Need advice please

K4TS · 12 April 2019 at 6:20PM

Good evening all. I will try to keep this brief. Basically car in front of me broke hard causing me to bump into the back of her. No damage to my car at all not even a scratch, her car tiny dent, we decided to try to sort it out without involving insurance as the dent really wasn’t that bad and no damage to mine. She took my number I took hers then she quickly drove off. Literally half hour later she calls saying she has taken it to a garage and they quoted between £2500 and £4000 which of course I questioned, because of the high price and also because of the quickness of getting a quote. I was told that the car repair was £2500 and the rest was labour. I told her I would think and call her back, so I did stating that I would like to see the quote on headed paper or better still have my mechanic give a quote, she then tells me that she is just going to do it through insurance and that it was my fault, yet at the scene she couldn’t apologise anymore for her breaking so hard. I’ve never been in this situation before so I didn’t take pictures or anything, I just have this feeling that she is now trying to blame me for damage what was already there and I’m not sure what to do about it. There was no witnesses and no cameras around. Thank guys for reading x

DUTR · 12 April 2019 at 6:41PM

If you went in the back of the 3rd party then it will more than likely go against you, in future keep a distance from the vehicle in front that allows you to brake without colliding.

martinthebandit · 12 April 2019 at 6:46PM

She is trying to blame you (as you put it OP) because if you run into the back of the vehicle in front of you it's always your fault.

elsien · 12 April 2019 at 6:47PM

What DUTR said - if you go into the back of someone that generally makes it your fault for being so close.
It's how the crash for cash merchants operate - slamming their brakes on and if you're really lucky reversing back into you.

McKneff · 12 April 2019 at 6:50PM

Man up, your fault. Entirely
You must inform your insurance company even if you are not going through them otherwise you would be in breach of contract and that could cost you dearly

I would suggest you do because she also has 3 years to come up with a whiplash claim.

K4TS · 12 April 2019 at 6:59PM

Yep your all right. Thank you so much for the advice guys

System · 13 April 2019 at 12:28PM

K4TS wrote: »

she then tells me that she is just going to do it through insurance and that it was my fault,

She's right, it was and it is her prerogative to go through insurance if she so wishes. My advice is not to drive as close to the vehicle in front in future and maybe be paying a little more attention as we're all guilty of going into drone mode when driving from time to time and maybe not paying our driving the attention we should be.

Learn the lesson, move on. In the grand scheme of things it isn't that bad as nobody got hurt.

Car_54 · 13 April 2019 at 1:17PM

Tarambor wrote: »

She's right, it was and it is her prerogative to go through insurance if she so wishes.

No, it isn't. Her claim is against the OP, not his insurer. He can, if he wishes, settle the claim himself.

parking_question_chap · 13 April 2019 at 2:30PM

Keep your distance, assume everybody driving in front of you is a crash for cash scam artist. Oneday you will be proven right and it will be easy to stop in time. Also be mindful about the type of vehicle in front, how good do you think the brakes are? If much better than yours then factor that into your following gap.