Unexpected bill from the Fire Brigade.

giraffe69

I don't think I'd give in that easily. Ask them for a breakdown of the bill. There may be elements you don't/should not have to pay. If you refer it to your insurance company it is likely to end up with your premium going up next year so some research before you do so is to be advised.

ado

Crabby wrote: »

My wife didn't ask for the fire brigades help, if she'd known they where going to bill her for £500 she'd have told them to bu££er off.

I would imagine that their costs would have started the moment they got disturbed from their sleep or pool game and slid down their big shiny metal pole to get into their fire engine i.e. most of their bill will be generated by the cost of the deployment not what they did when they got to your wife, so even if she had told them to go away there would still have been a bill to pay.

I've read several figures on the WWW about the cost of both ambulance and fire services call outs and they all seem to be in the £300 plus bracket even before they do anything at their destination. In the world of austerity and reductions to their budgets its not surprising that organisations like these now try to recoup costs from the consumer even when the service is nominally paid for from council tax.

One last point is that some modern cars now alert the emergency services themselves in the event of an accident, whereas in the OP's wife's case it sounds like a passer by called in future it might be her own car which does the job.

londonTiger

Inch_High wrote: »

Good question, but the police are the only emergency service not to invoice the driver for attending a collision.

they invoice in other ways like speeding.

topdaddy_2

Inch_High wrote: »

And you'd have done what about the fluids she spilt?

Your options are pay it or pass it onto the insurance company. They may well be expecting some invoices as you did inform them of the incident.

Assumption there. And the fb arent very good at dealing with spills. Sand is non porus for a start

Inch_High_2

londonTiger wrote: »

they invoice in other ways like speeding.

Yeah cause when convicted the police get all the money.

Do you really think a prosecution for excess speed would cover the cost of investigating a fatal collision?

Inch_High_2

topdaddy wrote: »

Assumption there. And the fb arent very good at dealing with spills. Sand is non porus for a start

I assume as they put spill dry down there was a fluid spillage.

londonTiger

Inch_High wrote: »

Yeah cause when convicted the police get all the money.

Do you really think a prosecution for excess speed would cover the cost of investigating a fatal collision?

because speeding = fatal collision obviously.

topdaddy_2

Inch_High wrote: »

I assume as they put spill dry down there was a fluid spillage.

And your assuming the spill was anything to do with the op's car

AdrianC

Crabby wrote: »

she skidded on a roundabout at low speed on a greasy road surface

...does not lead to...

and tipped her car onto its side.

molerat

I remember getting a bill for the ambulance when I had a shunt back in 1973 so nothing new, I just passed it on to my insurer.