Car Insurance incident

matthew10683

I have had car insurance with Bell Direct for the past year. Back in January my car was hit by a gate belonging to a company I visit as part of my job after it blew in the wind. I contacted my insurance company for advice, I specifically said that I was not reporting the accident and didn't want to go ahead with any claim or any repairs I wanted to know where I stood. In the next few days I received letters from the company about reporting the incident to claim and phone calls from repairers saying they would arrange for my car to be fixed. I rang the insurance company again who said that they had started the claim and I had lost my 5 years no claims bonus. After explaining to them again that I had specifically said not to proceed with a claim and I was just ringing for advice and not to report an incident they said they would sort it out and get back to me. They didn't and I had to ring again when they told me it had been taken off and my no claims bonus restored. I asked for a letter as proof of this which I received. Since then the company I was visiting had agreed to pay for damages to my car as obviously it wasn't my fault and they hadn't repaired their gates properly after they had been damaged previously. I now have to renew my car insurance and whenI tried to do this I had a quote which the new insurance company started to process. As I was about to pay they said that an incident had come up which would affect my premium and put it up by about £170. They said that although my no claims hadn't been affected there was an incident against my name which affects my premium. I explained what had happened and they contacted my insurer. My insurer (Bell direct) told them that I had reported an incident and started a claim which they said I had later dropped, when infact I had to ring them to stop the claim which I had told them not to proceed with at the first phone call. The new insurance company I was trying to buy insurance from said that Bell wouldn't delete the incident and there was nothing they could do. Bell Direct were a problem from the first phone call and went expressly against my wishes in proceeding with a claim which now comes up against my name when I try to insure my car. Does anyone know where I stand and if they can do this?

Biffa

Just to say, I'm in the same boat with this. I've just spoken to my insurance company to decline their renewal of £760! They say I've had two claims, when I've only had one.

Apparently, when I rang them for advise last year after someone hit me (thier fault, not mine), they've classed it as a claim, even though I didn't claim because the bloke paid for the damage to be reapired. Apparently, because there was damage to my car it's classed as a claim.

So, using their theory that it was a fault loss because my car suffered damage, do I need to ring them every week after going to Sainsbo's and nudging the post at the end of the parking space?????

Can someone come on and explain to me when a claim isn't a claim?? Surely, a claim would be when the insurance company gets involved and pays out against the policy?? Or have I missed something????

impy78

What will have happened is that the incident will have been recorded as a loss as opposed to a claim, which, rather unfairly, will still affect your future insurance.

What you need to do is to contact Bell, make sure that they have recorded this as a NON FAULT LOSS, as the company have reimbursed you for the damage to your car.

Knowing how insurance companies work, I would advise never to report any incident that you are not intending to claim for that doesn't invlove a third party, as the insurance companies will charge you more without actually having done anything.

Astaroth

Subject to the wording of the questions you have to tell your insurers about all incidents such as the two above. As impy says however, in both cases they should be recorded as non-fault/ not claimed for incidents and as such have next to no affect on your premiums and certainly not affect your NCD (if someone has a lot of non-fault accidents then it may start affecting premiums).

You need to get them to confirm that the NCD has not been affected and how they are recording the incident (ie fault/ nonfault, claim/ not claimed) and if you do not agree with their decision, escalate the complaint as per their proceedures which should be in the policybook and if still not happy with their final response go to the FOS. Remember that in the meantime you will have to be up front about the stituation with your current insurers as saying what you believe should be the truth rather than what you previous insurers have recorded would be fraud.

Fedorov

Hi all, (first post and trying to keep short!)

I'm so annoyed and desperate for some advice as my car insurance renewal is due 23 Feb 2007 and I've just discovered tonight that my existing insurer (Admiral) has screwed me over big time....

To cut a long story short around 20 Dec 2006 just as I was walking out the house towards my car, 2 cars from both directions slid on the ice and somehow missed my car - or so I thought. I checked what I could as I walked around the rear of it and drove to work.
Once I got to work I noticed a tiny slither of paint missing on my rear offside bumper. This car that I saw stop "close" to mine must have literally touched my bumper upon stopping. I heard nothing and the driver I believe innocently didn't know she'd touched my bumper and hence proceeded to drive off unaware of this tiny damage.

