Outstanding Car Loan After Non-Fault Total Loss Accident

jimjames

DisgruntledTotalLossGuy said:

Herzlos said:

How the car was financed or it's potential value are irrelevant here. The only relevant figure is how much the car was worth moments before the crash - the insurance company reckon that's £4000, but you seem to think it's higher.  Can you prove your valuation? Are there similar cars for sale you can use as a reference?

How much do you want the insurance company to pay you?

Hi Herzlos, I don't think it's higher than the valuation. Mind you, my £4,000 valuation was independent and my insurer honoured it after offering £2,000 then £3,500.

If you think the car is worth £4000 and they're paying £4000 then I don't think you have a case. A potential increase in value at some point down the line is irrelevant for a situation now. What the other insurance company insure isn't really your business, they may decline to insure that driver any more if they hadn't been aware previously. Maybe they were aware and the medical advice was that it was ok. Either way it's not your concern.

400ixl

As others have said, the purpose of the insurance is to put you back in the position you would have been before the accident. The debt you have for the vehicle is not relevant, its the market value. Likewise the repair value is not relevant if it exceeds the market value and they have offered a fair settlement.

You could if you are dealing directly with the 3rd party insurer try insisting they repair it, but given the big difference I don't see that being accepted.

The legal / medical fitness of the other driven is also not of your concern or likely to play any part of a non personal injury claim.

The only costs on top of the vehicle settlement would be any uninsured losses you can prove to incurred. For example if you had to hire a car between the date of reporting the accident and the settlement offer.

Don't think you have much of a case around the vehicle settlement.

Aretnap

It's a fairly fundamental principle of tort law that damages are intended to compensate for your losses, not to punish wrongdoing. If a negligent driver damages or destroys your car then it doesn't matter whether the negligence consists of taking his eye off the road for a moment or being drunk, high on drugs and driving at 100 mph. Your loss (the damage to your car) is the same in either event; you don't get extra compensation because he was very negligent rather than a little bit negligent.

It's also a fairly fundamental principle that compensation for damage to property is calculated in terms of the loss in value that the property has suffered. If the repair bill is less than the value of the item then the repair cost will generally be taken as equivalent to the loss in value (a £4000 car which needs £1000 of repairs is worth about £3000), but by definition the compensation due cannot be greater than the pre-accident value. By the same token it makes no difference whether the car was bought with cash, on finance, with a credit card or whether it was a gift that you didn't pay for at all - the value is the same in all cases.

I'm still not sure why you think the insurance company is to blame - it is hardly realistic to expect them to conduct medical examinations on everyone they insure on the off-chance that they have undeclared medical conditions - but even if they were to blame it would not help you because of the first two points.

Grey_Critic

The fitness to drive of the other driver only becomes of importance if they had not declared the condition. I would assume that the other driver was medically cleared to drive. Not that it matters as the insurer has paid you the value of the car.

We do not insure our vehicles on a new for old basis as we do our houses - I have previously questioned the fact the premium we pay does not reduce along with the depreciation of the vehicle but does tend to increase

Compare the value of my house since I bought it back in 1975 (which has increased by hundreds of percent) yet my insurance is not much different from back then.

Car_54

Grey_Critic said:

The fitness to drive of the other driver only becomes of importance if they had not declared the condition. I would assume that the other driver was medically cleared to drive. Not that it matters as the insurer has paid you the value of the car.

We do not insure our vehicles on a new for old basis as we do our houses - I have previously questioned the fact the premium we pay does not reduce along with the depreciation of the vehicle but does tend to increase

Compare the value of my house since I bought it back in 1975 (which has increased by hundreds of percent) yet my insurance is not much different from back then.

The big risk for the insurers is not the damage to your car. It’s the seven pedestrians you mow down, after bouncing off two Ferraris and a Rolls-Royce.
Houses tend not to do that.

Aretnap

Grey_Critic said:We do not insure our vehicles on a new for old basis as we do our houses - I have previously questioned the fact the premium we pay does not reduce along with the depreciation of the vehicle but does tend to increase

Unless you drive a very expensive sports car, the value of your car is fairly irrelevant to your car insurance premium because most of the risk is third party claims. If you drive a 10 year old Ford Focus about 2% of your premium rejects the risk that your insurer might have to pay out for a 10 year old Ford Focus. The other 98% rejects the risk that you might cripple someone for life, leaving your insurer with a bill for £23 million. You are just as likely to do that in an old cheap car as a new expensive car. In fact if anything you are more likely to do it in an old car, because the old car will not have modern safety features and is more likely to be in poor mechanical condition than a shiny new expensive one. 

[Deleted User]

Why are you unlikely to get a car that is similar? Are they very rare or something?

DullGreyGuy

Grey_Critic said:

We do not insure our vehicles on a new for old basis as we do our houses - I have previously questioned the fact the premium we pay does not reduce along with the depreciation of the vehicle but does tend to increase

Compare the value of my house since I bought it back in 1975 (which has increased by hundreds of percent) yet my insurance is not much different from back then.

Car depreciates in value but cost of staff, repairs and all the other claims and operational costs increase so its a question of how the two balance. Plus the value of a car simply creates a cap for first party loses, it doesnt reduce the value of most claims. If you have a £1,000 claim it doesnt mater if your car is worth £3,000, £30,000 or £300,000 the insurer is still paying out £1k

Car_54 said:

Grey_Critic said:

The fitness to drive of the other driver only becomes of importance if they had not declared the condition. I would assume that the other driver was medically cleared to drive. Not that it matters as the insurer has paid you the value of the car.

We do not insure our vehicles on a new for old basis as we do our houses - I have previously questioned the fact the premium we pay does not reduce along with the depreciation of the vehicle but does tend to increase

Compare the value of my house since I bought it back in 1975 (which has increased by hundreds of percent) yet my insurance is not much different from back then.

The big risk for the insurers is not the damage to your car. It’s the seven pedestrians you mow down

Havent seen any Motor stats for a good few years but it certainly used to be more like 50/50 on an aggregate basis. Yes 1st party claims tend to be much lower value but there are many 1 party claims like driving into your own garage wall, theft, fire, vandalism etc which offsets the fact that third party claims on average are much higher in value.

Whilst in principle someone could accidentally mow down a billionaire crossing the street the reality is most injury claims are whiplash/soft tissue which these days in particular do not add that much to the cost of claims.