Car insurance renewal - open claim

rubble2

I had a minor car accident about 16 months ago which is still the subject of an open claim. My insurance renewal will be due in a few weeks and I wondered what my options were should I look at renewing my insurance with an alternative provider?

As it has been 16 months since the incident I have already renewed the policy this time last year and found at the time that the renewal quote from the the existing insurer was competitive on price (it may be the same this time round - I have yet to receive a renewal quote).

If however I want to look at an alternative insurer how do I inform them of the open claim which is still in the throws of being resolved between my insurer and the third party insurer?

I can't give details of the value of the claim as I have no information on how the settlement will be resolved.

Thanks

maman

I had a similar situation when I renewed earlier this month. There had been an open claim since February 2023 as someone who reversed into me in a car park was contesting. The damage to my car was minimal (cracked light fitting) and I had it sorted at my own expense at the time. 

I spoke to the claims department at my insurer and they checked and found that they'd requested evidence of damage from the other guy but received nothing (probably because there was none 🤣).

They were happy to to close the claim. I was left thinking it could have been open indefinitely if I hadn't spoken to them.

I'd check with your insurer what the status of the open claim is. 

DullGreyGuy

rubble2 said:

I had a minor car accident about 16 months ago which is still the subject of an open claim. My insurance renewal will be due in a few weeks and I wondered what my options were should I look at renewing my insurance with an alternative provider?

As it has been 16 months since the incident I have already renewed the policy this time last year and found at the time that the renewal quote from the the existing insurer was competitive on price (it may be the same this time round - I have yet to receive a renewal quote).

If however I want to look at an alternative insurer how do I inform them of the open claim which is still in the throws of being resolved between my insurer and the third party insurer?

I can't give details of the value of the claim as I have no information on how the settlement will be resolved.

You answer the questions about the claim honestly, though you may need to contact your insurers claims team to find out the current status including both the settlements to date and any outstanding reserve, you add the two together to get the claim value. 

In most cases an open claim is treated as a fault claim just because of the lack of certainly, in a minority of cases some insurers will treat an open claim as a non-fault if at the time of registration they were certain that recovery wouldnt be a problem. Again your claims team can advise its current status or the renewal invite will state it in the claims history section too.