Roni Hand Car Wash - Gave my car away

pimento

What did you say the name of this place was? Roni Hand Car Wash?

Just asking.

You'd think they would be insured for something like this happening.

ShaneUK

I personally feel that Roni Hand Car Wash should be paying for EVERYTHING, even if you are insured under your house and/or car insurance. It is there fault, they need to rectify it.

Whist you are attempting to claim back all other costs, including excesses, in the long run you will still be out of pocket for their fault. Once you claim - insurance premiums increase.

Just thinking - you said you had recently bought the car - did the previous owner have a son, and could he have perhaps "collected" it??

As others have said - solicitor and perhaps local paper. If you can not afford a solicitor initially, do you have a paid for bank account, as sometimes you can get free legal advise through this. Or do either your home insurance or car insurance offer a legal advise service?

The best of luck in resolving this - and keep us all posted!

MrRedundant

Why would anyone pay a deposit on a new car? Your insurer should pay out the car's market value. A reclaim of the excess at most seems agreeable. Likewise does your insurer not provide a hire car?

I can see why you are annoyed but certain aspects of your claim seem exaggerated.
Why did the house keys etc need changed? Did you really leave all these in the car or with the valet. Silly.

pulliptears

MrRedundant wrote: »

Why would anyone pay a deposit on a new car? Your insurer should pay out the car's market value. A reclaim of the excess at most seems agreeable. Likewise does your insurer not provide a hire car?

I can see why you are annoyed but certain aspects of your claim seem exaggerated.
Why did the house keys etc need changed? Did you really leave all these in the car or with the valet. Silly.

He's handed over a bunch of keys, amongst which are his house keys. As there may be paperwork in the car relating to his address it's common sense to change the locks.

As for it being 'silly' to hand those over, hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it and alas most of us aren't perfect.

benhogan_2

i got the car on finance so the insurance company gave me a valuation for the car based on market rate - they then paid the finance leaving some money which was then used to pay for the rest on the insurance policy.

I might be the only person in the world then who keeps his car keys and house keys together ...? However I was not 100% sure that the car no details of my home address and wanted to be safe and get the locks changed.

I now need to find the same car for around the same price (which I cant at the moment) and take out new finance and put a new deposit down.

My insurance policy did not cover me for a hire car so I have had to get this out of my own pocket :-(

Thank you for your reply and truly wish I was some of this was "exaggerated"

I am now going to have to see if I can find some website dev work outside my 9-5 job to get a deposit together.

Thanks all,

glider3560

Other thing is to keep pestering the police. They may find the car and culprit if they try hard enough.

Katie-Kat-Kins

Talk to your car insurance company, they should be seeking to recover their outlay from the car wash company anyway and they should be able to include your uninsured losses with that claim.

Do not try to do this yourself if you have legal cover you most likely pay £20 a year for legal cover so make use of it. Tell your insurers that you want to use your legal cover to recover your losses.

If you don't have legal cover it is likely that you will be able to get help from a no win no fee solicitor anyway as this is a pretty straight forward issue.

And you are entitled to claim all losses that reasonably flow from the negligence of the car wash company so that would include your policy excess, your insurers outlay (so your no claims isn't affected), the cost of changing the locks, the cost of a hire car or alternative transport, the value of any items in the car etc.

Don't believe the barrack room lawyers on here who all have 20:20 hindsight, get some QUALIFIED legal advice!

blue_monkey_2

Wow, I have never even given this happening a 2nd thought. I give my entire bunch of keys over at Asda too as I keep them all together. I won't be anymore, but as they say, hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it. Have you been paid out OP? What money do you have outstanding, you can go to small claims for this money if under 5k. No solicitor needed, it costs £30 to file the claim. It is going to be obvious ot the judge the company was at fault.

Katie-Kat-Kins

blue_monkey wrote: »

Wow, I have never even given this happening a 2nd thought. I give my entire bunch of keys over at Asda too as I keep them all together. I won't be anymore, but as they say, hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it. Have you been paid out OP? What money do you have outstanding, you can go to small claims for this money if under 5k. No solicitor needed, it costs £30 to file the claim. It is going to be obvious ot the judge the company was at fault.

Why would you go through the small claims court and do all the work yourself if you could have proper legal representation without having to pay anymore money?????

It isn't moneysaving to do it yourself for free if you have already paid for an insurance policy that will do the work for you. It also probably isn't going to get you the best return if you do it yourself rather than engaging a professional.

Besides once the insurers outlay and all uninsured losses are included I'm sure it will exceed £5k.

pulliptears

blue_monkey wrote: »

Wow, I have never even given this happening a 2nd thought. I give my entire bunch of keys over at Asda too as I keep them all together. I won't be anymore, but as they say, hindsight is a wonderful thing isn't it. Have you been paid out OP? What money do you have outstanding, you can go to small claims for this money if under 5k. No solicitor needed, it costs £30 to file the claim. It is going to be obvious ot the judge the company was at fault.

I don't send my little scrappage scheme survivor in to be valeted etc, however, I do keep my house keys and my Mums house keys on the same ring. It never really crossed my mind either until this thread.

One good thing to come out of this thread, though no consolation to Ben, is that a lot of us will think twice about using these valets and if we do, give them only the car key.