Help - Insurance claim rejected and whiplash

InsideInsurance

edsredshed wrote: »

I spoke to someone at work who said that I could also think about taking (or threatening to) the Insurer to the Financial Ombudsmen as they may not have made it clear that driving to see patients was included (or not) in my insurance. They siad that going down this route costs the Insurance company money and they may just decide to settle my claim rather than go down this route?

How is a £450 fee going to make them take on a ~£5,000 cost?

Who did you buy from? Assuming you bought it from a direct insurer or from one of the major brokers then it was a non-advised sale. You say what you want and they price it for you. They cannot legally challenge what you want, just tell you the facts and you make the decision.

edsredshed

Thanks all, your advice and this discussion is very helpful.

It would be useful to get your thoughts on next steps. Would you advise signing the form alowing them to act on my behalf.

Could someone also explain what an "Unsatisfied Judgement" is - see below.

Thanks


"Should youwish to accept our offer you must give your consent by signing the attachedform and returning it to us at your earliest convenience.You will note, the form authorises us to act on your behalf and contains anundertaking by you to reimburse any payments (other than the costs incurred inconnection with your defence) that we may be required to make. This means thatany payments we make to the third party and/or their solicitors in settlingthis claim, you are agreeing to reimburse us.


Should you decide not to complete and return the forms then we will takeno part in this claim until an Unsatisfied Judgement is obtained against you.At this stage we should point out, that if this happens, there would have beenno active intervention to minimise the amount of the loss the third party hassustained and that therefore the amount awarded in the Unsatisfied Judgementcould be higher than normal. Once an unsatisfied is paid by us under the termsof the Road Traffic Act 1988 and agreement between the Motor Insurers Bureau,we will be entitled to seek full recovery of any money paid from you

ontrack

I guess what this means is you either sign away any rights and trust the insurance company not to settle at a level which will bankrupt you or
you don't sign, the case comes to court the court the insurance company settles what they have to under the road traffic legislation and then comes after you for the money they paid out.
I seem to remember some posts about this and there being a bit of flexibility in the level of settlement dependant on your circumstances

either way you are at the mercy of the courts/ insurance company
I don't know if you have any legal insurance maybe this would cover it??
If I was in this position I would be looking at legal advice, (again you may be covered for this in your household insurance) Before I signed away my rights.

londonTiger

blatently putting it on. tiny bump that doesn't even cause damage on bumper ends up causing whiplash!

Complete BS but it's difficult to disprove.

spacey2012

You obviously ran in to the back of someone who has been hit before and is fed up of been out of pocket.
A whiplash claim tends to put them back somewhere near level without all the hassle of uninsured loss claims in the county court.

fivetide

spacey2012 wrote: »

You obviously ran in to the back of someone who has been hit before and is fed up of been out of pocket.
A whiplash claim tends to put them back somewhere near level without all the hassle of uninsured loss claims in the county court.

Either that or they have:

a. been called by an ambulance chasing lot
b. had the details punted on to an ambulance chasing lot by their insurance company
c. been told to milk it with a bit of whiplash by a friend

Regarding work cover. I have it on mine as I have to occasionally drive to meetings. Not often but I know I need cover. Work doesn't ask for proof, the responsibility for being road legal lies with me. You do see these things on the police shows though where they pull someone over in the middle of the day for an unrelated issue, then ask what they are doing and as a result, check their insurance for business use. If you haven't got it then it comes down to some difficult conversations at the roadside.

londonTiger

What a stupid assumption. Maybe I just watched a recent expose of the claims culture and surge in whiplash claims.

Most people work with unergonomic offices and have some sort of chronic neck pain. Neck and back pain is pretty much a fact of life for many people.

You get rearended. Ambulance chaser phones up and asks have you noticed any neck pain recently since the accident.. driver says "now that you mention it I have been getting a sore neck recently.. I've never noticed it before but it's evident now!".

edsredshed

I work for the NHS and given they don't provide us with pens or pencils I'm not holding out much hope that they will have covered me.
Thanks for the comment about checking for legal cover, I'll check my home insurance. It does seem like an insurance/lawyer merry-go round - all at my expense for what was a VERY small accident

Bythe way Spacey 2012, I couldn’t disagree more with you.. If they are blaggingthe whiplash then they are being fraudulent end of story and its me picking upthe tab.. No excuses

InsideInsurance

edsredshed wrote: »

Could someone also explain what an "Unsatisfied Judgement" is

An unsatisfied judgement is simply where the court has made an award but the defendant hasnt paid what the court has ordered hence it being unsatisfied.

The Road Traffic Act can force an insurer to act even when there are indemnity issues but only once there is an unsatisfied judgement against you. Obviously this all adds additional costs because of the court processes.

Realistically insurers take exactly the same economics decision on if its worth trying to recover from you or not. Assuming the settlement is under £10,000 then its small claims court action and their additional costs in getting their money back cannot be added to the claim. If they think you can afford it they'll persue you. If they think you cant afford it and you refuse to pay then they wont throw good money after bad but may void your insurance for the failure to pay.

Quentin

edsredshed wrote: »

......Could someone also explain what an "Unsatisfied Judgement" is

InsideInsurance wrote: »

They are saying they'd take you to court to get the money back from you.....If they think you cant afford it and you refuse to pay then they wont throw good money after bad but may void your insurance for the failure to pay.

No.

If you don't agree to the insurer's proposal, then they will do nothing until they are forced to by the court.

This will be after you have been sued by the third party for all their costs, and should you fail to pay the court award after getting a judgement against you, that judgement becomes "unsatisfied" (ie unpaid), at which time your insurer will be compelled to fork out.

And at that time train their sights on you to reimburse them the lot (plus interest from the date they pay out)