Is the increased cost of car insurance an uninsured loss?

Foxy-Stoat_3

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Hence "" around the term, non fault in the common language meaning that you have no blame for the accident not non-fault from the insurance perspective.

In my case both accidents were non fault and the third party was insured.

I would of thought that the cost of handling the claim would of already been built into the premium already.

nobbysn*ts

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Its just a very hard head of claim to substantiate quantum on (if we want to go into technical terms)

I've not seen any higher court case where it was out of hand dismissed not due to lack of evidence to substantiate quantum but due to a fundamental issue with the principle of claiming for it.

Presumably you shopped around and didnt just stay with the same insurer blindly?

Why should the op shop around? If they do normally, fair enough, if they don't normally, it's perfectly fair to accept the new quote as is, if the insurer is adding the "correct" loading for the claims, that's the cost.

sma11person

I got told that increased insurance cost is not a "head of claim" would I thought was BS to be honest as it would be an uninsured loss as they should put me back to how I was before the accident, financially as well as repairing the car.

How come when I thought I should be restored to how I was pre-accident (other driver's fault), financially as well as repairing the car, most posters insisted I should just get on with it and look for a new car. What makes you so special? ).

Aretnap

nobbysn*ts wrote: »

Why should the op shop around? If they do normally, fair enough, if they don't normally, it's perfectly fair to accept the new quote as is, if the insurer is adding the "correct" loading for the claims, that's the cost.

Because he has a duty to take reasonable steps to minimise his loss, for a start.

nobbysn*ts

Aretnap wrote: »

Because he has a duty to take reasonable steps to minimise his loss, for a start.

Which means you should expect your current insurer to treat you fairly, and not add a massive loading merely because you don't shop around after an accident. It's not minimising a loss, if you believe you will be treated the same as you would have been before the accident. Unless the insurers are prepared to stand up in front of the judge and admit they are screwing you over because you didn't shop around. I'd happily put in the renewal price, against an internet quote for renewal without the claim, and go for the difference. If the existing insurer is simply loading it up because of inertia, it'll come round and bite them. They'll have to justify the premium, I won't have to justify the alternative.

Aretnap

InsideInsurance wrote: »

Two main reasons:

a) As insurers cannot recover internal claims handling costs so whilst they get the £5,000 for repairing your car back from the TPI the 10 hours of staff time, that persons desk/computer etc are unrecoverable. The more claims you have the more staff they will need etc

b) whilst you have been fortunate this time and the TP has stopped and been insured there are plenty out there who fail to stop or dont have insurance and so even though these are "non fault" your insurer ends up carrying the can. Clearly the risk is relatively low hence why its "only" a £50 increase -v- the potential loss of a total loss etc, depending on the value of your vehicle that could be a tiny proportion

Plus, it's not just the risk of having more "no fault" accidents in the future. It may well correlate with the risk of having fault claims in the future as well, because

(c) The fact that it was recorded as no fault doesn't mean that our driving was blameless. Years ago when I was young and foolish I rather knobbishly overtook a lane of queuing traffic at speed on a dual
carriageway, cut into a gap in the queue, slammed the brakes on... and the guy I cut in on didn't brake as hard as I did. He admitted liability, and I wasn't going to argue with that, so,it went on my record as a no fault accident. But even so, would you want to insure someone who drove like I did? I don't think I had much cause for complaint when my premium went up a but the next year.

Similarly if someone pulls out of a side street ahead of you without looking an average driver might go into the side of him and have a no fault claim... but a good driver might react faster and avoid an accident entirely. Which of the two is more likely to have an at fault accident himself in future?

(d) It may correlate with the type of road you drive on. If you spend a lot of time driving on country roads with poor surfaces, blind bends etc you're more likely to suffer from someone else's carelessness than someone who does most of his driving on safer roads at quiet times of day which leave a lot of margin for error - and you're also at more risk of causing harm to someone else when sooner or later you have a careless moment of your own.

Aretnap

nobbysn*ts wrote: »

Which means you should expect your current insurer to treat you fairly, and not add a massive loading merely because you don't shop around after an accident. It's not minimising a loss, if you believe you will be treated the same as you would have been before the accident. Unless the insurers are prepared to stand up in front of the judge and admit they are screwing you over because you didn't shop around. I'd happily put in the renewal price, against an internet quote for renewal without the claim, and go for the difference. If the existing insurer is simply loading it up because of inertia, it'll come round and bite them. They'll have to justify the premium, I won't have to justify the alternative.

Not really, your own insurer is (usually) a completely different entity to the third party's insurer, if your own insurer happens to treat you unfairly by imposing an unusually large loading come renewal time that's not the third party's fault, and if you're too naive or too lazy to spend 10 minutes putting your details into a comparison site to see of you can get the same cover cheaper that's not the third party's fault either.

nobbysn*ts

Aretnap wrote: »

Not really, your own insurer is (usually) a completely different entity to the third party's insurer, if your own insurer happens to treat you unfairly by imposing an unusually large loading come renewal time that's not the third party's fault, and if you're too naive or too lazy to spend 10 minutes putting your details into a comparison site to see of you can get the same cover cheaper that's not the third party's fault either.

And that's down to the judge on the day. Is the insurer simply one rogue company simply out to screw it's customer, and hence it's down to the customer for not shopping around, or is it a cost that has been incurred due to the fault of the third party? What do you think your insurer would supply to support the claim, or to dismiss it? Or would they decide they couldn't justify it and back out?

InsideInsurance

nobbysn*ts wrote: »

They'll have to justify the premium, I won't have to justify the alternative.

They never have to justify their new business/ renewal premium, they are a commercial organisation that are free to charge what they want. The regulator is only ever interested if they are charging enough across their whole book for the risks they are taking on.

The only thing they cannot do is use race/ disability and the other outlawed "isms". Outside that its a commercial decision.

Insurers generally make no bones that they give a "new customer discount" and as such its logical a new customer gets a lower price than an existing customer.

nobbysn*ts

InsideInsurance wrote: »

They never have to justify their new business/ renewal premium, they are a commercial organisation that are free to charge what they want. The regulator is only ever interested if they are charging enough across their whole book for the risks they are taking on.

The only thing they cannot do is use race/ disability and the other outlawed "isms". Outside that its a commercial decision.

Insurers generally make no bones that they give a "new customer discount" and as such its logical a new customer gets a lower price than an existing customer.

So, by definition it's impossible to mitigate losses by shopping around, as others will be cheaper for different reasons. All you need is a quote without the claim, and the difference to the renewal cost. It's equally valid the difference is down to the claim for commercial reasons known exclusively to them. As you say, it's whatever is reasonable on the day, on the facts presented. And again as you say, they never present any facts to prove otherwise.