Car in freak accident

msdeedee

My car was parked on a steep road near my home & got badly damaged when a parked van rolled backwards & hit it (along with 3 others). The van is owned by a local business & someone had parked & was sat in it when it crashed. My car is a write-off & I’ve been offered a fraction of what I paid for it less than 4 years ago. Is there anything I can do? The van was not parked in gear on a steep hill & the driver made no attempt to apply the foot brake. Any advice is much appreciated!

KimJongUn88

Of course you’re going to get paid a fraction of what you paid for it four years ago, cars depreciate.

AdrianC

msdeedee said:

My car was parked on a steep road near my home & got badly damaged when a parked van rolled backwards & hit it (along with 3 others). The van is owned by a local business & someone had parked & was sat in it when it crashed. My car is a write-off & I’ve been offered a fraction of what I paid for it less than 4 years ago. Is there anything I can do? The van was not parked in gear on a steep hill & the driver made no attempt to apply the foot brake. Any advice is much appreciated!

Hardly that freak. We used to live on a steepish hill, and it was a semi-regular occurrence.
I had one car wing and door bent by a roll-away.
My downhill neighbour had a car pushed into a lamp post and written off.
One car ended up upside down in a garden.

You claim from the van insurance. They can hardly deny liability...
You get the fair market value of your car immediately prior to the collision.

No, you don't get new-for-old replacement for a 4yo car...

Aretnap

What do you mean by is there anything you can do? If you're hoping to get the price of a brand new car then no, there's nothing you can do - the van driver's liability (and therefore his insurance company's liability) is to pay you the value of the car at the time it was destroyed - not its value at some point in the past. 

I suppose you could take out Gap insurance next time you buy a new car, if getting a new for old replacement nearly 4 years later is important to you. However it's a bit late to do that for the current car. 

Or if you think that the price you've been offered doesn't reflect the car's (second hand) value now, read up on how the Financial Ombudsman thinks that the car should be valued. 
https://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/consumers/complaints-can-help/insurance/motor-insurance/vehicle-valuations-write-offs
Note that you can only actually complain to the Ombudsman if you're making the claim through your own insurance company - they don't deal with complaints about third party insurance companies. However the third party insurer should be using the same process to value your car. 

ElizabethRose

A lot of the circumstances don't matter about who owns the van etc. Essentially your car has been damaged in a non fault accident and as a result written off. The insurance company (unclear your own or your claiming through the third party) have offered you what your car is worth now. 

Cars deprecate as soon as you drive them off the forecourt. A four year old car is worth no where near what it was when you bought it. The insurance is there to put you back in the same position so a four year old car not a new one.

MinuteNoodles

ElizabethRose said:

Cars deprecate as soon as you drive them off the forecourt. A four year old car is worth no where near what it was when you bought it. The insurance is there to put you back in the same position so a four year old car not a new one.

This. I bought my car as an ex-demo 5 months old with 5k on the clock. I bought it for £16k, almost a third less than it's new £23,800 value. A year on according to various price guides and WBAC valuation it's lost another £3k. So at 18 months old it's worth £10k less than it was new.

macman

I'm not convinced that the OP was expecting the insurance to pay out on a 'new for old' basis. I think she is just saying that the settlement offer is lower than she was hoping for and what can she do about it?

AdrianC

macman said:

I'm not convinced that the OP was expecting the insurance to pay out on a 'new for old' basis. I think she is just saying that the settlement offer is lower than she was hoping for and what can she do about it?

Perhaps.

But...

msdeedee said:

...& I’ve been offered a fraction of what I paid for it less than 4 years ago.

Grumpy_chap

The OP has also not given any indication of what fraction they have been offered of what they paid 4 years ago.  1% or 99% makes a big difference to the whole thread.

Mickey666

KimJongUn88 said:

Of course you’re going to get paid a fraction of what you paid for it four years ago, cars depreciate.

I don't agree with insurance companies 'writing off' a car simply because the repairs would cost more than the value of the car.  I know they do it all the time and it has become standard practice, but I don't like it.

Why? Because it means someone can cause, say, £5,000 worth of damage but only have to pay out, say, £1,000.  It simply isn't fair.

If someone damages my car, I'm not really interested in the cost of the repairs or the value of my car.  What I want, and which insurance is supposed to be about, it to be put back into the same position as I was before the inflicted damage - ie MY car, repaired to the state it was.  If it was someone else's fault, why should I suffer any loss?

Why is it so unreasonable to expect the guilty party to pay for the repairs, regardless of the value of the car?  I wasn't planning on going shopping for a new car, I don't want to be forced to go shopping for a new car, I'm quite happy with my existing one, it has another 10 years in it and I was planning to keep it.  If someone damages it they should pay to put it right!

If the guilty party's insurance company will only pay a proportion of the damage caused then why should that be my problem?

AdrianC

Mickey666 said:

I don't agree with insurance companies 'writing off' a car simply because the repairs would cost more than the value of the car.  I know they do it all the time and it has become standard practice, but I don't like it.

It's the very definition of "beyond economic repair".

Why? Because it means someone can cause, say, £5,000 worth of damage but only have to pay out, say, £1,000.  It simply isn't fair.

Of course it's fair.

You had a car worth a grand, that car ceases to exist, you have the value of it... a grand.

If someone damages my car, I'm not really interested in the cost of the repairs or the value of my car.  What I want, and which insurance is supposed to be about, it to be put back into the same position as I was before the inflicted damage - ie MY car, repaired to the state it was.

No, that's not what "insurance is supposed to be about". Read your policy docs.

If it was someone else's fault, why should I suffer any loss?

You haven't. Your car was worth a grand, you now have the value of it - a grand.

If you want an insurance policy prepared to pay out ten grand on a one grand car, then find an insurer prepared to offer one. You'll obvs need to pay an appropriate premium...

For classics, where value can be harder to define post-event, there's "agreed value" policies - where the value is agreed up front. But they still won't pay more than that value to repair it.

And that's before we get near damage bad enough for Cat B status... Would you really expect insurers to reshell these, f'rinstance? https://www.copart.co.uk/lot/43153530 or https://www.copart.co.uk/lot/42045050