Pls I need help about a car ins claim!

Alexythimia

Thankyou the person above your post also said go Churchill
I’m just trying to do the best thing and not lose money as I saved so long and hard just to afford a car for £3000 and it was taken away within 4 months of driving whilst it was parked, the old lady that hit me had a really nice car and totally wrote mine off with minor damage to her own yet all she could say was “ her poor car”!
It’s just so hard not having much money for these things, I’d feel a bit better if it was me bumping the car but it was parked on its own and totally smashed in

macman

You won't get offered what you paid for it, you'll get offered something less than it's value at the time of the incident.

Alexythimia

I can accept that I just don’t want to be low balled into a ridiculous price of £1500 when my own goskippy said the least I’m looking at is £2350

Also the neighbours insurance took the car away, so do I need my insurer go skippy or Churchill to get it back?
Sorry to keep asking these questions

waamo

Why do you want it back? If it is written off it's no use to you. If they pay out on it then it's no longer yours anyway.

AdrianC

I don't even understand what the neighbour adds to this, or why anybody else's insurance is talking to them...

Let's go back a step.
Your car was parked.
This other car hit yours.
No other cars were involved, right?

You have a choice...
1. Claim off your insurance.
They will then go to the other driver's insurance.
If the other driver's insurer admit liability, you will not pay an excess and it will be a no-fault claim on your record.
If they do not, then your insurer will cover the cost, you will pay your excess, and it will be an at-fault claim.

2. Claim off the other driver's insurance.
If they admit liability, your claim is paid.
If they do not, it isn't.

Either way, the value of your car is the market value of it, as determined by industry-standard price guides. You can appeal it to the financial ombudsman if you aren't satisfied.

The only way the neighbour's involvement makes any sense to me is if they aren't actually introducing an insurer, but some kind of claim management company, who are then taking a %age of the claim.

Waamo - since it's a low-value vehicle, it may well be a CatN write-off with relatively minor cosmetic damage, easily repairable within the payout, even after deducting salvage value.

Ebe_Scrooge

OP, in terms of the settlement you've been offered by the other party's insurance - when a car is written off, any insurance company will offer you the "current market value". This will almost always be less than you paid for it (hence the whole thing about "gap insurance"). As Ectophile said, you don't necessarily have to accept their offer immediately. If you can provide reasonable evidence that "the going rate" for that car is more than their offer, you can ask them to increase their offer. This means trawling through AutoTrader or whatever, finding a number of cars that are the same age, similar spec, similar condition, etc., and presenting your list to them. Not such a daunting task if your car is fairly common, more difficult if yours is a rare car or unusual spec. Unfortunately, you can't expect to get back the same as you paid for it - it's almost certainly worth less now than when you bought it. It's older, got more miles, had more owners, etc.

Bear in mind, a lower-value car can be "written off" for relatively minor damage. An insurance company will look at the cost to have the damage professionally repaired, which is never cheap, and even relatively minor damage can exceed the value of the car. If you're not too bothered about the car being restored to showroom condition, it may well be possible to have the damage repaired by a local independant body shop, or even DIY it, for a reasonable cost.

<Edit> Cross-posted with AdrianC above somewhat :-)

peter_the_piper

You don't have to just accept the £1500, there is room for negotiation.

NBLondon

Alexythimia wrote: »

Also the neighbours insurance took the car away, so do I need my insurer go skippy or Churchill to get it back?
Sorry to keep asking these questions

No that's a really important question! The only people who should take it away are a) your insurance company if you had reported it or b) the insurance company of the person who hit you if you have claimed from them and they have admitted liability.

You need to find out who exactly "neighbour's insurance" are. If as AdrianC suggests they are actually a claims management company - have you signed any paperwork with that company name that authorises them to take away your car and make a claim against Churchill on your behalf? Or did your neighbour just get a breakdown company to take it away - there may be storage costs as the wreck has to be somewhere while the claim goes through - so you will need to add these to the claim from Churchill.

If yes - you signed it over to someone

1) Best to tell goskippy that you did that.
2) That company will try and get more money out of Churchill but when they take their cut and then the "helpful" neighbour takes his - you may well end up with not enough money to be a new equivalent car.
3) Read that paperwork and see if you can work out how much it will cost to pull out of that deal and get your car back - at which point claim directly with Churchill and these new costs on.

If not;

Your car may have been stolen. Definitely tell goskippy!

waamo wrote: »

Why do you want it back? If it is written off it's no use to you. If they pay out on it then it's no longer yours anyway.

Because I'm not sure if the OP knows who actually has the car at the moment!

Arklight

This is baffling. Who has taken your car away? What does your neighbour have to do with this?