Admiral car insurance - liars and and double dealers.

seanymor

My car was hit by an Admiral policy holder while it was parked outside my house. Their car became entangled in my rear bumper and they had no choice but to knock at my door and admit fault. Several days later, Admiral contacted me to arrange for repair. Their repair company (Steer from Ayr) took my car away. A couple of weeks later my car was returned but not all the damage was fixed and I rejected it. Steer took my car away again. Several weeks later my car was returned. The following morning, in the full light of day, it was obvious that the replaced/repaired bumper was not a match to the colour of my car. I raised a complaint with Admiral about the inadequate paintwork and the excessive delays. After several weeks Admiral agreed that the delays were excessive. For the bpotched paintwork, they made the shocking and reidiculous determination that my original bumper (and it was original) was a poor colour match before they repaired it. They said this was an end to the matter and I was to take it  up with the Financial Ombudsman if I was not satisfied. 

I contacted the Ombudsman immediately and raised a complaint, as advised. After a month the Ombudsman responded to say that Admiral rejected the complaint because I was  not an Admiral  policy holder. As a result, the Ombudsman said they could not progress.

So, through not fault of my own, I have suffered at the hands of an Admiral driver hitting my car, suffered at the hands of Admiral's repairers who made a mess of the repair and suffered at the hands of Admiral cutomer service who wasted my time,  lied about the original colour of my car prior to repair and lied about escalating to the Ombudsman.

I appear to have no redress - as far as I know. The Ombudsman was very disappointing and clearly ineffective. Admiral have squirmed out of it and I consider to be a deeply dishonest and unscrupulous company. It feels like this is well worn a scam.

Not much you can do to avoid Admirla policy holders hitting you, but think twice before accepting their repairers if you do find yourself in this position. And spare other drivers the hassle by not buying a policy from them.

HampshireH

Have you spoken to your insurers and asked them to take this up with Admiral

km1500

you shouldn't be dealing with Admiral at all you're not even their customer you should be dealing with your own insurance company

have you notified your insurance company about what's happened you have the legal duty to do this otherwise you risk having your policy voided should you ever come to claim in the future

DullGreyGuy

seanymor said:

My car was hit by an Admiral policy holder while it was parked outside my house. Their car became entangled in my rear bumper and they had no choice but to knock at my door and admit fault. Several days later, Admiral contacted me to arrange for repair. Their repair company (Steer from Ayr) took my car away. A couple of weeks later my car was returned but not all the damage was fixed and I rejected it. Steer took my car away again. Several weeks later my car was returned. The following morning, in the full light of day, it was obvious that the replaced/repaired bumper was not a match to the colour of my car. I raised a complaint with Admiral about the inadequate paintwork and the excessive delays. After several weeks Admiral agreed that the delays were excessive. For the bpotched paintwork, they made the shocking and reidiculous determination that my original bumper (and it was original) was a poor colour match before they repaired it. They said this was an end to the matter and I was to take it  up with the Financial Ombudsman if I was not satisfied. 

I contacted the Ombudsman immediately and raised a complaint, as advised. After a month the Ombudsman responded to say that Admiral rejected the complaint because I was  not an Admiral  policy holder. As a result, the Ombudsman said they could not progress.

So, through not fault of my own, I have suffered at the hands of an Admiral driver hitting my car, suffered at the hands of Admiral's repairers who made a mess of the repair and suffered at the hands of Admiral cutomer service who wasted my time,  lied about the original colour of my car prior to repair and lied about escalating to the Ombudsman.

I appear to have no redress - as far as I know. The Ombudsman was very disappointing and clearly ineffective. Admiral have squirmed out of it and I consider to be a deeply dishonest and unscrupulous company. It feels like this is well worn a scam.

Not much you can do to avoid Admirla policy holders hitting you, but think twice before accepting their repairers if you do find yourself in this position. And spare other drivers the hassle by not buying a policy from them.

