Our slates damaged next door's car.....

mattymoo

Just be careful that it stops at the excess.
He may decide he wants to claim for other uninsured losses such as hire car costs when his car goes in for repair. Hire car is typically £150-200 per week.

If you pay the excess you are in effect admitting legal liability and if he was to push for the hire car costs etc, he would succeed against you. Your insurers would probably tell you to get lost since you made the payment off your own bat when you were not liable.

If you want to cover yourself, make the payment of the excess "without prejudice" and without admission of liability. Put that in writing and make your neighbour sign.

Without prejudice simply means the payment does not prejudice any future claim. The legal merit of the phrase has been questioned and since I left claims in 1994, I could do with Astoroth or someone to confirm the phrase is still in use.

Astaroth

It was certainly still used 3 years ago

lisyloo

Just as an aside there was talk around 20 years ago about introducing 'No Fault' insurance. That is where it was not necessary to prove negligence.
Anyone know what was the outcome of the discussions..........???
Sorry we know what the outcome was but does anyone know why were the proposals not adopted...........??

Can you clarify what you are referring to?
Are you talking about medical claims? or something else?

If you want insurance (against damage to your car, house or against loosing income when sick etc.) then you are currently free to purchase them.

Dumyat

shockingmoment wrote:

Two adjacent semi's - cars parkd between the semi's. this bit is really not in dispute - the evidence is very very clear!

I'm going to pay his insurance excess as I do feel somewhat responsible - he'd do the same if it was the orther way round. He's going to lose some NCB afterall.

It does seem unfair though.

Thanks everyone for your comments - I do appreciate them.

I think you have probably chosen the same option I would have. if it was a stranger it would be easy to stick to the letter of the insurance policy. but you are going to have to live next to these people. bad relations with a neighbour is not good.

lisyloo

Again. How do they/you know it was one of your tiles that caused the damage?

For every smashed tile on the floor/damaged car there should be a roof with the same colour missing tiles so it should be pretty obvious.
We had some come off at my office and I can assure you that they fall pretty much vertically even in strong winds so they are very unlikely to travel very fall.
It should be blindingly obviously which roof it came off.

Ah -so flying roof tiles are like cats - they can do what they like on other people's property and the owner isn't responsible!!!

Owners are not responsible for the actions of gales, hurricanes, floods etc.
There isn't always someone to blame.

Seriously though, I always thought that this sort of thing was covered by the public liability part of your insurance

The 3rd party liability section covers things you are LIABLE for.
Individuals are not liable for the weather.
Individuals are only liable if they have been negligent or done something deliberately.
If something happens (even as a result of their actions) but they weren't negligent then they aren't liable.
So if I open my window and the music startles a child or a horse and causes injury then I am not liable because there is nothing negligent about opening a window.

I think people need to get away from the BLAME culture we live in where someone is always to blame.
Sometimes things happen where no-one is to blame.
For this you need to get YOUR OWN insurance or pay out of your own pocket.

Sorry to rant on but the blame culture gets up my nose a bit.

Sponge

A couple of years ago, a tile from my neighbour's roof landed on my car and caused a nasty scratch on the off-side front wing. I decided it wasn't worth claiming for, so got a quote from a local bodyshop. It could have been a lot worse and he could make it as good as new for £170. So I got the work done myself.

A week or so later I bumped into my neighbours (they'd only moved in a month or so previous) and we go chatting about the previous storms and he said how lucky it was nothing got damaged. I then mentioned my car and he was shocked. He immediately wrote me a cheque for the full amount!

I was worried about causing bad relations with such a new neighbour, but it's been fine ever since.

agal

I would imagine your neighbour was also shocked that he didn't realise he had a tile missing!

shockingmoment

We've had 'the chat' with our neighbours and shared the sad tidings.

They were as surprised as us at the insurers comments. They haven't hired a car etc as suggested might happen. Any payment we make will be cash, no receipts etc and will be offered as a gesture of good will.

They are very friendly neighbours, (we both hold spare keys, empty mail boxes on hols etc etc) and I'm sure that trying to exploit the situation would be furthest from their minds.

Again - thanks everyone for your comments.

justwannabeloved

Hi

I work in an insurance claims department handling claims over the phone.

The information you were told by your insurance company is correct. If your tiles fall and hit the neighbours car you can only claim for the damage of your roof, you cannot claim for the car damage as they car is question does not belong to you .

You can only ever claim for your building or contents, not for others.

Your neighbours car insurance would then claim back off of your building insurance to cover their lost.

We are hearing this alot at the moment with all the storms/ bad weather the uk has being having.

regard
justwannabeloved

Astaroth

You can certainly claim for other peoples property but only that which you are legally liable for - as already explained (and as the OP understands) in this case they would not be liable for the damage caused