Total Loss Payout - elephant/admiral

AngryBird1

I would like to know of any other money savers who have had to negotiate a total loss settlement through Elephant or Admiral insurance.

I was in a non fault accident and they offered me £1290 based an a car advert in Autotrader 118 miles from me. When I checked with the dealer to find out why it was so cheap he told me the mileage on the advert was wrong and it had in fact done much higher mileage than my own car.

I wrote letter of complaint to Admiral telling this, with proof of all adverts for cars same as mine which were all priced from £1595-£1995. 5 days later they phone me up and offer me just £1325 I was livid!:mad: I still have their hire car 3 weeks after the accident. Want to go to ombudsman but will take another 7 weeks before they will look at it. Dont know how much longer I can keep hire car for.
:mad:

dacouch

Read and follow the advice in this link from the Ombudsman

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/publications/technical_notes/motor-valuation.html

As you can see the Ombudsman expects Insurers to value the car by using the three valuations guides to value the car at the "retail" price from a reputable dealer.

The Ombudsman specifically states that adverts do not normally reflect the value of the car

OnanTheBarbarian

If this was a non-fault claim and you are in a hire car, are Admiral/ Elephant your own insurers of the third party insurer?

Usually, the hire car co will start getting nervous about keeping you in the car a week or so after an offer has been made as you could take another 2-3 weeks to argue for another £300 on the settlement value of your car, yet incur potentially £600+ in hire charges in doing so, which will become the subject of a dispute by the fault party's insurance co for failure to mitigate.

Are the hire co aware you have had an offer and are in dispute with the insurers?

AngryBird1

Glasses guide values my car at £1560 before I add in extra for having very low mileage, that is why I want to persevere with getting a better offer.

Elephant are my own insurers and it is them who have provided the hire car. Elephant are so slow to respond to any form of correspondence that is why I have had the hire car so long. It was two weeks after the accident before they offered me a settlement, which I immediately refused, and then it was another 7 days before they upped the offer by £30. I really just want to get as much money as I can to get the vehicle repaired. Approved repairer quoted £2060 but trying to get another estimate from a local welder but I still expect it to be around £1500.

I am now thinking of claiming direct from third party insurers (Aviva) and ditching Elephant. Hopefully they will give more honest settlement figure.