minor car accident, on private land, not my fault, any advice?

monkeyman15

Hi

My van was involved in a bit of an incident last friday, and I was wondering if anyone could offer me any advice. If I've posted this in the wrong place please point me in the right direction.

I'll briefly set the scene..
After work on friday I pulled my van up to the entrance door of the building (on private property) to load my equipment straight into it. I was just about to get in my van and set off when the car with trailer next to me started driving, the trailer caught my open passenger door and bent it right back. (car driver is claiming that someone must have opened the door further after he set off, this isn't true as far as I remember).

My door is now pretty badly bent and barely shuts. Plus the panel infront of the door is a bit bent, and missing some paint.

I know the car driver, and will have to work with him quite a lot in the future, so it's getting a bit awkward. He says he doesn't want to admit responsibility as he thinks someone else opened the door. He hasn't given me any insurance details (he reckons that as it was on private land insurance doesn't apply, surely that's nonsense, what if he'd hit a small child instead of my van door?!) , but has said if I get a quote for the repair, he'll pay half. This seems ridiculous to me as I wasn't even driving, so why should I have to pay half of the repair? It's a simple case of him towing a trailer and not checking mirrors before he set off surely?

I've asked the building management for a copy of any cctv evidence there may be and await their reply.

Does anyone have any advice for me?

Many thanks!

Mark_Mark

Is it private property or somewhere the public have access to?

dacouch

If you have his registration number you can obtain his Insurance details from https://www.askmid.com for a small fee and then claim directly off his insurance

Aretnap

For the purposes of Road Traffic Law, private land is defined by who has access to it rather than by who owns it. If the general public use the land in question it's probably a public place, if it's only employees of your company, delivery men etc then it probably isn't.

If it's not a public place then he doesn't have to give you his insurance details, but it doesn't really matter because you can get them for £4 from AskMID

http://www.askmid.com/askmidenquiry.aspx

and unless he has the cheapest nastiest policy in the world, it will cover third party risks in private places as well as public ones.

monkeyman15

thanks for the responses, that was lightning quick!

It was actually the grounds of a castle, but anyone can drive there straight from the road. I'm not sure how that would be classified? Or even if it would make a difference?

I don't have his registration number, I'll try to get it, but would contacting his insurers be of any use if he's not accepting blame?

Mark_Mark

monkeyman15 wrote: »

thanks for the responses, that was lightning quick!

It was actually the grounds of a castle, but anyone can drive there straight from the road. I'm not sure how that would be classified? Or even if it would make a difference?

I don't have his registration number, I'll try to get it, but would contacting his insurers be of any use if he's not accepting blame?

Public place then.

dacouch

monkeyman15 wrote: »

thanks for the responses, that was lightning quick!

It was actually the grounds of a castle, but anyone can drive there straight from the road. I'm not sure how that would be classified? Or even if it would make a difference?

I don't have his registration number, I'll try to get it, but would contacting his insurers be of any use if he's not accepting blame?

His Insurers would contact him and ask him about the accident.

If possible it's often easier to persuade him to report the accident himself to avoid him getting defensive and denying it.

If you have any independent witnesses or the cctv footage if it's clear it can make a massive difference

NewUserHere

His insurers certainly won't be happy he never reported the incident to them within 24 hours!

InsideInsurance

monkeyman15 wrote: »

He hasn't given me any insurance details (he reckons that as it was on private land insurance doesn't apply, surely that's nonsense, what if he'd hit a small child instead of my van door?!) , but has said if I get a quote for the repair, he'll pay half.

There are some difference if the Road Traffic Act applies or not, as others have said it isnt as simple as who owns the land but about if its intentionally open to the public or not (so your driveway isnt covered by the RTA despite it being possible for the public to get onto it but a supermarket carpark is)

You can get RTO insurance but it is incredibly rare and I dont know anyone that offers it to anyone but corporate fleets. RTO only covers what the road traffic act requires, as the RTA doesnt apply to "private" land RTO cover doesnt cover incidents there.

Assuming they are a normal person and have TPO, TPFT or Comp cover then their insurance will cover it.

The only other difference would be that if there were indemnity issues, the vehicle was stolen or the TP refused to engage their insurers then because the RTA doesnt apply the insurer cannot be forced to settle the case where as if it happened on a public area then the insurer can be (for stolen cars, only if the driver is identified) even if their policyholder doesnt want them to.


You evidently need to get the CCTV or find witnesses who can confirmed what happened. They say you opened the door into their path, you say they hit a static object. Likely result without any other evidence is 50/50

Stoke

I'd say get that CCTV asap!!

monkeyman15

Thanks for all the advice so far. A little update.

Incident happened just off cctv coverage, isn't that always the way!

I went to my local friendly garage, they said it'd cost around £6-700, and insurance companies might even write the van off over it! (it's a fairly old (2002) van, with high-ish mileage.)

Luckily after a few awkward days my colleague has accepted that it wasn't anything to do with me, and that it was his car that hit mine, so is accepting liability of sorts, and will be paying for the repair on his credit card.

Hopefully it'll all end well