Can anyone help - cyclist hits car - advice please

T1naB

Hi - my 10 year old son was cycling in our cul de sac and unfortunately lost balance and hit a neighbour's car. He has owned up and I have reassured the neighbour that we will get it sorted. Obviously it was entirely my son's fault, but can anyone advise me the best (proper?) way to proceed?

Should the neighbour claim on his car insurance and have them recoup it from our household, should we just see how much it is and see if we can pay (I think it will be a lot, it's a brand new Golf), or do we just inform our house insurance and they deal with it? Or is there an alternative? I want to make sure it's all done properly, but not waste money we don't have. _pale_

Thanks, your help is really appreciated.

Quentin

Firstly you shouldn't be accepting liability for this.

Leave it to the insurers to sort out. If you want, you can give your neighbour details of your household insurance (assuming it covers this sort of thing).

If it doesn't, then the moneysaving thing would be to tell the other party to deal with it through his insurer!

seafarers_wife

it was an accident, it happens. i had a child on a bike go into the side of my car whilst i was driving and the quote from the garage was nearly £300 to repair the few minor scratches and couple of dents the handle bars had put in. its not worth putting it through the insurance becuase of the increased premiums so if your neighbour really wants it doing then it might work out cheaper to pay without involving insurance companies.

i didnt ask the kid or his parents to pay and have left the dents and scratches as they are, i was just glad the kid wasnt hurt, just in case anyone thinks im heartless!

olly300

There has been discussions on this before on different parts of the forum which have got quite nasty.

You can either:
1. Get the car owner to get quotes from two different garages* and reimburse them yourselves from your own pocket.
2. Tell them to go through their car insurance and give your house insurance details if asked.

The decision of what to do depends on how well you get on with your neighbours and what you want your relationship to be afterwards.

*Expect them to demand to go to the authorised VW dealer to get it fixed when in fact they could go to any decent body shop as the dealers/insurance companies outsource the work out to other garages. (I know where a lot of the body shops are in my area for example.)

chanz4

Just because its a golf doesnt mean expensive, my mrs hurt myn and it didnt cost much to repair x2 fully dented doors inc replacing.

prowla

If you do it via an insurance company then it will cost a load more.

paddedjohn

Quentin wrote: »

Firstly you shouldn't be accepting liability for this.

Leave it to the insurers to sort out. If you want, you can give your neighbour details of your household insurance (assuming it covers this sort of thing).

If it doesn't, then the moneysaving thing would be to tell the other party to deal with it through his insurer!

whats wrong with being honest?

Quentin

paddedjohn wrote: »

whats wrong with being honest?

Nothing to do with honesty!

It's a condition of many policies (and all motor policies) that the policyholder should not admit liability in the event of an incident, but leave it to the insurers to establish liability.

ROY47

Quentin wrote: »

Nothing to do with honesty!

It's a condition of many policies (and all motor policies) that the policyholder should not admit liability in the event of an incident, but leave it to the insurers to establish liability.

and the way insurance companies take months and months to sort things out and have repairs done that end up costing £000's of pounds when it may well be able to sort the damage out at a reasonable cost without involving insurance companies

is yet another reason insurance premiums are rocketing :mad:

I personally would admit liability ,my son / daughter hits a car on a bike and we don't admit liability ?????????????

always told my kids if you've done something wrong , tell the truth because if I find out later ,you'll be in more trouble !!

now I have to tell them to lie about it ? Sorry no I won't do that

Better still get insurance for the childs bike ,seperate to household insurance

quick search brings something like this

http://www.evanscycles.com/insurance

which covers this sort od incident

here are two sides to the policy:
Bicycle insurance – this provides cover against theft, loss or accidental damage to your bike.
Liability insurance – this provides optional cover so that you are protected against third party claims should you cause injury or accident whilst using your bike.

Quentin

ROY47 wrote: »

always told my kids if you've done something wrong , tell the truth because if I find out later ,you'll be in more trouble !!

now I have to tell them to lie about it ? Sorry no I won't do that

I think you misunderstand.

Not admitting liability (as required by the conditions of an insurance policy) is not "telling you to lie"!

No insurance agreement makes you tell lies!

You should teach your children about the importance of reading everything before they sign it, and of sticking to any agreements they have accepted when entering into any contracts!

scheming_gypsy

First step: Ask your neighbour if he wants to tell his insurance as it may effect his premiums for the next 5 years, as he now lives on a street where kids damage cars with bikes - therefore he's a risk of another claim. He might be happy enough for it to be sorted out by a local bodyshop, as it's a brand new car and not an older one there's less chance of paint fading and the body shop having to match it up and therefore a faster fix.