Negotiating cash settlement from insurance

robdex1

Was involved in a non fault accident where the 3rd party went in to the back of me and damaged rear bumper and boot lid. Spoke to my insurers and they said its a write off and they will offer me the market value at £2700 but I can't keep the car or buy it back. Its a 57 homda jazz with 77k miles. Decide to call 3rd party insurers and after looking at photos they have said the same thing and have offered £2100. I tried to argue its worth more but he said trade value is £1300 and retail is £2100. 

My main objective is just to get a payout and keep the car as I managed to get a friend to secure the bumper so it is completely driveable. They said if I want to keep the car then I will get around £1500. My question is should I try to negotiate the amount or just take it. 

DullGreyGuy

Your free to make a counter offer if you want but as you are dealing with the third party insurer then you dont have any right of complaint and escalation to the Financial Ombudsman. Your escalation would be paying an engineers report to get an independent view of the value and then court 

Most insurers will give at least some wriggle room rather than risk incurring the costs associated with court etc.

Petriix

I've had reasonable success haggling before but you need to be realistic and find some evidence. My strategy was to find the cheapest like-for-like vehicle which was either the same or better in every attribute i.e. I wouldn't accept a lower trim or higher mileage. I found a few examples on Autotrader and argued the toss with the third party insurers. They tried to fob me off with a bit less, I mentioned the distance/cost to collect, they got managerial approval and met me in the middle.