Friend in a bit of a pickle...

Mark_Hewitt

Sounds typical, lacky gets ordered to do the mundane task as the person who wanted to get out was far too important to do it themselves. Then the lacky gets dumped with all the blame.

Strider590

^^ Exactamundo

Ordering someone else to take your risk for you AND then to take the blame, is pure incompetence.

Lirin

I park our work van in gear, and the handbrake on (throwback to punishing lessons from my Dad, and a very steep hill)... So far, nobody's hit the wall with it.
Yes he should have checked, hindsight is wonderful. He should have never moved it, or the client should have been called to move it himself. Argue with the company, and talk nicely to Sally to see if she'll take it for a few quotes.

victor2

The company should pay. The client was asked to leave his keys and did so in good faith. Sally is too important to move the car herself and should expect the company to pay for the repairs. If she knows the company won't pay then she should have realised that before asking for the car to be moved. If it is private property, it is the company's problem to sort out. I once asked the police if it would be legal for my daughter to learn to drive my car on my company's car park without insurance. They said legally yes, but if she damaged any company property, the company could sue her.

Mr_Thrifty

If she's a partner in the company, then I guess it depends how much he values his job.

I'd possibly just take the £500 hit and get on with life, remembering next time that no good deed goes unpunished.

What kind of company is it? Big or small? What line of business etc?

Inactive

Mark_Hewitt wrote: »

Sounds typical, lacky gets ordered to do the mundane task as the person who wanted to get out was far too important to do it themselves. Then the lacky gets dumped with all the blame.

Sums it up nicely.

no-oneknowsme

Does the client know that his car has been pranged ? If Sally's car is damaged then there could well be damage to the clients as well ! Sometimes damage is caused but un-noticed.....

Pernicious

The client's car came away unscathed apparently, I'm not sure if he is aware of the situation, I would assume so...I will ask my friend later.

It's not a large company - an independant accountancy firm based in the one area so I assume it would actually be quite costly for them hence them trying to stay out of it, & Sally doesn't seem interested in going through them just straight through insurance.

From what I understand of the situation the client willingly left his keys so that someone, no one person named in particular, could move it if needed. Perhaps he assumed it would be someone with an insurance policy that covers them third party or perhaps he didn't care as you don't expect something like this to happen really.

Mikey - can you give me any more info as to how public liability insurance could cover this please? Just had a quick google & my head feels like it's about to explode :rotfl: lots of info there.

I'm worried if this doesn't get resolved amicably that he may be forced out of his job as he is lower down, thus easier to get rid of & replace, but he'd be hard pushed to pay for all of this by himself.

Strider590

Pernicious wrote: »

I'm worried if this doesn't get resolved amicably that he may be forced out of his job as he is lower down, thus easier to get rid of & replace, but he'd be hard pushed to pay for all of this by himself.

Then he needs to go over her head and explain the full situation to HER boss. In any company a good manager knows that he or she is ultimately responsible for the actions of their subordinates and when giving this task to your friend she cannot wipe her hands of the responsibility.

Does your friend have a license? is he an experienced driver? should he be moving clients cars?

You don't give people tasks which you are too afraid or lazy to do yourself.

SandC

Is Sally's car a company car? Does the company have any company cars? If so ask him to find out what the company insurance covers as it's not always just basically x car with x driver.