Increased excess for not using 'approved garage'

Zingy

Bit of a complicated one here so please bear with me.

Crashed my car a few weeks ago, my own fault and no one else was involved/no damage apart from to my car and just had it repaired.

I've got a mazda and they offer a service where if you're in an accident you ring them up and they deal with everything, they contact the insurance company for you.
But, my insurance company are now trying to say that I didn't use an approved repairer and therefore my excess is increased by £200. This is in my policy.

Here comes the more complicated part. Before agreeing to mazda dealing with everything I phoned my insurance company myself to check what garage they wanted to use to find out whether I would have to pay the extra £200. It was the same garage so I let mazda deal with everything as they give me a courtesy car.

While my car was in the garage I phoned my insurance company to check how much it would be, they assured me I wouldn't be paying the extra excess. When it came to paying I was charged the extra.

Any suggestions as to where I should go from here?
The way I see it is I've used an approved repairer I have just gone through mazda rather than the insurance company direct.
Thanks

Trebor16

I would contact the insurance company and ask them if your conversations were recorded. If they were then ask them to review the conversations you had to see if it backs your version of events.

property.advert

I've seen this in the last couple of years, usually at around £200.

If I pranged my own car and wanted to use a non approved insurer, I guess my chosen repairer would have to swallow the extra excess somehow.