Cat n wrongly logged on car

Nicoranger

Hi all , I don’t know if anyone has had this problem before and can help me.
In December 2021 I had a non fault accident and the third party insurer paid for repairs.
In November 2024 I tried to part ex my car only to be told that there was a cat n marker on a hip check. Having spent the last few months trying to find out who has put this marker on , definitely not from any of my broker , underwriter , motor engineer or repairer on my side , I can only assume it was put on by mistake by the third party insurer. How do i get this marker removed as it devalues the car by nearly 50%.
hope someone can help that has had the same problem because insurance companies are no help at all .

DullGreyGuy

They are taking the micky if they are taking 50% off for a cat N. 

So you claimed directly from the third party insurers? Used an accident management company? 

In the first instance approach the third party insurers, be aware however you have no right of going to the ombudsman as a third party. 

paul_c123

Nicoranger said:

I can only assume it was put on by mistake by the third party insurer. 

Unfortunately you can't assume that. It is quite possible the Cat N marker was on previous to your ownership - did you check this when you bought it?

In any case, to check (properly), you'll need to do a paid-for vehicle check which will reveal WHEN it was put on.

Nicoranger

Hi Paul , it was put on the day after the accident.
i have done a vehicle check and it gives me the date but not the company responsible for logging the marker

tifo

Nicoranger said:

In December 2021 I had a non fault accident and the third party insurer paid for repairs.
In November 2024 I tried to part ex my car only to be told that there was a cat n marker on a hip check. Having spent the last few months trying to find out who has put this marker on , definitely not from any of my broker , underwriter , motor engineer or repairer on my side , I can only assume it was put on by mistake by the third party insurer.

If the third party insurer paid you the full value of the car because they thought the repair costs were higher than around 60% of the value then it's a Cat N and you would have had to buy the car back at salvage price, if they paid for the repairs only then it wasn't 'written off'.

You need to check your payment and possibly what the valuation engineer wrote.

Mildly_Miffed

My suspicion is that the OP claimed from their own insurer, who wrote it off - but then the third party insurer contacted them, and said "We accept liability, we'll handle the claim", and repaired it.

So the question becomes one of whether the OP's insurer ever paid out...

Nobbie1967

You say the third party ‘paid for repairs’. Did they pay the repair bill direct to the garage or give you a sum of money that you use to get it repaired. I’m wondering if they wrote it off and paid out the car value-salvage value that you then used to repair the car?

Nicoranger

Hi all , Thankyou for your comments.
could i please make it clear that when I had the accident the 3rd party admitted liability, my car went in to be repaired and was returned to me fully repaired, the full cost of the repair was claimed back from the 3rd party insurers through my insurance company.
The cat n marker was logged the day after the accident.
Could anyone tell me if there is an official/ government HPI website or can any insurance company log details on any HPI site such as write offs etc on any vehicle without contacting the owners or the DVLA , which seems to be what has happened.

DullGreyGuy

Nicoranger said:

Hi all , Thankyou for your comments.
could i please make it clear that when I had the accident the 3rd party admitted liability, my car went in to be repaired and was returned to me fully repaired, the full cost of the repair was claimed back from the 3rd party insurers through my insurance company.
The cat n marker was logged the day after the accident.
Could anyone tell me if there is an official/ government HPI website or can any insurance company log details on any HPI site such as write offs etc on any vehicle without contacting the owners or the DVLA , which seems to be what has happened.

Always helps if you give full details up front... 

You originally said you claimed from the third party insurance and now you say you claimed from your insurer. Waiting for the next message saying you used an accident management company. You need to understand who directly dealt with your claim to know who will have notified them, it doesn't matter who ultimately paid for it.

Insurers log total losses on the Motor Insurers Anti Fraud and Theft Register which is another database run by the Motor Insurance Bureau

paul_c123

As I see it, it shouldn't have been recorded as Cat N. But there is no process to reverse that, its a one way street. So your insurer (ie the insurer at the time of the recording of the Cat N marker) should offer you compensation on the loss of value. The difficulty will be determining correctly, this loss, because there is no official guideline of what a Cat N car is worth, vs a clean car. Also, age of car affects it - as time goes on, an older car will lose less % of its value as Cat N vs clean, also of course it will be worth less anyway so there's a lower % of a smaller amount. Eventually, the scrap value of the two cars is the same once it gets to that point in its life.

But given its over 3 years ago, you may have a battle determining who put the marker on - as above you can only assume its either your or the 3rd party's insurer, but equally it could have been an admin error of a different car with similar plate, or some other complication such as a private plate involved etc...

I don't think there's any way of a member of the public knowing who put the marker on, and the insurance companies involved are under no incentive to help you out here because they'd be proving themselves were liable (and face no claim if it went unproven).

At the end of the day, the car has been crashed and repaired anyway so its perceived value, knowing that info, will be lower than an equivalent car that never had a crash. Its only because there's no evidence trail when a car is crashed/repaired but DOESN'T have the marker placed, that there is no perceivable deduction in value unless the repair was done poorly (which is detectable, for example if there's any paint, you can find this using a paint thickness gauge).

angrycrow

Ask your insurer to check MIAFTR which will show who put the cat n marker on the car and when. Incorrect markers can be removed but only by the insurer who put them on in the first place. Once you know which insurer added the marker you can ask them to remove it.