I called Admiral for advice as I wasn't sure what to do when I had no details of the other party involved etc... I explained I didn't wish to make a claim or anything yet as I was going to visit my Honda dealership (it's a new Civic) to let them look at it first.
This damage was so small that the dealership kindly offered to touch it up while it was in for some "new car" warranty work that was needed anyway.

That was the last of it, or so I thought!!!

My insurance renewal comes through last week for 382.00 pounds!!! So I do the usual trick of going to their website, pretending to be a NEW customer and get quoted 272.00???!!!
I call them up tonight to ask why they are charging me over 100 pounds more for being a loyal customer only to be told that this online quote I've just done I did NOT specify that I had any previous accidents/claims in the last 3 years!!!

I never dreamt that my simple enquiry on the morning of this event would lead to them basically black-marking me as having an "incident" on their system!!!!!!!!!!

What is worse is that I then tried Elephant.co.uk who I knew from earlier in the week were my best alternative quote, I filled it all out, got quoted 252.00 which was great, I didn't specify that I'd had any previous accidents/claims/convictions etc... I call them up with the reference number and I'm all ready to give this guy my creditcard number after checking all my details when all of a sudden he tells me that it's been flagged up from some "central system" about an incident back in December 2006 which I failed to mention...

This then puts the premium up even more as I'm considered to have not disclosed vital information, but I honestly never thought that going to another insurer I would need to mention such a silly little incident just because I called by current insurer to enquire prior to the garage just doing a warranty repair for me.

So now I'm faced with revisiting all these websites and having to specify that I've had a "previous accident/claim" and the majority of these companies think I'm some sort of criminal and whack the prices right up!!!

I find this absolutely disgraceful, that I almost have some sort of criminal record against my name for any quotes I now apply for... something that was not my fault, I never made or intended to make a claim I purely called them the day of the incident for some advice yet I am now getting screwed for something somebody else did to my car, and even they don't know they damaged it

All helpful advice gratefully received please!!!

Thanks

Fedorov.

Edit: having read the postings above I am calling Admiral first thing in the morning to see what they are classing this "incident" as.

matthew10683

Thanks for your help. Just wondering if they would have any proof that this actually happened because I didn't fill out the forms they sent me and only asked for advice on the telephone. If I said that I was asking for advice on behalf of a friend and this incident didn't actually happen to me surely they wouldn't be able to prove it did, would they?

Fedorov

Thanks all, I've written a letter and am sending it to the Chief Executive of Admiral Insurance by special delivery tomorrow, I've noted on the top of the letter that I have sent copies to BBC Watchdog, FSA, and Insurance Ombudsman. See what happens...

brazilianwax

Fedorov wrote:

Hi all, (first post and trying to keep short!)


What is worse is that I then tried Elephant.co.uk who I knew from earlier in the week were my best alternative quote, I filled it all out, got quoted 252.00 which was great, I didn't specify that I'd had any previous accidents/claims/convictions etc... I call them up with the reference number and I'm all ready to give this guy my creditcard number after checking all my details when all of a sudden he tells me that it's been flagged up from some "central system" about an incident back in December 2006 which I failed to mention...

This then puts the premium up even more as I'm considered to have not disclosed vital information, but I honestly never thought that going to another insurer I would need to mention such a silly little incident just because I called by current insurer to enquire prior to the garage just doing a warranty repair for me.

So now I'm faced with revisiting all these websites and having to specify that I've had a "previous accident/claim" and the majority of these companies think I'm some sort of criminal and whack the prices right up!!!

I find this absolutely disgraceful, that I almost have some sort of criminal record against my name for any quotes I now apply for... something that was not my fault, I never made or intended to make a claim I purely called them the day of the incident for some advice yet I am now getting screwed for something somebody else did to my car, and even they don't know they damaged it

All helpful advice gratefully received please!!!

Admiral and Elephant are owned by the same company (and use the same computer system). Diamond and Bell Direct are also theirs. That's how they knew. :rolleyes:

Fedorov

RESULT!!! Just had a phone call at 5.45pm from Lindsey at Admiral (Complaints Manager I believe), it was referred to the underwriters where the central database holds this record of my "incident" and they have reviewed on an individual basis and deemed it such a small incident that they will be removing it from the database in the next 7-10 days.

She is also going to refund 77 pounds back as they are going to match the £272.20 internet price I originally found

I've kindly requested that she can confirm everything in writing with me and was also given her direct phone number should I need it.

Think I'll be sending a "thank you" letter to them next....

Fedorov.