Total Loss - None Fault Payment Timings?

Chaos121

Hi all,

I was rear ended at a set of traffic lights on 03/10/2025. I lodged the claim with my insurance and other party admitted full liability. The day after an independent claims management company contacted me, arranged a hire car and then my car was sent off to copart for valuation. After a short debate over the valuation, i was offered a fee i deemed acceptable and now I believe the valuation settlement has been sent to the third party insurers. Does anyone have any experience in how long it usually takes from valuation being agreed to actually receiving your funds? Its been roughly a week and ive had no further update.

Thanks

MyRealNameToo

Chaos121 said:

I was rear ended at a set of traffic lights on 03/10/2025. I lodged the claim with my insurance and other party admitted full liability. The day after an independent claims management company contacted me, arranged a hire car and then my car was sent off to copart for valuation. After a short debate over the valuation, i was offered a fee i deemed acceptable and now I believe the valuation settlement has been sent to the third party insurers. Does anyone have any experience in how long it usually takes from valuation being agreed to actually receiving your funds? Its been roughly a week and ive had no further update.

You're insured with Admiral?

The accident management company has absolutely no interest in getting you out of hire, it's where they make the vast majority of the money from. As such they won't be chasing, they'll be slow in responding to the TPI etc to eke out as many days hire as they can.  

On the flip side the third party insurer will be wanting to prioritise it but they have to check they are happy with the valuation before paying it out. Once the money has been paid the clock starts ticking on when the hire car has to end. 

In an ideal world we used to turn these around in 2-3 days if we agreed with the valuation but it was very dependent on the mail room identifying it properly so it was prioritised, the backlog and how swamped the desk engineers were to do a valuation and finally the back long for the manager/senior to authorise the payment requests. In periods of bad weather and flu it could stretch to a couple of weeks, in particular if we thought the valuation was too high in which case we needed our engineers to write up the counter offer which takes much more time than them simply saying approved. 

Chaos121

Thanks for getting back to me, im insured/was insured with first central....the accident hire company are accident exchange. I don't particularly want to be driving around in a qashqai i don't own for much longer....i have chased AX but they say 'it is down to the third party insurer now' who are Allianz. Its frustrating I must say.

MyRealNameToo

First Central is an intermediary... its more common for brokers and intermediaries to sell pass their customers to AMCs than the actual insurer / underwriter. 

Assuming they are part of the ABI GTA then they are getting £81.17 + VAT per day you are in the car. It will be higher if they arent party to the GTA. They won't chase Allianz as they make more money if Allianz are slow. Can't comment for AX but certainly in my claims days I noted that these letters of claim oddly seemed to be sent to the wrong claims office despite prior correspondence having been set to the correct office when working out liability etc. 

Chaos121

So essentially they are basically out to rip off Allianz for as long as they possibly can. Shocking really. Hopefully Allianz do the chasing then to cut their own costs! Thanks, very insightful.

diveunderthebonnet

If you are involved in an accident do you have to use an AMC ? seems they like ripping somebody off.

MyRealNameToo

Chaos121 said:

So essentially they are basically out to rip off Allianz for as long as they possibly can. Shocking really. Hopefully Allianz do the chasing then to cut their own costs! Thanks, very insightful.

Depends on how you want to look at it... from their point of view they are providing a service to someone who has been disadvantaged through no fault of their own and are assuming credit risk by helping you at their own expense. If the third party insurer is slow or inefficient thats their own fault and were they not providing you with a hire car you would be stuck without a vehicle for weeks or months until Allianz pull their finger out. 

The other view though is a basic yes. 

diveunderthebonnet said:

If you are involved in an accident do you have to use an AMC ? seems they like ripping somebody off.

No, but if your policy is limited to a traditional courtesy car or you only have TPFT cover then you are stuck without transport whilst the total loss is being dealt with which wouldnt be by your insurer if you are TPFT. If you have 6 cars and this was just the weekend toy that got written off that probably isnt a problem. If however its your only vehicle, you live in the middle of nowhere and are a nurse with 6 kids then the lack of a vehicle will have a major impact and even if the car is repairable the standard 2 door mini is probably not going to meet your needs.