried burning through a steel cable shrouded in a heat resistant sleeve?

I have seen old cars burnt out in the engine bay, Carb melted but the throttle cable is still there. Handbrake cable
would need more heat than that.

Lum

What if the car in question had a hydraulic handbrake?

What car was it that hit the TT?

skiddlydiddly

Unlikely to be a rally car Lum .

vaio

forgotmyname wrote: »

Burn through the handbrake cable? Have you tried burning through a steel cable shrouded in a heat resistant sleeve?

I have seen old cars burnt out in the engine bay, Carb melted but the throttle cable is still there. Handbrake cable
would need more heat than that.

That was my first thought too, but it doesn't need to actually melt the cable (as you say, that's oxy-acetylene country), all it needs to melt a plastic spacer or two somewhere in the mechanism and that could well be enough to lose enough tension from the cable that the car will roll

Lum

skiddlydiddly wrote: »

Unlikely to be a rally car Lum .

I thought there were a few production cars that used them too? Not sure which makes though. Probably Citroen as they seem to like complicating things with extra hydraulics.