I have had an accident in which the other driver has admitted blame

Pimlico

I have had an accident in which the other driver has admitted blame. Their insurance company has contacted me and said that they would like to take over my claim and pay it out. They are being very pushy about things like supplying a hire car, but when I speak to the car replacement company, they are very awkward and won't tell me what sort of car I would get. I wanted advice as to whether it is in my interests to let the other driver's insurance company handle the claim, or whether I would be better off dealing with it through my own insurance company and having them recover the costs.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6686508/i-have-had-an-accident-in-which-the-other-driver-has-admitted-blame

The main disadvantage of using the TP insurer is if you arent happy with something you have no right of a complaint nor an ability to go to the ombudsman.

Most find it less painful to use the third party insurer but inevitably there will be those where it does go wrong who regret it. You need to be a little careful with dealing with your own insurers though now, a number will refer you to credit hire and some even credit repairs. Having had an offer from the TPI to deal with matters directly both of these could land you in problems if you went the credit route.

In principle you can mix and match, so could let your insurers deal with the repairs but take the hire from the TPI. Most find the TPI more flexible in terms of using a garage of your choice, give a more appropriate replacement car (outside of credit hire) etc.

Depending who they are using they may or may not be providing the vehicle themselves. The TPI will have authorised up to a certain group of car normally and whilst they cant say exactly what the vehicle is they normally should be able to confirm the basics of it being a 5 door group C up to 1.6 engine or a 5 door junior exec with up to a 2.0 engine. Exactly what you get depends on whats available

TooManyPoints

If you have reported it to your own insurers (as you must under their policy terms) they may insist you pass any correspondence you receive on to them unanswered.

This is always wise anyway. It is not unknown for Third parties to recall a completely different version of events after they have left the scene. As well as that, some of them develop mysterious, career-threatening medical problems, allegedly resulting from the incident, even though you saw them walk away perfectly fit and well.

sheenas

I went this route when someone reversed into my car. It made the hole process smooth as less people involved. Just make sure you are happy with the company they recommend to do the repairs. The car being offered is most likely a basic small car.

victor2

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6686508/i-have-had-an-accident-in-which-the-other-driver-has-admitted-blame

Just let your insurers deal with it. It's what you pay them to do, so let them earn their money!

maman

I had a similar experience but fortunately I had already reported the incident to my own insurer who supplied me with a like for like courtesy car and subsequently handled the whole thing for me. I just said a polite 'no thank you' to the other party's insurer and they backed off.

Brie

Do you have a licence to drive "any" car? My OH isn't licenced to drive manual, just automatic, so the line in his insurance that he will get an appropriate car is important. In the past we had a accident and the insurance company tried to give him a tiny manual car and we had to push to get something more like his automatic SUV. He wouldn't have got his legs into the tiny car let alone be able to actually drive it!

maman

That reminded me @Brie of an occasion we were given a Fiat 500 as a courtesy car. DH said he felt like Noddy driving in it! 🤣

chuffinnora

We had something similar also. After an accident we started the process with our own insurer.

The car was taken in about 3 days later for repairs, and we had a courtesy car.

After about 7 days, the other parties insurer called us directly to offer they deal with everything because their driver admitted responsibility. They also offered a £300 payment as a "thank you". I explained it was already too late as we had used our own insurer.

When I relayed this to our company, they said this is typical these days and they also do something similar.

daveyjp

There are four ways of dealing with it.

1. Report to your insurance company. They pass to an accident (mis) management company who try and sort everything including arranging a repair and supplying a very expensive hire car.

2. Other party insurance company arrange a hire car and repair your vehicle

3. If 100% the other party is at fault and this is agreed by the party insurance company, you arrange a quote for a repair with your chosen repairer and if the other party insurance compny is happy with the quote the other party insurance pays the bill.

4. You and the third party make an arrangement between yourself - not recommended, but on older vehicles which are likely to be written off using any of the other three approaches this can be beneficial.

Over the years I have been down all four routes. Route 3 has always been the most effective and stress free.

MyRealNameToo

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82166501#Comment_82166501

This is more about buying the right insurance. The traditional courtesy is not guaranteed to be available and is a small basic car provided by the garage themselves if they have one available and only if your car is going to be repaired.

Most insurers now offer the ability to have a "guaranteed" courtesy car which is typically a hire car. Similarly many offer a two tier option of either a small car or something closer to your own vehicle.

The one downside of the guaranteed hire is that its often got a maximum duration which will be fine for the majority of cases but parts on backorder etc you may find the car has to go back before yours is back on the road.