Company hire car damage liability

wombatsandpumas

Hi there. I tried to post this on the CAB forum but it wouldn't let me for some reason, sorry if this isn't quite in the right place.

I'll try and keep the story short but a couple of weeks ago a hire car was booked by my work's office assistant, with me as the named driver, to attend a work event for the weekend.

The day i received the hire car, i parked it on my drive. A few hours later i caught, red handed, the toddler of one of my neighbours scratching doodles into it with what resembled a piece of plastic! Me and my wife ran out, she grabbed the toddler's hand and took her back to her mum, and told her what had happened. But at the time, my wife showed me the scratches rubbed off. So no great worry!

Days later the hire car company came over to pick up the hire car and spotted the scratches. I said no look, they rub off! And he said "there they do, but here they're much deeper". Clearly I hadn't noticed the extra scratches which were deep and across three panels.

The hire car charged around £1000. The bill landed on my doormat under my name (even though it was booked and paid for by the company (who didn't book excess waiver either), on the company card).

Work are now being v unsupportive of me, and demanding I take it upon myself to ensure I get the £1000 from the neighbour. I feel like this should not be my responsibility, and am not sure how best to proceed.

As a side note, I don't know the neighbour well, but form what I can gather she's an unemployed single mother.

Any advice gratefully received. Sorry it wasn't as short a story as I'd hoped!!

marliepanda

It was scratched in your care. Whose responsibility is it? It's either yours or the neighbour.

bugslet

We hire vehicles as a Company.

Personally my view is that the car was ordered and paid for by the company, and their choice of approach to how they insured the vehicle, and you were under their instruction, so it's the Companies problem to sort out.



In an ideal world the neighbour would cough up but if you are correct, it sounds there would be a lot of aggro with no actual money at the end.

If it was us as a Company, we'd be dealing with it. You could ask to see the Company policy!

boliston

If you hired a car and took the risk of not buying a waiver then you would accept the risk however the car was booked and insured by a third party and the third party chose to risk not buying a waiver. Surely being a named driver does not make you liable unless you have been negligent? I would have thought that the hirer is liable for the excess charge?