Car Insurance - Does size of claim against me effect renewal cost?

DurhamWolf

Hello

I wonder if you could help me with a quick question.

I understand that following an accident which was my fault that my renewal premium will rise. However will this rise be linked to the size of the payout to the claimant against me. ie. is my renewal cost likely to be more if the claimant has received £5000 rather than £500?

I appreciate it may not be as simple as that but a general rule of thumb would be interesting to know. I feel my insurance company have paid out far too much for a claim - infact I believe the claimant has fraudulently claimed much of this - and would like to know if this directly effects me before I put together a formal complaint.

Thanks in advance.

lisyloo

On the basis that comparison sites ask for the cost of the claim then I would yes it may affect your quotes.

Why don't you do some virtual quotes on comparison sites and see?
Put in the claim at what you think it should be and then what was actually claimed and see the difference.
(use false phone number and email)

oscarward

How would you know how much the other parties claim was? Unless the OP insurers told him he would have no way of knowing.

adamc260

It does have an impact on it yes but I don't know by how much. Obviously if an insurer paid out say £10,000 instead of £100 then new insurers will deem it as more of a risk.

Quote

oscarward wrote: »

How would you know how much the other parties claim was? Unless the OP insurers told him he would have no way of knowing.

^^ good point.

It's unlikely that the amount of a claim will have that much if any impact on your insurance premium. Having said that it's like asking if the value of the vehicle, or a speeding offence, or annual mileage, or adding a driver, will affect the premium. Only four things can happen following the disclosure of a material fact. Price goes up, price stays the same, price goes down, or no price is available. And whilst there might be a general theme among insurers, all insurers may react differently to a claim.

None of this is, of course, much use to you. I wouldn't waste any time or effort on a complaint, formal or otherwise.

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adamc260 wrote: »

It does have an impact on it yes but I don't know by how much. Obviously if an insurer paid out say £10,000 instead of £100 then new insurers will deem it as more of a risk.

Cobblers .

darich

adamc260 wrote: »

Obviously if an insurer paid out say £10,000 instead of £100 then new insurers will deem it as more of a risk.

So which is the higher risk.....the careful driver who was unfortunate enough to scrape a bentley and ferrari as he manouevred into a parking space and caused £1000's of damage......or the boy racer who writes off his £300 banger driving like a fool??

FlameCloud

darich wrote: »

So which is the higher risk.....the careful driver who was unfortunate enough to scrape a bentley and ferrari as he manouevred into a parking space and caused £1000's of damage......or the boy racer who writes off his £300 banger driving like a fool??

You havent taken into account what he might hit or injure on the way. Material damage costs pale into insignificance the majority of the time compared with liability for injury.

dacouch

FlameCloud wrote: »

You havent taken into account what he might hit or injure on the way. Material damage costs pale into insignificance the majority of the time compared with liability for injury.

Or the credit hire costs, one of my clients had his Ferrari written off by a garage and the credit hire cost of a Ferrari was £750 a day. They declined to offer it as the garage's insurance excluded credit hire payments so it would have meant taking the garage to court and recovering hire car costs from the garage's own finances

DurhamWolf

oscarward wrote: »

How would you know how much the other parties claim was? Unless the OP insurers told him he would have no way of knowing.

My insurance company have told me what they've paid out and what for.

rev_henry

dacouch wrote: »

Or the credit hire costs, one of my clients had his Ferrari written off by a garage and the credit hire cost of a Ferrari was £750 a day. They declined to offer it as the garage's insurance excluded credit hire payments so it would have meant taking the garage to court and recovering hire car costs from the garage's own finances

That's the kinda thing we use as examples of what can happen but never actually do! :eek:

OP if you think there's something dodgy going on then consider contacting these people:
http://www.insurancefraudbureau.org/

I think the trouble is, a lot of the time, the insurers know fraud is going on but it would cost more to investigate than to just pay out.