Delay with car repair after accident

ronmiel · 1 November 2012 at 1:38PM

On the 6th September my friends car was involved in a minor accident. I was a passenger in the car along with my daughter in law. We were stationery waiting for the car in front to turn right, when we were hit from behind by an Audi who didn't see us in time. The damage was not great, the bumper, back lights would need replacing and of course anything else which may have been damaged. She drives a Honda Jazz.
My DIL had mild whiplash, so the Police and an ambulance were called. The Police said it was definitely the fault of the Audi driver and he admitted resonsibilty. My DIL suffered no lasting problems.
My friend has fully comprehensive insurance, the company was informed and they arranged for the car to be collected by a garage from 30 miles away. We live in a city and there are many local garages.
The insurance company were very good at ringing us and asking if we were OK etc, They said they would get a replacement hire car sent out to my friend, but as she prefers an automatic there could be a delay of about a day, She informed them she was going on holiday from the 8th to the 16th September, so wouldn't need one until we returned, if her car wasn't ready by then.
We returned from holiday and her car was not ready. Another friend had a similar car which he was not able to drive for two or three weeks while his license was being renewed, so he offered to lend her his car. My friend informed the insurance company she wouldn't need a hire car for the forseeable future.
Since her return she has been in touch with the insurance company, direct and through the insurance agent, regularly, but her car is still not ready. She has had to let her friend have his car back and she has now had a hire car for the last two weeks.
It is now 8 weeks since the incident and she still hasn't got her car back. If it were in a local garage it would be easier to keep a check on things, but they say they have now started to repair it.
Is there anything she can do to hurry things on?

InsideInsurance · 1 November 2012 at 1:53PM

Not really though evidently it depends on the cause of the delay.

Unless she intends to go to the garage in person every couple of days then it doesnt make much difference if she's phoning a company on the other side of town or 30 miles away.

She has done a good job in mitigating her costs by not taking the car when it wasnt needed and just needs to keep on top of them. Whilst you may get a quicker answer from the garage the insurers have a liability for having instructed her to use them so its always good to keep hassling them too as there are more routes for complaints with them as a regulated industry and as they are the company she has a contract with.

ronmiel · 9 November 2012 at 4:27PM

Just an update on the situation. My friend still has not got her car back, she contacted the insurance company again today and they have said she should have it back next Wednesday. We will see, that will be 10 weeks. As she was told over two weeks ago that they were working on the car, it seems to be taking a long time to repair!!
In the meantime her loan car, a Citroen C3 with just over 5000 miles on the clock, blew it's heater matrix the other day and has had to be replaced. She now has another Citroen C3. It would have been so much easier to finish repairing her own car.

chanz4 · 9 November 2012 at 4:35PM

are they awaiting parts?

ronmiel · 9 November 2012 at 7:02PM

I would have thought that any parts needed to repair minor damage to a fairly new Honda Jazz would not take ten weeks to find. I appreciate we don't know the total damage done besides the bumper and back light cluster, but even so, it seems a very long time,