Garage involved in car crash.

Yant0s

So my mum's not had much luck. The cambelt went on her ford smax and trashed her engine. Car is worth about £4500, so decided to pay a local garage £2000 for a new engine.

Was due to get the car back today, got a phone call. Somebody has gone into the back of her car on test drive. They said from the looks of it her car will be written off.

How does this all work? It's a weird situation.

What is likely to happen. Will the drivers at fault insurance company give my mother full value of the car £4500 to my mother then treat the garages loss of earning separately and pay them £2000?

It wouldn't seem fair if she had to pay for incomplete work that she hasn't seen or inspected out of her own pocket, surely the at fault drivers insurance company would be responsible for the garages loss of earning.

I'm just unsure of she would get full market value, the car was in full working order when it was hit. Does it even matter that work was currently being carried out on it?

Surely the insurance company can only vaule the car that is actually sitting in physically Infront of them not speculate its previous condition.

Zorillo

The car isn't worth £4500 with out £2k being spent on the engine, but the engine repair doesn't add additional value to the car.

So the settlement is roughly £4500 (assuming that's a genuine figure) but your mum still owes £2k to the garage.

Yant0s

What experience do you have of these cases and knowledge of the legalities of it ?

As far as I'm concerned the work is incomplete, It is not finished, It is still under repair. Legally my mother is not supposed to pay yet, only on delivery of the finished product that she deems to her satisfaction. So why do you expect her to pay for a product that has not been delivered?

It is the third parties fault that work on the car had to cease, the their parties insurer needs to cover the garages loss of earning due to them not being able to deliver their finished product.

Look at it this way... I order something off the internet and pay for it. Before the company I can order from can pay my item, their factory burns down. The item I payed for is destroyed. So what are you saying,. You would expect me to pay for the item that was burnt in the fire and the company had not obligation to ensure I had a refund or ensured I received the item/service I payed for?

Same goes for my mum's car...

If the car gets fixed by insurance... Is then returned to the garage, to complete their engine work. Yes I agree, she needs to pay them £2000 on work completion.

IF the car is written off and the garage is unable to complete the work payed for and deliver the product promised to their customer in the agreed contract. Why is my mother responsible for paying them for an incomplete service ? They must claim on the third parties insurance as the crash destroyed their product/service. Same as the fire did in my example.


As for the insurance valuations of the car legally the can only vaulate what is physically in front of them?

Do you honesty think it would be legal to ignore the condition of the car that's infront of them and base their valuations on a guess on what the car was valued at three months before the accident?

Of they can go back three months ago and value the cars condition,. I presume my mother would be also happy to go back 3 months and 2 days before the cam belt snapped. I don't think so...

Legally surely they can only vaulate the car that is Infront of them?

HHarry

Well if the work hadn’t been completed then the car isn’t worth £4.5k. It’s an S-Max with a trashed engine worth the scrap value.

Either the car was fixed, it’s worth £4.5k, and you owe the garage their £2k.
Or it wasn’t fixed and the insurance company give you £500.

Yant0s

Do you work in insurance?

Just the insurance guy who advised me said...

The car must be valuated in its exact condition of the time of crash (with new engine) legally, the valuation figure will be sent to my mother.

As work by the garage is legally classed as incomplete if the car is written off. The garage cannot deliver a completed product to their customer. The at fault party destroyed the garages work in the crash this means the at fault partys insure is responsible for paying the garages loss of earnings.

On the flip side if the car is not deemed a write off , crash damage is repaired by insurance,. the garage receives the car back to complete its own repairs. Yes my mother is responsible for paying garage fees as the work was classed as complete.

lisyloo

Why are you asking here if you’d had professional advice?

foxtrotoscar_2

The work the garage has done is either complete or incomplete, you can't have it both ways LEGALLY. If you messed me around like this the old engine would be refitted. LEGALLY, the new engine does not belong to the customer until it's paid for.

Keep_pedalling

Your mother is responsible for paying for the work that was carried out, which sounds like everything bar the completion of a test dive. She has no right to expect to be put in a position where she is £2k better off than she would have been had the accident not happened, and certainly not at the expense of the totally innocent garage.

csgohan4

OP looks like you want your cake and eat, which is it? If you don't pay the garage bill, expect to be taken to a small claims court.

Your going to be put back into the position before the crash, a car that needs fixing.

dacouch

Yant0s wrote: »

Do you work in insurance?

Just the insurance guy who advised me said...

The car must be valuated in its exact condition of the time of crash (with new engine) legally, the valuation figure will be sent to my mother.

As work by the garage is legally classed as incomplete if the car is written off. The garage cannot deliver a completed product to their customer. The at fault party destroyed the garages work in the crash this means the at fault partys insure is responsible for paying the garages loss of earnings.

On the flip side if the car is not deemed a write off , crash damage is repaired by insurance,. the garage receives the car back to complete its own repairs. Yes my mother is responsible for paying garage fees as the work was classed as complete.

If the second paragraph is the advice your Insurance guy told you then he does not know what he is talking about.

Was it someone in a call center who told you this?

The garage will not release the car until they're paid the money they are due for completing the work

Aretnap

Yant0s wrote: »

What is likely to happen. Will the drivers at fault insurance company give my mother full value of the car £4500 to my mother then treat the garages loss of earning separately and pay them £2000?

It wouldn't seem fair if she had to pay for incomplete work that she hasn't seen or inspected out of her own pocket, surely the at fault drivers insurance company would be responsible for the garages loss of earnings.

No. This is one of several errors in your thinking (the others have already been covered).

The other driver (and hence his insurer) is only liable for the damage he actually caused. If he wrote off a car that was in good condition, that means he has to pay the value of a car in good condition - presumably £4500. He doesn't have to pay the value of the car AND the cost of the work it took to bring it up to that value - that would mean in effect he would have to pay for the repairs twice.

Looking at it from his point of view, it's right and proper that he has to pay for the damage that he's caused, but it would be manifestly unfair if he had to pay a different amount for the same car just because it was being driven by a mechanic on a test drive, rather than by your mum on her way home a few hours later after the repairs had been finished.

So your mum gets fair value for it based on its condition at the time of the accident - but she owes the garage for the work they had actually done to get it into that condition, which as above sounds like everything they were supposed to do bar half a test drive.

Of course if, as you suggest, the work was not complete, it will be obvious when the insurance company inspect the car that it had a half finished engine replacement, and they will reduce their valuation to reflect the incomplete state of the repairs. You can't have it both ways - the repairs were either completed or they were not.