Retain and repair our own car that was declared Cat S. No fault accident. Dvla.

Pumpadinkadonk

Hello everyone.

Just a bit of background. I was involved in a no fault accident in my car. We mistakenly phoned a no-fault accident management company to deal with the matter after the accident and they are dealing with it on our behalf. (Darn google search). We realised this and informed our actual insurance company about the accident and told them we would not be claiming through our actual policy.

The management company have been dealing with it fine so far. And the other party in the accident has admitted fault and will pay us a good price. The car has been deemed Cat S. So it can be repaired but not worth it in the eyes of insurance.

We want to keep the car and repair it so we will be paid the value of the car minus the salvage value. 

I have tried to get answers about Cat S cars and what to do, but they only seem to cover issues concerning what happens when.
1. The insurer/ agent keeps it and sends it for salvage.
2. Or you want to buy a car that has been previously declared Cat S by someone else.

So this car will still belong to us and will never have been owned by the insurer or a salvage yard.

We will be taking it back and repairing it.

I have see information about re-registering it with the DVLA, but that does not seem to apply to our situation where we retain our car, fix it with a trusted garage and make it road worthy again. 

Please can anyone clarify this for me because it is so confusing.

DullGreyGuy

Check with the third party insurer if they are actually going to inform the DVLA and MIAFTR that its a Cat S total loss... insurers will always do so for their own insured's vehicle but don't always do so with TP vehicles that aren't A/B total losses 

Nobbie1967

You don’t need to re-register it, just repair it and continue driving it. It might be prudent to get it MOT’d after repair for peace of mind. When mine was written off after I claimed against the third party’s insurance, when they settled, they informed me that it would be recorded as a Cat S and I should inform anyone I sold the car to that it was such (since the V5 wouldn’t show it until updated by the new keeper).

Just make sure you keep a note of when the tax is due. After mine was written off, I didn’t receive a tax reminder and as a result was untaxed for 3 months. The lack of reminder may be unrelated to the writeoff, but it’s the only time I’ve not received one and you can see the logic of not bothering to send a reminder if the car is probably sat in a scrapyard somewhere.

BEBELUCA2017

Do you really want to be driving around in a vehicle that was been deemed structurally unsound regardless as to whether it was been recorded or not?  Also, repairing a vehicle with such extensive damage may not be economically viable if you're not in the trade or know somebody that will do it cheaply for you.

DullGreyGuy

BEBELUCA2017 said:

Do you really want to be driving around in a vehicle that was been deemed structurally unsound regardless as to whether it was been recorded or not?  Also, repairing a vehicle with such extensive damage may not be economically viable if you're not in the trade or know somebody that will do it cheaply for you.

There is structural damage, doesn't mean it's structurally unsound. 

If the OPs car was much newer then it probably would have been economical to repair it, have sent plenty of cars to be put on a jig to have the frame straightened after an accident. It's just thats an expensive process and so it exceeds the value of the OPs car. 

Cat A or B mean it's unsafe to be repaired and either B. can be broken for parts or A. has to be crushed. 

Nobbie1967

BEBELUCA2017 said:

Do you really want to be driving around in a vehicle that was been deemed structurally unsound regardless as to whether it was been recorded or not?  Also, repairing a vehicle with such extensive damage may not be economically viable if you're not in the trade or know somebody that will do it cheaply for you.

In many cases, mine included, there is no engineers inspection of the car to determine whether it is structurally sound, but a quick judgement call based on photos of the damage submitted. Mine was a frontal impact and damage was limited to the front crash bar that was unbolted and replaced. Given how these can rust, the car is probably more structurally sound after repair. Suspect they thought the impact may have damaged the inner wing, but this was fine.