OneCall insurance repair cost-limit

VeryOldBailey

After colliding at low speed with another vehicle (my fault), I informed my insurance company, OneCall.

The repair company approved by my local Hyundai dealer quoted the cost of the repairs as in excess of £4k. OneCall Claims say that their approved repairers could do the repairs for £1250. When I asked them to send me an itemised copy of their quote I received this reply:

"We have not completed an estimate of the vehicle as we have not assessed the vehicle. Our rate is set for all claims. We will only pay our garages £1250 for repairs. If once the vehicle has been assessed and further work to be carried out we will still only pay £1250."

I understand that the repair company approved by my local Hyundai dealer might be guilty of exaggeration but a disparity of more than £3000 seems unlikely.

I have read and re-read every word of every document OneCall sent me when I took out the policy. There is no mention of a repair cost limit.

Is an undisclosed repair cost-limit a feature of all car insurance policies?

When I submitted my claim I was expecting my car to be repaired to the state it was in immediately prior to the collision. Was I being naive?

Aretnap

I could be wrong, but I read it as saying that they have an arrangement with the garage where they pay a flat rate of £1250 per car repaired - regardless of the actual amount of work that needs carrying out. Not that they will only repair your car if it can be done for <£1250.

Presumably £1250 is a fair estimate of the average cost of a repair, and it suits both the insurer and the garage to pay a flat rate per job rather than to itemise every part, screw and minute of labour.

DullGreyGuy

VeryOldBailey said:

After colliding at low speed with another vehicle (my fault), I informed my insurance company, OneCall.

The repair company approved by my local Hyundai dealer quoted the cost of the repairs as in excess of £4k. OneCall Claims say that their approved repairers could do the repairs for £1250. When I asked them to send me an itemised copy of their quote I received this reply:

"We have not completed an estimate of the vehicle as we have not assessed the vehicle. Our rate is set for all claims. We will only pay our garages £1250 for repairs. If once the vehicle has been assessed and further work to be carried out we will still only pay £1250."

I understand that the repair company approved by my local Hyundai dealer might be guilty of exaggeration but a disparity of more than £3000 seems unlikely.

I have read and re-read every word of every document OneCall sent me when I took out the policy. There is no mention of a repair cost limit.

Is an undisclosed repair cost-limit a feature of all car insurance policies?

When I submitted my claim I was expecting my car to be repaired to the state it was in immediately prior to the collision. Was I being naive?

They are saying they have a fixed fee arrangement with their garages such that some are over paid and some are underpaid but clearly both companies thinks it works out ok in the round and it saves on delays with getting work authorised or negotiation on what work actually needs to be done. 

It's not a model I've seen before but lots of companies try to come up with cost advantages. A hire car company offered 30% discount if we simply pay all cases where we admit liability in bulk rather than challenging them on dates for each and every case but retain the right to audit. 

What is an increasingly common feature is an additional excess that becomes payable if you want to use a garage other than their approved repairer. 

VeryOldBailey

Thank you both for your input.

Although I can understand the benefits for the businesses involved it seems shabby treatment of the insured party.

Am I the only driver who is unaware that if the cost of repair is more than the sum the insurer is willing to pay, the driver will have to pay the difference?

Car_54

VeryOldBailey said:

Thank you both for your input.

Although I can understand the benefits for the businesses involved it seems shabby treatment of the insured party.

Am I the only driver who is unaware that if the cost of repair is more than the sum the insurer is willing to pay, the driver will have to pay the difference?

The insurer is not saying that. If you have the car repaired by their approved supplier you will not have to pay anything. Why would you not want to do that?

Aretnap

VeryOldBailey said:

Thank you both for your input.

Although I can understand the benefits for the businesses involved it seems shabby treatment of the insured party.

Am I the only driver who is unaware that if the cost of repair is more than the sum the insurer is willing to pay, the driver will have to pay the difference?

That's not how it works. Your insurers approved repairer will do the work necessary to repair your car to the condition it was in before the accident and you won't have to pay a penny, apart from your excess. What your insurer pays the repairer for their efforts isn't something that you need to worry about or even know - but as it happens the garage gets paid £1250, regardless of whether the repairs consist of buffing out a scratch, or replacing the whole front half of the car.

Your problem seems to be that you dodn't want to use the approved garage, but choose your own garage instead. The insurer is saying that if you do that they'll only pay what their approved repaired would have charged, which seems fair enough in principle. OneCall are a broker, not an insurer, so they sell a lot of different policies from different underwriters with different terms and conditions, but it seems that at least some of their policies do include a clause to this effect, eg this one.

https://quote.onecallinsurance.co.uk/existing_customers/website-documents/getDocument.php?doc_name=1739545362OneInsuranceWording02.09.24PC2.pdf

So are they saying that they won't pay more than the flat rate that they would pay their approved garage? That's a new one in me admittedly and would tend to make using your own garage non-viable for major repairs. But it would be a problem even without the flat fee. Insurers are in a position to negotiate lower rates with garages than you or I are, so the likelihood is that the approved repair will always be cheaper than your own garage, so you are always going to be out of pocket of you don't want to use the approved repairer. The obvious solution would be to use the insurer's approved repairer. Or if choosing your own garage is important to you use a non-bargain basement insurer who has more generous terms about using a non-approved repairer, though it's probably a little late for that now.

DullGreyGuy

Aretnap said:
OneCall are a broker, not an insurer, so they sell a lot of different policies from different underwriters with different terms and conditions, but it seems that at least some of their policies do include a clause to this effect, eg this one.

One Call are both a broker and an insurer, they have a Gibraltar based entity. Some policies they place with their own insurer and others they place with other insurers. They are a more traditional broker in that each insurer has its own terms rather than the likes of the AA or Hastings which take a similar approach but the terms are harmonised.

The linked to terms are their own insurers and state:

If you choose to use your own repairer, there might be delays in sorting the repairs for your car. If you use your own repairer, you might not be able to have a courtesy car, even if your insurance says you can. If you use your own repairer, we will only pay the cost that we were told by our own repairer.

So yes, their terms do cap non-approved garages to the rate their approved garage would have charged. 

Its certainly an unusual term however there are strong parallels to Home where its common that cash settlements will be made at what the preferred supplier would have charged for a replacement rather than the retail price