Crashed courtesy car in the snow!

easilydistracted

Hello everyone. Someone damaged the paintwork on my car and so it was in the bodyshop being repaired. The bodyshop gave me one of their curtosy cars, it is not a credit hire agreement or anything, just insued on their own garage policy.

Unfortunately I managed to crash the car in the snow and a lot of damage was done. I was told the excess I would have was £350 on their car and have paid this, they will need to claim the rest on their insurance.

I have not had a fault accident before and am now wondering how I will need to declare this when getting insurance quotes. Obviously it is a fault accident, but not sure if it is a claim and I need to declare the full amount of damage as the amount claimed, as it wasn't claimed on my policy?

I have protected no claims (phew!) but understand this could still affect the renewal cost. Any ideas how I would record this? I have been trying to let me insurance company now for info, but they have been engaged so far.

Thanks in advance

Gloomendoom

Unfortunately, yes, you should declare it.

Your no claims bonus is not reduced unless you make a claim on the policy it relates to, protected or not. Your premium may go up when you come to renew though.

StrongWork

Will have to be declared as an 'at fault accident'. Expect your insurance premium to go up unfortunately.

arcon5

Out of curiosity... if op chose not to declare it would there be any way of insurance companies finding out since the claim will be on somebody elses police?

Gloomendoom

arcon5 wrote: »

Out of curiosity... if op chose not to declare it would there be any way of insurance companies finding out since the claim will be on somebody elses police?

Probably not.

withabix

....but when the OP then made a claim, they would check and the OP would then find his insurance was voided for providing incorrect information.

SLITHER99

When I've borrowed garage courtesy cars, I've always had to give my driving license number. So yep, I'd imagine there would be a way of finding out about an undeclared claim.

Best to just declare it and have done.

forgotmyname

Not sure how the CUE database works, But people have been caught out when they have declared it on one policy and not declared on another policy.

Is it worth the risk? You goto make a claim and they say oh you didnt declare this so we are cancelling your policy.

easilydistracted

Thanks everyone, just to be clear my query was more whether it goes down as an 'incident' no claim or an at fault claim on the generic search engine comparison sites I would be using down the line at renewal. I would be pretty stupid not declaring it as the police had to come to help and checked my details on their database plus I would spend the rest of the policy worrying and feeling guilty. I guess the best thing to do is to tell my insurance now exactly what happened and then checked over the phone when renewing.

forgotmyname

At fault claim. Figure unknown.

missile

whether it goes down as an 'incident' no claim or an at fault claim

As far as I know, it makes no difference how you declare. It still affects your future premiums.