Missing thread

mikey72

It's gone, just when it was becoming an interesting discussion.

dacouch wrote: »

As I said the ABI rates were basically a way of placing control over the CH rates which were becoming ridiculous. You could find a CH company charging £300 a day for a Corsa prior to the ABI rates being introduced.

The approved contractor is an interesting one, the prices are often considerably more than the cheapest price.

The theory is that the Insurer benefits from a longer credit period, less administration as they receive one bill from a supplier for a certain trade eg windscreens so they have less staff costs etc.

The approved contractors also tend to reduce fraudulent claims as they are supposed to weed out dodgy claims or work that does not need doing.

If you look at a bill from Autoglass for replacing glass, it will look very expensive and is generally much more than the cheapest local supplier. However the Insurers do not pay that amount they tend to receive a massive reduction or the entire months invoices are averaged down and the Insurer pays the average.

With windscreens the Insurers makes savings as they do not need to employ staff to handle the windscreen claims as the telephone number for a windscreen claim goes straight through to a call centre run by the windscreen supplier.

It also stops a lot of fraudulent claims as prior to the introduction of using companies such as Autoglass it was very common for someone to go into a tyre company or sun roof company. They company would then suggest to the customer that they put the bill through as a windscreen so the customer would get the tyres or windscreen fitted for free (There was often no windscreen excess then)

As with any very large company or government, the supply chains often end up paying over the odds compared to an SME who tend to have better control over their purchase costs

You could find them charging £300 a day, but why was it paid?
It's not an open cheque book.

As to the peculiarity of not charging the invoice price, that would be an interesting accounting exercise for both parties. Probably similar to paying a commission to the insurer for receiving the contract.
I can't complain about pricing though, every contractor I know has two pricing scales, one for insurance work, and one for not. It can be up to a factor of ten difference.

Snappypirate

I think the main problem is insurers paying out on the thousands of fraudulent claims.... They're the real crooks

newbie007_2

Interesting to read and learn from the posts in that thread. I think I smell a rat with a newbie signing up and promoting these rip off middleman company, probably got deleted because its spam.

Snappypirate

Staged accidents, people with phony whiplash... That's what insurers get annoyed about and have every right.... But they simply don't have the manpower to defend ever claim fiercely, it's cheaper to payout

Snappypirate

Lol your a suspicious bunch! Well talk no more about brand names!

dacouch

mikey72 wrote: »

I can't complain about pricing though, every contractor I know has two pricing scales, one for insurance work, and one for not. It can be up to a factor of ten difference.

It's partly because of the cash price and the insurance price contractors charge that Insurers use their own contractors to try and minimise the difference.

The approved contractors is relatively new in Insurance so is still developing. As with a lot of things big Insurers do they tend to make mistakes when they introduce them eg Aviva with Asprea. Obviously they need work to make them properly workable.

Another of the reasons they do it as it tends to be quicker for the customer, before the approved suppliers and contractors. A customer would typically have to send in a couple of quotes and the Insurer would then send out a loss adjuster to validate the claim and check the quotes were correct. With approved suppliers etc they just pass the claim onto them and they validate the claim, work out a quote and then in effect get on with the work (In theory). It also saves the Insurer the cost of a loss adjuster who are not cheap.

As I said before it's still has a lot of development to go, personally I generally get my customers to get quotes from a trusted local contractor and take the claim from there. As I know the claims processes inside out it's generally quicker as I can fax/email the quotes off and then ring the same day to get authorisation (Assuming it does not need a loss adjuster). They then benefit from a proper tradesmen and if there is a problem the tradesmen will come back and fix it without delay.

adamc260

Sounds true though what newbie is saying

MrRedundant

http://apps.abi.org.uk/tphire/SupportingDocuments/Car%20rates%20wef%201.%207.%2010.doc

The above is a link to the current approved rates.

These where brought in to regulate the rates as some companies where charging £00's per day for a Corsa.

These are maximum rates and are by no way the market rate for a hire car.

Credithire companies make their money by getting people into the biggest car they can for as long as they can.

Insurers have to settle as claimants are entitled to a car whilst they are outwith one. They are fighting back now though on the claims where people trade up or extend the hire basis.

I suspect it will be an area in the next few years that will be cut back on as it is completely destroying the insurance market as claim costs are simply massive at the moment.

A lot of insurers are now being more proactive in clear fault claims to avoid credithire companies becoming involved; for example in the OP's case they may have called immediately; taken the car; fixed it and given a courtesy car on their rates.

MrRedundant

Snappypirate wrote: »

Lol your a suspicious bunch! Well talk no more about brand names!

Out of interest why in "your case" did you simply not recover your excess from the insurer without all the hassle of TP companies eh?:money:

Snappypirate

Interesting though the company I work for has about 200 employees and last year one of them cut his wrist quite badly with a stanley knife cutting something.. He was off about 6 weeks on full pay and as normal is was reported to health and safety executive and insurers.

The insurers actually wanted us to ask the employee to claim as they said it was cheaper than him suing us, i said but he doesn't want to sue us... They weren't happy as they said it meant they had to keep their file open!

Bizarre!

Snappypirate

Mr redundant - cash flow! I didn't have to pay it in the first place and wait months to get back... But let's drop the subject seeing as it got it deleted!