Car stolen, recovered, written off and then salvage bought back

Jello123

Hi

My car was stolen, but then recovered a few days later with a lot mechanical damage.

The police recovered vehicle to their storage place and did some forensics. Took them about two weeks before releasing the car.

Then the insurers wanted to collect the car and take it to their own places miles away from my house. I said no thanks and that I will send it to my own garage. They said that’s fine but I will need to pay £200 additional excess. This is a standard fee if a client wishes to use their own garage for repairs. I said fine.

So my garage recovered the car from the polices syorage to their own garage and then inspected car. This garage had it for a week. Essentially the cost to repair was so high that the insurers decided to write off car.

The insurer has agreed a settlement figure. But I said I wish to buy the salvage back. So they deducted this from settlement figure and said I can go collect the car now and the cheque will be in the post.

My question is... the garage obviously has a bunch of costs they need to reclaim. E.g. they kept the car for a week whilst they assessed it, they also collected the car from the police storage facility and also paid the police storage fees. Who do they recover these costs from?

I would assume the garage would invoice the insurers for this, but I thought I’d double check as I don’t want to be in a position where I receive a horrible invoice in the post a few weeks later!

I did ask the guy I delt with at the insurance company and they seem very vague. Almost like they don’t understand what I am asking.

Thanks in advance

MEM62

As these costs were incurred at your instigation I expect that your insurers will not pick up the bill. Far easier just to let the insurers follow their normal arrangements.

Retrogamer

Jello123 wrote: »

Hi
My question is... the garage obviously has a bunch of costs they need to reclaim. E.g. they kept the car for a week whilst they assessed it, they also collected the car from the police storage facility and also paid the police storage fees. Who do they recover these costs from?

You i would assume on the basis that you wished to deal with this personally rather than let your insurance company do their thing.

Perhaps check again with your insurance company though as they are the only ones who can give the answer.