Whilst the repairers are acting under the insurers instruction and therefore the insurer is responsible for any issue its not as if the insurer has told them to throw any old paint on it nor is it as if the person on the phone has personally seen it but is simply going on what the garage has informed them. The older the car the harder it is to paint match.

Without any comment to your own vehicle, just because something is "original" doesn't mean it's a good colour match. My first car, a Mk1 fiesta was almost as old as me when I bought it from its from new owner (a friend), never had crash damage and yet the bonnet had faded much more than the rest of the car and the plastic rear bumper hadn't faded at all so there was a notable difference between them and the neighbouring panels. 

Admiral's job in this scenario is to indemnify their policyholder in respect of your claim against them, they are looking after their customer (and their shareholders) rather than trying to ensure you have an amazing experience. If you want someone looking after you, you claim off your own insurance as thats what you've paid them for and they then deal with Admiral after. This way you have access to the Ombudsman if something goes wrong. Downside of claiming off your own insurance is the paying the excess and having to reclaim it and the open claim if you are near to renewal. 

Having gone down this path you've really got 3 choices...

1) Live with the paint 

2) Get a quote for respraying & blending, submit it, if they dont accept it then consider litigation

3) Get an engineer to inspect the repairs and prepare a report, get a quote for fixes the engineer says is necessary if its not built into the quote, submit it, if they dont accept it then consider litigation

The problem with 2 is that it doesn't prove the paint job wasn't good enough and problem with both 2 and 3 is that it doesn't prove how the car looked with its original bumper to contest their claim that fading etc meant it already didnt match well

mr_stripey

your own insurance company would have a better chance of getting a good outcome here. 

Hoenir

Why haven't you involved your own insurance company? 

ThorOdinson

The only other option is get it sorted yourself and try to recover the cost from small claims court.

PHK

Hoenir said:

Why haven't you involved your own insurance company? 

Yes, by not involving their own insurance company the OP has potentially prejudiced the insurance companies position. Also, could result in problems should the OP want to claim in future. 

I am surprised that Admiral didn't ask to speak to the OPs insurer. The claim would be recorded on CUE so it's not as if the OP's insurer wouldn't find out in the future. 

400ixl

PHK said:

Hoenir said:

Why haven't you involved your own insurance company? 

Yes, by not involving their own insurance company the OP has potentially prejudiced the insurance companies position. Also, could result in problems should the OP want to claim in future. 

I am surprised that Admiral didn't ask to speak to the OPs insurer. The claim would be recorded on CUE so it's not as if the OP's insurer wouldn't find out in the future. 

Because they are trying to avoid the OP getting passed to an accident claims company who will put them in a credit hire vehicle and increase their costs by thousands. The 3rd party insurer want to be in control.

Ideally the OP would have gone through their own insurer, refusing any accident claims company involvement.

PHK

I agree that they should avoid a credit hire agreement but that doesn't mean they should contact their insurer. Because not doing may have a significant effect on any claim made in future. 

eddddy

FWIW, I've dealt direct with the "other party's" insurers on 3 occasions, when the other parties were at fault.

I informed my own insurers 'for information only' and they were happy with the arrangement.

On all 3 occasions, the "other party's" insurers seemed to be falling over themselves to give a good service - presumably because they didn't want me to go to an accident management company.

• 1) On one occasion, for a major repair, I chose my own repairer - a main dealership.
• 2) On another occasion, I checked out the insurers nominated repairer and was happy with them
• 3) On another occasion, I negotiated a cash settlement, which I was very pleased with

On both occasion 1 and 2, there was some disputed damage - I thought it was caused by the accidents, the repairers said they thought it was unlikely, but the "other party's" insurers agreed to pay for it anyway.

And on occasion 1, after a few months the new paint started rippling. I didn't contact the insurer, I just contacted the main dealer, and they did the paintwork again.

@seanymor - maybe contact the repairer, rather than the insurer, about your paint matching issue.



(Prior to that I had dealt with my own insurer following an accident when another driver was at fault - and they were much more difficult, and more 'tight-fisted'.)