I dent my neighbours car but he shouldn't have been parked there?!

needsupport24

We park in a private housing association communal car park (flats). There are marked bays, however, he was not parked in a marked bay. His car was parked behind me perpendicularly and it is very hard to move out of my marked bay because of this. I accidentally dent his car, I know its my fault and we have discussed how were going to pay for this but shouldn't he take responsibility for the fact that he shouldn't have been parked there? I was in a rush to get to an appointment so that must have contributed. I passed last year and have been driving for about 10 months with no such problem. If we go through insurance, will there be any affect of me saying he shouldn't have parked there or am I paying up regardless as its my fault as my car was the moving car?

I'm 20, first time driver. I told him I'd rather pay for this and not involve insurance but I'm worried he might try to get more money out of me by claiming that repairs cost a lot.. He did say he wanted to go through insurance cause people have said before that they would pay him but then they didn't but we decided he would look for a garage and so would I. Based on pictures, I was quoted around £180 to fix a dent in one car door. What do you think about this?

Thanks!

Windofchange

Ok, it's your fault. DO NOT INVOLVE THE INSURANCE COMPANY. You can report the accident, and he can too, but unless a claim is made it won't impact you. I should imagine the excess on your policy is more than £180 so it makes no sense at all to claim.

Write it off as a lesson learned.

FutureGirl

You're at fault. Doesn't really matter that he shouldn't have parked there.

You will only usually pay an excess if you're claiming for your own damage, not the third parties.

You have to notify your insurer of the incident whether you claim through them or not. Your premiums will go up because you've been involved in an accident and you're at fault. But if you don't claim then your NCB will remain intact.

The only issue I can see, is that if you pay for the damage privately make sure you get an invoice and keep a copy.

Aretnap

Bottom line is that you hit a stationary car so it's your fault. The fact that he was badly parked will make no difference to liability - if you weren't confident that you could get through the gap safely you shoudln't have tried. Harsh, but that's how it works.

In theory you should report it to your insurer even if you don't plan to make a claim, but if we were going to settle with a handful of cash most of us would choose not to tell them. Contrary to the above, if you do tell them they will record the accident and this will likely have an impact on your future premium even if you don't claim.

OTOH if you want to settle outside insurance you're at his mercy to some extent - if you think that the money he's asking is unreasonable your choices are (a) to pay up or (b) to say "here are my insurance details".

Your excess is irrelevant as it is only payable if you claim for damage to your own car. Third party claims are paid in full (with at least 99% of insurance policies anyway)