Insurance Excess

interstellaflyer

Aretnap wrote: »

When liability is settled it's usually a simple matter of writing to the third party insurer with a copy of a receipt showing the excess you've paid, and requesting reimbursement - in the unlikely event that they don't pay you you can make a claim in the small claims court.

I don't have a receipt as my car was written off, they simply paid out less the excess, to be honest, my excess was only £100 so I'm not overly bothered but it would be better in my pocket than theirs.

takman

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
I think you are screwed no matter what, and terms and conditions who reads them, Microsoft put a section in there terms and conditions where you could claim $4,000 and it took 4 years till some one claimed it

Do you have a source for that because i have never heard of it and i can't find any mention it online.

IamNotAllowedToUseMyName

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
I did contact my insurance company about my insurance going up and they said if you are involved in an accident we take it as part of your fault because you should have seen the accident coming and took relevant steps to avoid it. I think it is a cop out about having to claim your excess back off the other party, I think it is a deliberate part of insurance company policy to stop you using them when you have an accident

The point of an excess is to stop the overhead of small claims, and also so ensure that a driver does not take a careless attitude to driving simply because they are ensured. It's a tried and tested practice. If the insurers simply give it to you, then they haven't really got an excess - and they can't justify the extra money for legal protection. In a no fault accident, it should be straight forward enough to contact the other party's insurers and ask for the money and it'll be a tick box exercise, they should just hand it over. If you haven't got the details, ring your insurer and ask them for the claims reference with the other company and contact details.

But also another example of an insured person having no idea that there are two elements that insurers can manipulate after an accident to get the money back.

I view an insurance payout as a loan for repairs these days - if you have an accident, you personally will recoup the industry its money, even if you thought you had insured against the extra costs of an accident by paying an extra premium to protect your no claims. With shared accident information, the industry can operate a cartel to ensure that anyone who suffers an accident will pay a premium in base insurance so you find that you cannot move elsewhere as the other companies penalise you in a similar way.

Also, you think you understand the costs of having an accident being the loss of your no claims (and assume that it is only after you've run out of no claims that your premium will go up). In fact you cannot do a fair comparison between insurers as you cannot find out what their premium changes are in the event of an accident.

The nasty side to it is that the base premium being calculated by accident record is not unreasonable. The cheat is more that people are not clearly informed that losing the No Claims Discount is not the full and final cost impact of an accident. To be honest, I think NCD is the scam if you are going to factor accidents into the base premium.

Aretnap

interstellaflyer wrote: »

I don't have a receipt as my car was written off, they simply paid out less the excess, to be honest, my excess was only £100 so I'm not overly bothered but it would be better in my pocket than theirs.

In that case you should have a letter showing the valuation for the car and the excess that was deducted and the amount that you actually got paid - that will serve the same purpose as a receipt.

Keith_Butler

Thank you Ian for your answer,
It looks like insurance companies have to make a profit and sometimes there is winners and sometimes losers, I seem to have been one of the losses, I will study your reply and i'm sure it will help in the future

Aylesbury_Duck

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
I think you are screwed no matter what, and terms and conditions who reads them

So you hand over hundreds of pounds every year without bothering to understand what terms and conditions apply, and you're complaining about being screwed over? Right.

Keith_Butler

Hi,
No Aylesbury I like to think of my self as very thrifty Yorkshire man and always find the best price, and would bet you £1 to a penny that virtually all the companies will have a very similar terms and conditions, you show me 10 men and I will say none of them have read all the terms and conditions.

Aylesbury_Duck

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
No Aylesbury I like to think of my self as very thrifty Yorkshire man and always find the best price, and would bet you £1 to a penny that virtually all the companies will have a very similar terms and conditions, you show me 10 men and I will say none of them have read all the terms and conditions.

I'm sure you'd find them, especially on here, but that doesn't make it sensible and it doesn't help your situation, either. Collective wilful ignorance of the terms and conditions isn't a defence.

Nothing wrong with being thrifty, but there's a lot wrong with chasing the best price to the exclusion of understanding exactly what you're getting (or more importantly, not getting) for your money. Sadly, a lot of people who have paid for a service end up on here when they experience problems and one of the first things people ask is "Have you read the terms and conditions" or similar, the answer to which is very often "no".

Would you spend £500 on a TV without understanding what it would do and what it wouldn't? Every year?

Manxman_in_exile

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
No Aylesbury I like to think of my self as very thrifty Yorkshire man and always find the best price, and would bet you £1 to a penny that virtually all the companies will have a very similar terms and conditions, you show me 10 men and I will say none of them have read all the terms and conditions.

Do you mean "best price" or do you mean "best value"? They aren't necessarily the same as different policies offer different levels of cover (not always explicit on comparison sites).


I first joined this site three years ago after an accident as I wanted advice about the claims process. The posters here were very helpful (including those starting "Why didn't you..."). The most helpful bit of advice was always read the T&Cs so you know what you are covered for. We have assiduously followed that advice since, and I advise anybody else reading this thread to do so too.


EDIT: And in our case the third party insurers paid everything including car hire and offered a very good valuation on our written off car.

takman

Keith_Butler wrote: »

Hi,
No Aylesbury I like to think of my self as very thrifty Yorkshire man and always find the best price, and would bet you £1 to a penny that virtually all the companies will have a very similar terms and conditions, you show me 10 men and I will say none of them have read all the terms and conditions.

No need to make that bet if you actually read what the policy covered before you took it out!.

They do actually vary a fair bit and i always spend a bit of time checking each policy before i buy it. For example you will see big differences in whether or not your allowed to drive other cars on your insurance and under what conditions. Whether or not you can use your policy to drive abroad and for how long. Plus also big differences in fees for cancelling and making changes.

Also you neglected to tell me the source for the Microsoft terms and conditions comment earlier in the thread.