Friend in a bit of a pickle...

vaio

JQ. wrote: »

Hmmnn - OP I really don't think your mate should go all guns blazing based on the advice in this thread - I don't think anyone has catagorically answered your question. My immediate thoughts :

• Public Liability insurance is irrelevant - a forklift running over a member of the public on site yes, private cars in a car park no. Private cars have their own insurance.
• All cars involved are privately owned, so discussions about company cars is irrelevant
• Comments about it being Company Business are irrelevant, it was a car crash. I have access to several company cars - If I crash one I am responsible, which involves paying the £500 excess on the company car insurance policy. Same as my private car - if I crash it while on company business I am responsible. I think the fact that it was on company premises is a red herring and irrelevant.
• Comments about the dark overlord Sally ordering her minions about are a bit comical. I've worked in an office where double parking takes place and 2 people going out to move a car is completely normal. If a Partner is blocking a graduate's car, the graduate will ask the Partner to move their car. It takes far less time if 2 people do it.
• I've regularly moved other peoples car - but only when insured. When I had a company car I'd only move Company cars, now I have a private car I'll hapily move any car, as I have 3rd party cover. If someone asked me to move a car I knew I was not insured on I would refuse, and have done.
• Whilst morally, the company should pay I'd be interested to hear how that is enforceable. Unless Matt catagorically stated to Sally that he was not insured to move the client's car and she forced him to do it.
• Arguably, on the basis that Matt has been driving for 7 years, you would expect him to excercise a duty of care when driving someone elses car. It would appear he did not. When I get in someone else's car I certainly spend a bit of time working out what's going on, I don't just get in and crank it up.
• Sally is insured and can certainly claim on her insurance - however, her insurance company will then just go after Matt for their costs. If she takes a like for like courtesy car for a few weeks - that could end up very costly.

I don't know what the answer is, but then again I don't think anyone else does, so I would advise your mate to tread very carefully. There's a poster on here called Dacouch who seems very knowledgeable about insurance - might be worth pm'ing him/her.

I don’t think insurance has anything to do with it.

I think the bottom line is an employer is liable if an employee, acting on instructions or in the course of his employment, causes damage.

The employer might have insurance to pay the resulting bill but that often isn’t compulsory and in any event, it doesn’t affect the liability

JQ.

vaio wrote: »

I don’t think insurance has anything to do with it.

I think the bottom line is an employer is liable if an employee, acting on instructions or in the course of his employment, causes damage.

The employer might have insurance to pay the resulting bill but that often isn’t compulsory and in any event, it doesn’t affect the liability

All I'm saying is that there are lots of if's, but's, maybe's and conjecture in this thread. Even you've put an "I think" in there to cover yourself.

I'm definately no expert on insurance, but we have PLI and it has never come into play in a car claim. In the last 12 months I would say we've had 4 car claims, all involving both company and private cars on company business. One of which was a claim in our company car park. About 8 years ago at another firm I worked at an employee wrote off his own car whilst he was on company business - transpires he was driving without insurance. He lost his job and the total value of the car.

If someone can quote a PLI clause that covers Matt, then fine. All I'm saying is please can someone "prove" it's the companies responsibility, before he go's in demanding that the Company cover the costs and possibly gets himself in trouble.

I'm sure I am wrong but no-one's convinced me yet.;)

vaio

I'm pretty sure I'm right and as I said, it's nothing to do with insurance.

The basic long established law is that employers are liable for damage done by employees acting in the course of their employment. There are lots of cases which have attempted to define "course of employment", but in this case there is no issue as he was acting on a direct instruction from a senior member of staff.

There might or might not be an insurance policy they have that will cover the liability but the liability still exists even if they don't have insurance

Google "Vicarious liability" IYCBA

JQ.

vaio wrote: »

I'm pretty sure I'm right and as I said, it's nothing to do with insurance.

The basic long established law is that employers are liable for damage done by employees acting in the course of their employment. There are lots of cases which have attempted to define "course of employment", but in this case there is no issue as he was acting on a direct instruction from a senior member of staff.

