Motor Car Accident

LCJT

Hi there
We got hit by a car speeding away from the police. The person just drove off after my husband had to swerve left to avoid a head on collusion. The person managed to hit us on my husband's side. This happened on Saturday. On Monday the insurance came to collect the car. Our insurers refused to give us a courtesy car until they have had confirmation from the defendant's insurance. It is now Wednesday, still no courtesy car - IS THIS NORMAL?
At the time of the impact, I was twisted towards the back busy with my two small kids, so my back is sore. GP said it will take 4-6 weeks to heal, am I in my rights to see if I can get Physio or Osteopathy to help, and then try claim the expense back?
Then the 2 car seats we had in the car - are we right to expect them to be replaced/reimbursed? One model is totally discontinued, it is an old seat from around 2013. The other one I bought last year, so should be able to get the same one. BUT I am nervous doing this as we were in a no fault accident in beginning 2015- I AM STILL WAITING FOR MY INSURERS TO REIMBURSE ME FOR THE CAR SEAT. They kept trying to give me 100.00 less then what I paid, now finally it has gone to court.
Lastly, we just had word today that the repairs is going to be around 6k, the car is worth 9k so my husband says there is a chance they will write it off...IS THIS CORRECT? We just finished paying it off and now this? Can this be fair and just? If they write it off I presume they will give us the market value? How will we know if what they offer is the best we can get? And if it is a write off, how long can we expect to get a courtesy car for?
Looks like we will be going no where this summer, totally ruined.
There is no question that we were not at fault, there were witnesses.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read my dilemma

huckster

Yes you need a responsible third party to claim for a courtesy car, so the cost is covered.

You might not be able to get private healthcare costs refunded, so if you can use NHS, that would be less risky. If the third party insurers admit liability quickly, then you can negotiate having any necessary treatment paid. If you go ahead with private treatment, even with a third party insurers admitting liability, they might argue about necessity of treatment and its cost.

Car seats should be covered for current value under comp cover. You won't get current new value. It is not like Home Insurance which is mostly new for old cover.

Car could be a write off and if so you should get current market value in terms of replacement from a garage. Depends on the extent of damage and how the Insurers engineer views it. You will have to wait and see.

If you can get the third parties insurance details using their registration number on Askmid, you could call them to hurry the claim process. Perhaps the car was not insured or stolen ?

LCJT

Thank you so much for taking the time to reply

I still don't understand the part about the car seat though - current value, as in my old car seat's current value or the current value of the same one new? Reason being, you cannot buy a second hand car seat without the possibility of it being in an accident.

Quentin

It isn't a requirement that insurers must reimburse you the full cost of a new seat (even though safety wise you ought to replace them once they have done their job)


Many insurers do replace them FOC - you look to be not with one that does.


Try sending them a copy of this letter from ROSPA:


http://www.childcarseats.org.uk/docs/insurance-letter-replacing-restraints.pdf

LCJT

Thanks so much...will definitely use this.

This is proving to be a total nightmare. The insurance kept saying they cannot send out a courtesy car till the estimate is done. We then decided to hire a vehicle in hope to get reimbursed. We needed the vehicle as we having my little girls first birthday party tomorrow and my husband really needs to get back to work, he works 1.5hrs drive away. They dropped of the hire vehicle. Half an hour later the Garage phoned and said that the car is going to be fixed and they sending out a courtesy car. Now we don't know how to approach this. And I am really hoping that if we sell the car we will be able to get the same if not more than what a payout would have been. So confused. Thanks for your help.

teddysmum

At least you have paid off your finance. My son's car was written off in similar circumstances (person in known uninsured car being chased by police-If only they had carried out the threat of confiscating uninsured/taxed cars, this car wouldn't have been chased,as the driver had just been warned about possible confiscation) and he lost out as the replacement payment didn't cover the finance outstanding.

huckster

You don't know when the courtesy car will arrive. If it is provided free by the garage or at a cheaper rate than your hire car, you will need to start using this courtesy car and finish the hire car rental, if you don't want to end up with an amount you can't claim back.

The third party insurers are only going to reimburse for one car, so would pay for the few days you needed a hire car and then whatever this courtesy car costs. You need to find out the basis of this courtesy car. Is it provided free or at a hire car rate ? How long will this courtesy car be provided for ?

Until you obtain more information, you are not going to understand the situation and we can only guess.