advise please

Lynn110

In feb mydaughter having just past her test had a accident involving 3 parked cars. This has been treated as 3 separate claims as she hit one then drove into another then finally reversing into the third. Two cars had very little damage. The other car had more. Her own car came of worse. In order to keep cost down we were advised to consider fixing hers ourself therefore we would not to have 3 lots of excess applied.
I have since found out that one of the cars that minimal damage has had 1500 paid on it £330 repairs and £1200 for a hired car!!! As the cost of repair was only £330 it could not have been off the road for long even if it was a week how can £1200 in car hire be justified, I have spent more than an hour talking to my insurance company today to be told i have to accept this. Is there anything I can do as u can imagine how much her insurance will be having just past her test. i must also add it appeared to have been just light had been broken which owner had fixed by mid morning the next day,. The 2nd car has never been fixed although paid £550 and the 3rd which had the most out of the 3 £700 and was off road for 8 days.
Any advise appreciated.

ACG

If your insurance company are saying it has to be paid, then they have to pay it. Its probably because its cheaper for them to pay rather than fight it.

You dont pay it, you just pay your excess and higher premiums going forward. It might seem wrong but for them to go through the legalities your talking hundreds just in letters etc.

Out of curiosity, how can you hit 3 parked cars in one go?! If i did this, id have my family taking the mickey out of me for the rest of my life.

Lynn110

Thank you for your advise.
She had only past her test 2 weeks before. 17 years old way too young, After hitting the first car she panicked and lost it basically. She was in such a state there was no way i could have laughed at her.

ACG

My family arnt as understanding, give it a couple of days and the whole family would know.

I woke up thinking about this one, to put it into another context....

If you were told to pay £2700 (minus any excess from your customer) or you could go to court and potentially pay £1000 in your legal costs, £1000 in their legal costs plus the £2700 what would you do?

Id be inclined to cut my losses and just pay the £2700 and i imagine thats how your insurers are looking at it.

I dont deal in car insurance so i could be totally wrong but thats just my opinion.

mikey72

This should be treated as one incident. Not so much for the excess, but otherwise she will have to declare three claims in her first year of motoring, which will render her uninsurable. The costs of the claim don't really matter, so you should let the insurers decide on that, it's the number here. She needs to send a written complaint to her insurer, stating it was one accident, not three, and she hit all the cars in the same accident. She may as well claim for her car, and pay one excess, (not three), and get it repaired. If the insurer insist on treating it as three incidents, refer it to the FOS, and ask them to decide. Don't let it go without a fight though, it will be important in the future.

Lynn110

Mikey 72
Thank you very much for your advise. I have questioned the fact its being treated as 3 claims on more than one occasion but they won't budge. They say it has to go down as 3 because she hit the first car drove hit the 2nd and reversed hitting the 3rd. The reason why she drove after hitting the first one was because she wanted to park to look at the damage and because she got her self into a state due to hitting a car panicked hense the other two hits. As u can imagine she will not be able to afford to insure the car when its due.

dacouch

mikey72 wrote: »

This should be treated as one incident. Not so much for the excess, but otherwise she will have to declare three claims in her first year of motoring, which will render her uninsurable. The costs of the claim don't really matter, so you should let the insurers decide on that, it's the number here. She needs to send a written complaint to her insurer, stating it was one accident, not three, and she hit all the cars in the same accident. She may as well claim for her car, and pay one excess, (not three), and get it repaired. If the insurer insist on treating it as three incidents, refer it to the FOS, and ask them to decide. Don't let it go without a fight though, it will be important in the future.

The reversing into the third car is definately a separate accident / incident

TSx

I'd say they're (unfortunately) all seperate claims - there is an intervening cause in between each incident - the damage to the second car was not a direct result of her hitting the first car, and so on.

thegirlintheattic

I wouldn't worry about it tbh, she will unlikely not be able to afford insurance for the next few years anyway, so by the time she gets back on the road the claims may have expired.

Prehaps would be safer as well.

Sgt_Pepper_2

ACG wrote: »

If your insurance company are saying it has to be paid, then they have to pay it. Its probably because its cheaper for them to pay rather than fight it.

You dont pay it, you just pay your excess and higher premiums going forward. It might seem wrong but for them to go through the legalities your talking hundreds just in letters etc.

Out of curiosity, how can you hit 3 parked cars in one go?! If i did this, id have my family taking the mickey out of me for the rest of my life.

What excess?

They paid for their own repair.

Lynn110

Thank you all. There are differences of opinions but as my insurance company state 3 separate accidents then will have to accept that. I was just a bit frustrated that one was £530 and it has been rubbed out by owner and the other £1500 (£300 to replace a £6 part) the rest for hire car charges when a BMW for 5 days is under £500 to hire. But as i have been told its not so much the amount of claims its the amount of claims made.
Is she uninsurable as I'm being told?