Why dashcams are so important.

Nodding_Donkey

Last Sunday evening I had a car accident where another vehicle decided to pull out of a stationary queue of traffic as I was passing him. He was in lane 1, I was in lane 2. This resulted in the front nearside corner of my car being mashed, along with the rear offside corner of the car in front of him. He of course denied all responsibility, I was going too fast (30mph) etc, etc. Blah, blah

I used Askmid at the roadside to find out he was insured with Admiral and in fact heard him on the phone reporting the accident to them from the scene.

Next morning I phoned Admirals third party claims line. Initially they told me that the accident hadn't been reported to them yet:

Me:"But I heard him from the roadside, he reported it at about 17:45"

Admiral:"Ahh that will have gone to our out of hours claims service and might take a couple of days to get to us" a couple of days, !!!!!!!


Me:"Right, lets knock that on the head straightaway, I'll email you a link to my Dashcam footage. If I haven't heard back from you with a proposal of how you're going to deal with this by close of business today then I'll be instructing a Claims Management Company first thing tomorrow"

Funnily enough they called me at about 15:00. Their policyholder had initially denied liability until they showed him the video, at which point he changed his story.

I now have a hire vehicle provided by them.

My car has been assessed a total loss (Cat C)

An offer has been made and accepted and I can keep the hire car for 5 days after receiving the money.


Without the dashcam I would probably be in the position of my insurance company arguing with them over liability and driving around in a totally unsuitable hire car.


The Dashcam I have is only a cheapie I bought online but I am off later today to buy a decent one

spira9

Dash cams are awesome. I have one and used it pretty much every time I drive. Except the few times I didn't use it and crazy things happened. It's weird having one at first as it can be distracting and a bit embarrassing. But after a while I don't even notice it's there.

What car was it?

Nodding_Donkey

Mine? A swb Shogun

vikingaero

It probably sounds weird but I feel naked/unprotected if I drive a vehicle without a dashcam. I've had one person reverse into me and claim it was my fault, until the footage was shown. I've helped a motorhomer who was being raged at by a biker when the accident was quite clearly the bikers fault.

I fully expect on my average commute that half a dozen people will do something stupid or cut me up. It's unfortunately normal. But it takes one incident to escalate. You have to work on the assumption that most people are entitled and drive how they want. In the event of an accident you can guarantee that you will have denied liability.

Since I've had dashcams I really only save the most serious and most humourous incidents. With new technology there's an army of dashcam warriors recording non-events. There's the thought that if you have time to beep your horn then even though you might have right of way, you could have done more to avoid an accident. Being annoyed but alive is better than being dead and right.

GwylimT

Mine hasn't been needed for an rta yet, but it did film someone dragging a young child across the road who was crying. The persons name was in the paper a few days later for having innapropriate images of children, so I took my video to the police and they are now also charging him for attempted abduction.

loskie

do any manufacturers offer them as an optional extra? Would cost them peanuts and they could easily charge 200 to 300.

loskie

ND
if you like your shogun and the repairs arent too costly look at buying it back and getting a bodyshop to fix it with used parts.

vikingaero

loskie wrote: »

do any manufacturers offer them as an optional extra? Would cost them peanuts and they could easily charge 200 to 300.

Some cars have a plethora of electronics by the rear view mirror. My sisters Mazda has a rain sensor, a light sensor, a camera and a laser. The latter two are only used for the adaptive cruise and not for anything else dashcamwise so you would think it would be easy to introduce/implement.

AFAIK at the moment only BMW have an aftermarket dashcam - the BMW Car Eye dashcam which is around £329 fitted.

mcjordi

get a cheap android mobile and use one of the many dash cam apps out there.. i use "black box" on mine.. quite a good app for free

Nodding_Donkey

loskie wrote: »

ND
if you like your shogun and the repairs arent too costly look at buying it back and getting a bodyshop to fix it with used parts.

Unfortunately I can't afford the time but every cloud and all that, I'm using it as an excuse to get a newer one

Nodding_Donkey

mcjordi wrote: »

get a cheap android mobile and use one of the many dash cam apps out there.. i use "black box" on mine.. quite a good app for free

That's great if you remember to set it up every time and don't want it to work when you are parked up.