There might or might not be an insurance policy they have that will cover the liability but the liability still exists even if they don't have insurance

Google "Vicarious liability" IYCBA

If that's the case why do we have the business use classification on car insurance? If that principle of law is applicable then surely we're all being ripped of by our insurance companies as it is our employer's responsibility to cover any damage caused when driving for business purposes.

I've been working in professional services firms for 15 years, from global corporate companies to small partnerships - I've been aware of probably 40 firsthand car crashes in that period, partners crashing graduates cars, graduates crashing partners cars, solicitors crashing cars, accountants crashing cars - on each and every occasion the employee has been responsible for the damage, either by a claim on the company car insurance or their own private insurance policy, both of which have cost the employee cash.

Perhaps you could provide some real world examples of how vicarious liability can be applied to driving a privately owned car on company business.

Mark_Hewitt

Isn't the important thing here that the person concerned wasn't driving their own car on the way to / from work etc, but was acting on the explicit instructions of his employer, hence despite being out of the office was still "at work" at the time.

During the course of my work I've had cause to drive a van full of servers from one place to another, if I'd then crashed it into another car I wouldn't expect to pay for the damage out of my own pocket!

JQ.

Mark_Hewitt wrote: »

Isn't the important thing here that the person concerned wasn't driving their own car on the way to / from work etc, but was acting on the explicit instructions of his employer, hence despite being out of the office was still "at work" at the time.

During the course of my work I've had cause to drive a van full of servers from one place to another, if I'd then crashed it into another car I wouldn't expect to pay for the damage out of my own pocket!

If the van was a company vehicle and your company policy states you are responsible for the excess on the policy then yes you would have to pay - that is our company policy. If you're driving your own car to transport the servers, then you would be personally responsible.

I'm not talking about driving to and from work that's not company use, I'm talking about going out to sites and clients during business hours as part of the business. All the incidents I've been aware of have been during business hours when the car is being used for business purposes. The companies I've worked for have never paid for the repairs.

I instruct people every day to drive cars as part of our business - if they crash that's their responsibility. Similarly, I'm out of the office on average 3 days a week - if I crash my car I'm responsible.

Strider590

JQ. wrote: »

I instruct people every day to drive cars as part of our business - if they crash that's their responsibility. Similarly, I'm out of the office on average 3 days a week - if I crash my car I'm responsible.

If that's their job then so be it, but I strongly doubt in this case that driving clients cars without insurance cover was in the job description OR falls into the category of:

"to carry out other duties as may be reasonably expected by the the manager or members of the board of management"

I don't think that driving without appropriate insurance can be "reasonably expected"

Mark_Hewitt

Occasionally I've been asked to move servers using my own car. I've always refused as I'm not insured for business uses. I guess this may seem 'petty' to some, but the consequences if something goes wrong certainly aren't!

JQ.

Strider590 wrote: »

If that's their job then so be it, but I strongly doubt in this case that driving clients cars without insurance cover was in the job description OR falls into the category of:

"to carry out other duties as may be reasonably expected by the the manager or members of the board of management"

I don't think that driving without appropriate insurance can be "reasonably expected"

Driving is not my job nor that of anyone else in our office, but to get to other places driving is the easiest method, so forms part of our business day.

And as I said earlier in the thread, if Matt had catagorically stated that he was not insured to drive the car and didn't want to do it, but Sally insisted, then my opinion would be completely different. Again, as I said earlier if I had been asked to move a car knowing I was not insured I would have refused.

So, just to be clear, if I drive my personal car for business purposes without the appropriate insurance in place it is the responsibility of my employer to cover the costs of any accidents. Or is it my responsibility to ensure that I have appropriate insurance in place. Personally I would have had insurance to move the clients car, Matt didn't.

JQ.

Mark_Hewitt wrote: »

Occasionally I've been asked to move servers using my own car. I've always refused as I'm not insured for business uses. I guess this may seem 'petty' to some, but the consequences if something goes wrong certainly aren't!

Exactly, and had you had a crash in your own car, but not been insured because you had not paid the premium for business use, do you think your employer would have paid for the damage to your car and that of the Third Party (assuming it was your fault). Or would they say it was your responsibility to ensure your car was insured for business use?