Lime bike damaged our car

Mackers12

Thanks all, 

We have already paid to get the light fixed. From your advice it sounds like it may be one of those things we'll just have to lump. Not sure it sounds worth the hassle of small claims considering the high bar for demonstrating negligence, unfortunately! 

If I thought we had a reasonable prospect of seeing the money again, then it would be different. 

neilmcl

Mackers12 said:

Thanks all, 

We have already paid to get the light fixed. From your advice it sounds like it may be one of those things we'll just have to lump. Not sure it sounds worth the hassle of small claims considering the high bar for demonstrating negligence, unfortunately! 

If I thought we had a reasonable prospect of seeing the money again, then it would be different. 

Still send the LBA anyway, they may back down as those pics are quite persuasive. At the end of the day it'll only cost you £25 with minimal effort to do a money claim online so you haven't got that much to lose.

maisie_cat

neilmcl said:

jon81uk said:

Your insurer may be able to help with a legal claim

But then he'd have to declare the accident. I would stay clear of your car insurance for this one.

Bad advice, the "incident" should be disclosed to the insurance company.

Mackers12

maisie_cat said:

neilmcl said:

jon81uk said:

Your insurer may be able to help with a legal claim

But then he'd have to declare the accident. I would stay clear of your car insurance for this one.

Bad advice, the "incident" should be disclosed to the insurance company.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this bad advice (I'm not challenging you, I just am not sure why it is?).

We haven't disclosed and don't currently intend to disclose to the insurance company or claim through insurance. 

Aylesbury_Duck

Mackers12 said:

maisie_cat said:

neilmcl said:

jon81uk said:

Your insurer may be able to help with a legal claim

But then he'd have to declare the accident. I would stay clear of your car insurance for this one.

Bad advice, the "incident" should be disclosed to the insurance company.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this bad advice (I'm not challenging you, I just am not sure why it is?).

We haven't disclosed and don't currently intend to disclose to the insurance company or claim through insurance. 

Read your insurance documents.  You are probably contractually obliged to report any incidents or accidents to them, and this is an accident.  You may choose to inform your insurer for information purposes only, or not tell them and trust that it doesn't come to light at a later date - you have told Lime, after all.

I've had two situations that would cause me to play it safe and notify your insurer.  One where someone drove into the back of me at low speed, there was no visible damage and nothing picked up when I took it to the dealer for a precautionary check, but I reported it to my insurer for information purposes just in case the other party contacted their insurer.  It had no effect on my premiums that year or thereafter.  The other is that I had a stupid little bump a few years ago, entirely my fault whilst reversing, which caused several hundred pounds of damage.  It was a proper claim on my insurance but has made absolutely no difference in the last two years to my premium, until this year.   I put it on the comparison site, got the price, the claim didn't transfer through to the provider so I had to add it manually.  My renewal is £16 cheaper with the accident declared versus not having any claims on my record! 

There's a lot of scaremongering about insurers loading premiums for the slightest thing, and it's not always true.  You can simply do dummy quotes for insurance with or without the accident to see for yourself if it would make any difference.

unholyangel

Mackers12 said:

maisie_cat said:

neilmcl said:

jon81uk said:

Your insurer may be able to help with a legal claim

But then he'd have to declare the accident. I would stay clear of your car insurance for this one.

Bad advice, the "incident" should be disclosed to the insurance company.

Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this bad advice (I'm not challenging you, I just am not sure why it is?).

We haven't disclosed and don't currently intend to disclose to the insurance company or claim through insurance. 

As Ducky says, most (if not all) insurers have a clause that you need to inform them of any "incident". 

You don't have to use your insurer to make the claim on your behalf (just tell them it's information purposes only), but you do have to report it to them. FWIW, it doesn't always increase your premium. It can, but it depends on circumstances. 

Manxman_in_exile

It's a pity that you (or your neighbour) didn't get a wider angle shot showing the bike and your car in relation to the pavement.

What I mean is that the photos of the bike leaning against your car suggest that the bike was parked (I presume on a stand) relatively close to your car, so that if it were to topple over (or be knocked over by a third party) it should have been reasonably foreseeable to the hirer that it would hit your car.  This would be more so if the pavement were, say, 12 ft wide and the bike could have been parked well away from your car, but less so if the pavement is only 4 ft wide.  So were they parked unreasonably close to your car or not?  Should it have been obvious to the hirer that if it fell over it would hit your car?

I think I'd give a LBA to Lime and put in a claim if they don't respond.  Strictly speaking they haven't been legally negligent , but I think you could try arguing that they ought to be responsible, in the circumstances, for the presumed negligence of their hirer.  I don't think it's entirely unknown for the small claims court to arrive at the "right" answer if not the legally correct one.  What have you got to lose?

Have you got it in writing that they would accept responsibility if you could show that their hirer was at fault?

(Oh - I'm assuming two things: 1. the bike is parked on the pavement not the road, and the bike was parked after your car was already there?)

Sandtree

Mackers12 said:
Maybe I'm missing something, but how is this bad advice (I'm not challenging you, I just am not sure why it is?).

We haven't disclosed and don't currently intend to disclose to the insurance company or claim through insurance. 

