Hit and run on motorway

booter

Hi all. The lad (19) was crashed into on the motorway by a truck with non uk reg. His car was seriously damaged, and he's lucky to have walked away with just a few aches and pains.  The truck didn't stop or report 🤬

The lad reported, expecting the police to make attempts to locate the driver, but they then said that cctv footage shows a non uk reg. They said there was no way to get the driver's insurance details, so they can't take it any further and passed the case directly to Highways England.  Highways England can't investigate, and don't know why the police haven't/can't/won't 🤷‍♂️ Not even sure why it's been passed to them!?
Oh, and their best advice was to speak to the CAB.🤨

Long story short, he has a 9K car, fully comp insurance which cost him nearly 2K but no ncb.  If he makes a claim, the cost of future insurance will be crippling, so he doesn't want to claim. It's looking like the repairs are going to be at least 1.5K 😔 (not yet had the full estimate)

He's worked and saved so hard to buy this car and get the insurance  (no outstanding finance) and it seems so unfair that he's going to be badly financially penalised for something that wasn't his fault! But, I'm just glad he's ok - it could have so easily been a different story 😑

Can anyone offer any advice or suggestions please?!

GrumpyDil

Have you notified his insurance company yet as that is a requirement even if you don't claim on the policy.

I also don't know if the insurance company will have ways of tracking down the insurance details from the reg, similar to the way it works in the UK.

Also, I'd suggest making sure that any cctv footage is retained, if that's possible, as if you do find a way of tracing the vehicle that will be important. 

DB1904

If the vehicle was an artic what reg are they looking at the trailer or the tractor unit?

angrycrow

As above post some countries register lorries different to the UK with separate registrations for the trailer and cab. Guessing this is the case here and the dash cam only captures the trailer registration so the police are unable to locate the lorry.

As your sons insurers will be unable to locate the responsible lorry this will be a fault claim if he uses his own insurers. Either way he needs to declare it to his insurers and it will effect his renewal next year. 

born_again

In cases like this it should be a simple case of reg flagged at all ports. When it tries to leave it gets impounded. Driver is taken to court & their insurance is then forced to pay of lorry is kept impounded.

Belenus

booter said:

Hi all. The lad (19) was crashed into on the motorway by a truck with non uk reg. His car was seriously damaged, and he's lucky to have walked away with just a few aches and pains.  The truck didn't stop or report 🤬

I am glad that your son is relatively unharmed physically.

It is possible that the lorry driver was unaware that he hit your son's car. How likely is that from your son's description of what happened?

Please don't take offence at this but is it possible that your son was partly or wholly at fault for the accident?

Belenus

born_again said:

In cases like this it should be a simple case of reg flagged at all ports. When it tries to leave it gets impounded. Driver is taken to court & their insurance is then forced to pay of lorry is kept impounded.

That could be fraught with difficulties.

Anyone could claim wrongly or maliciously that Lorry XXX YYY has caused an accident and not stopped.

Who would decide on the truth?

It would be very unfair for a completely innocent foreign truck driver to be detained and have his lorry impounded for days or weeks while investigations take place.

booter

GrumpyDil said:

Have you notified his insurance company yet as that is a requirement even if you don't claim on the policy.

I also don't know if the insurance company will have ways of tracking down the insurance details from the reg, similar to the way it works in the UK.

Also, I'd suggest making sure that any cctv footage is retained, if that's possible, as if you do find a way of tracing the vehicle that will be important. 

No, he's not reported it yet - think he's still in shock tbh, but I've advised him the same 😊

Not sure how I can ensure cctv footage is retained though?! Police pass the buck to Highways England and they just say they can't provide it!

booter

DB1904 said:

If the vehicle was an artic what reg are they looking at the trailer or the tractor unit?

angrycrow said:

As above post some countries register lorries different to the UK with separate registrations for the trailer and cab. Guessing this is the case here and the dash cam only captures the trailer registration so the police are unable to locate the lorry.

As your sons insurers will be unable to locate the responsible lorry this will be a fault claim if he uses his own insurers. Either way he needs to declare it to his insurers and it will effect his renewal next year. 

Thanks, I didn't know this 😔 It was the trailer reg (taken as the lorry sped (sp?!) off 🤬

booter

Belenus said:

booter said:

Hi all. The lad (19) was crashed into on the motorway by a truck with non uk reg. His car was seriously damaged, and he's lucky to have walked away with just a few aches and pains.  The truck didn't stop or report 🤬

I am glad that your son is relatively unharmed physically.

It is possible that the lorry driver was unaware that he hit your son's car. How likely is that from your son's description of what happened?

Please don't take offence at this but is it possible that your son was partly or wholly at fault for the accident?

From what he's said, I don't think the lorry driver was unaware, just not bothered 🤷‍♂️

Not offended by the possibility that some fault may lie with him - after all, I wasn't there, so at the moment (without the cctv footage) I can't be 100% certain.

DB1904

born_again said:

In cases like this it should be a simple case of reg flagged at all ports. When it tries to leave it gets impounded. Driver is taken to court & their insurance is then forced to pay of lorry is kept impounded.

Not sure how that would work, the driver may have failed to stop but would need to prove they were aware. What would you suggest happen is the driver failed to stop but wasn't to blame? A law saying their insurance must pay even though they aren't liable.