car accident - hit by 3rd party - I pay for car hire?!

miss_lisalou

Thank you all for your advice. I find this infuriating that consumers can pay an additional amount towards their policy for a courtesy car, and when they need it they can simply be passed on to an expensive hire company and potentially have to foot the bill themselves, despite not being at fault for the accident in the first place!

As it turns out, it would have been cheaper for me to arrange the repairs to my car and not involve my insurers at all than to end up paying for this bill

OnanTheBarbarian

You don't have to pay for the bill - so long as you assist the hire company with the recovery of their charges. On paper you are liable for the costs, but they should not ask you to pay unless you misbehave.

Aretnap

As InsideInsurance says the courtesy car extension on your own policy would apply regardless of fault - if you'd driven your car into a tree you could use it. However because another party was clearly at fault you had the option of going to the third party's insurers via a credit hire company instead - an option you'd not have had if you'd driven into a tree. Your insurers will encourage you to take this option, mainly because they get a nice commission from the credit hire company, it's true, but there are also advantages to you by doing it that way - you're more likely to get an exact replacement, you can have the car for as long as you need it rather than being subject to the 14 day (or whatever) cap that's in place on your own policy, and and as you're not making a claim through your own policy your no claims bonus isn't affected while it's settled (which could cause you problems if the settlement wasn't finalised by your renewal date). So the credit hire route may well have been the best option for you as well.

Once again, you're not going to have to foot the bill yourself so long as you do what's asked of you. The at fault party's insurers are responsible for paying the costs of the accident, including the hire car costs. The credit hire company and the third party's insurers are just arguing about exactly what those costs are. The result of that argument makes no difference to you at all - you just have to provide the credit hire company with some information which will help them argue your case.

Quentin

miss_lisalou wrote: »

Thank you all for your advice. I find this infuriating that consumers can pay an additional amount towards their policy for a courtesy car, and when they need it they can simply be passed on to an expensive hire company and potentially have to foot the bill themselves, despite not being at fault for the accident in the first place!

You will have agreed (maybe unwittingly) that you didn't make any claim off your own policy, and that you were sold on to the claim handler/credit hire company.


As a result you have not had any hassle over an excess to pay (and subsequently reclaim}, nor any (temporary) loss of NCD pending the conclusion of the claim which can cause issues if your renewal comes due whilst the claim is still being resolved with the other side's insurer.