Many people commit insurance fraud so you are not alone but it doesnt change the fact you have a contractual obligation to inform your insurers of any incidents and when getting a quote for motor insurance you will be asked to declare all incidents irrespective of if you claimed for them.

Mackers12 said:

Not really, a minor mark on the paintwork just below the light fitting that we can live with, and aren't trying to recover any costs for (we don't plan on doing anything about it). 

If you arent trying to recover costs then what are you debating with Lime?

The problem here is that the only evidence you have is that one of their bikes is against your car. You have no evidence if the last rider parked it irresponsibly, if there is a design flaw in their stand that resulted in it falling or if some of the local yobs decided to kick it over into you car.

If your above post was wrong and you are intending to recover the cost of your repairs then Lime may decide to settle because its cheaper than defending a claim but you may end up paying to go to court and losing those fees on top of the damage because you have no idea what actually happened.

Mackers12

Manxman_in_exile said:

 So were they parked unreasonably close to your car or not?  Should it have been obvious to the hirer that if it fell over it would hit your car?

Thanks for this - this was really helpful. First, both of your assumptions are correct - the car was there first, and the bike is on the pavement. Our neighbours actually sent us 6 pics, I only previously posted the 4 that showed the broken light. There is one that (sort of) shows where the bike is in relation to the car and size of footpath (below),.  so I would say that it was parked unreasonably close, and obvious that a topple was highly likely to damage the car it was parked beside. 

https://ibb.co/6FV24d2

In terms of what they have said in writing, it's a bit vague, so no, they haven't explicitly paid they would pay if we could show X, but they talk about how we must prove that the "e-bike led to the damage of the vehicle", and that, "In our view, the mere fact that Lime's e-bike has been overturned on your's vehicle does not mean that it is also responsible for the damage that has occurred." 

Sandtree said:

If you arent trying to recover costs then what are you debating with Lime?

Thanks Sandtree. Just to note that we are trying to recover the cost of the broken light fitting (which is what the original thread was centred on). The comment you quoted was in response to a question about whether there was any additional damage to the paintwork. There is a scuff on the paintwork that looks like it was caused by the bike also, but could have been there before, and in any case we aren't fussed about this.

As you point out - whether or not we are successful in trying to recover the costs is a different kettle of fish! I think the general view from all the helpful comments seems to be that a) it's going to be difficult for us to prove negligence as nobody saw the incident actually happen, but also b) the pictures are persuasive that the bike did cause the damage, and may be worth a shot. 

I've checked the Lime user agreement. It does note that any accidents must be reported asap, and any accidents with 'property damage' must be reported to the police within 24hours. However, it doesn't seem to mention anything about ensuring users park or leave the bike in a suitable location that is safe and unlikely to cause damage to a vehicle. 

Is there an argument of negligence on Lime by not educating / requiring their users not to park in an unsafe location or a location that is likely to cause damage (which could otherwise have prevented the damage)? 

Sandtree

Mackers12 said:

As you point out - whether or not we are successful in trying to recover the costs is a different kettle of fish! I think the general view from all the helpful comments seems to be that a) it's going to be difficult for us to prove negligence as nobody saw the incident actually happen, but also b) the pictures are persuasive that the bike did cause the damage, and may be worth a shot. 

I've checked the Lime user agreement. It does note that any accidents must be reported asap, and any accidents with 'property damage' must be reported to the police within 24hours. However, it doesn't seem to mention anything about ensuring users park or leave the bike in a suitable location that is safe and unlikely to cause damage to a vehicle. 

Is there an argument of negligence on Lime by not educating / requiring their users not to park in an unsafe location or a location that is likely to cause damage (which could otherwise have prevented the damage)? 

You have to remember that civil law, on which claims like this fall under, is decided on “the balance of probabilities” rather than higher threshold of “beyond reasonable doubt” that applies to criminal law.

Its a double edge sword because it does ultimately mean that many things are a bit of a roll of a dice and arguably more subjective. If ultimately you are willing to take a punt the reality is that Lime will most likely settle as a small claims court doesnt allow legal costs to recovered and so defending the claim is likely to be more expensive than settling on a without prejudice basis... though some companies will defend on principle as not to set a (non-binding) precedent even if its financially worse.

The bike itself causing the damage is fairly irrelevant, as a claims negotiator I’ve been sent hundreds of photos of roof tiles through windows after storms trying to hold our insured home owner liable but this is an act of God unless the claimant can show that the roof was in a state of disrepair prior to the storm. They key question isnt did the bike hit the car but why did it hit it? That would indicate who, if anyone, is liable.

There are various elements on parking safely on the Lime website (https://www.li.me/how-to-lime). As previously mentioned though, it may not have been one of their users that caused the problem. We have various Lime and Jump bikes around our area and its not uncommon to see one moved just a foot or two so either its got a regular user who always leaves it in the same place or more likely its others moving the bike without hiring it.... when it goes from being stood up next to the local coop side wall you’d guess thats the hirer or a good samaritan and when tis laying on the floor in the middle the pavement thats probably the local kids. More than once Iive seen it on the floor going into the shop and its been stood up and moved to the wall when I’ve come back out.