Breakdown cover & winching

DD265

Anybody know of any breakdown policies which include winching as standard?

EdGasketTheSecond

What's 'winching'?

Nobbie1967

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

What's 'winching'?

Dragging out of a ditch or similar I assume.

Scrapit

Winching onto the load bed of the recovery truck or winching out of a green lane etc? Cos the first is fairly standard, the second alot rarer

DD265

Sorry, onto the load bed of a recovery truck - in this case, from a nice level bit of road.

Had my car recovered this morning; thought suspension had gone, turned out to be a stone wedged between the wheel and caliper, and a coincidentally loose mud flap. We didn't know about the stone at the time and the recovery driver winched the car onto the truck. It could've driven on; the wheel moved the same either way. I wasn't given an option.

That was this morning, and this evening my breakdown cover provider want to charge me £135 for the privilege of using 'specialist equipment'. In the T&Cs of my policy 'winching' is counted as specialist equipment, but I am struggling to get my head around why what happened was anything more than a bog standard recovery. The recovery firm didn't notify the insurer until 7 hours after the recovery took place. The insurer say I should've been asked to agree the charge before being recovered, so I'm refusing to pay on that basis.

I would like to get a quote from another firm for cover going forward, to see if I think it's worthwhile switching.

twhitehousescat

hang on , any broken down car would need to be "pulled" onto the flatbed with some form of winch

unless you could say , push a 2 ton car/suv on with just your back

it is normal practice to winch a vehicle if it cannot move under its own steam

Boomslang

EdGasketTheSecond wrote: »

What's 'winching'?

Snogging ?

AdrianC

DD265 wrote: »

Sorry, onto the load bed of a recovery truck - in this case, from a nice level bit of road.
...
That was this morning, and this evening my breakdown cover provider want to charge me £135 for the privilege of using 'specialist equipment'. In the T&Cs of my policy 'winching' is counted as specialist equipment, but I am struggling to get my head around why what happened was anything more than a bog standard recovery.

They're having a laugh. That should be a bog-standard recovery.

I suspect chinese whispers, and they thought you were in a ditch or something - they all charge for recovery from off the road.

Norman_Castle

In the T&Cs of my policy 'winching' is counted as specialist equipment, but I am struggling to get my head around why what happened was anything more than a bog standard recovery.

Its normal to winch a car onto a recovery truck, I suspect being winched out of an awkward location is considered differently. How far were you winched onto the truck and from where?

sevenhills

DD265 wrote: »

Had my car recovered this morning; thought suspension had gone, turned out to be a stone wedged between the wheel and caliper, and a coincidentally loose mud flap. We didn't know about the stone at the time and the recovery driver winched the car onto the truck. It could've driven on; the wheel moved the same either way. I wasn't given an option.

Maybe, because your car hadn't actually broken down, they are trying to recover the cost?

EdGasketTheSecond

I've been winched onto a flat-bed truck by autaid twice and out of a ditch once. AA and RAC should also recover you if you have recovery option