Car witten off (not my fault) Being told I have to sell the scrap!!

mattymoo

Pagan98 wrote: »

Legally, the other party should be putting you back in the position you were in prior to the accident occuring. This is typically interpreted as refunding the purchase price of an equivalent vehicle (normally based on book value, discounted for condition). If you retain ownership of the scrap then they are entitled to deduct the scrap value from the payout.

Not quite true. They should be putting you back in the same Financial position you were in before the accident. The payout should be sufficient to replace with a vehicle of equivalent age / mileage / condition subject to the salvage adjustment.

Many will complain that cars advertised in say Autotrader are selling for much higher values but that is only advertised prices. Sellers negotiate and if you supply ads to back up a request for a higher payout, they check with the sellers to see what the car actually sold for.

mattymoo

Pagan98 wrote: »

No disrespect to the poster, but this is why people get so frustrated with insurers. Why should the innocent party be inconvenienced in this manner? Just because it is the normal arrangement doesn't mean it is acceptable or justifiable.

Vtricky has covered this pretty well. Insurers settle all claims under English Law (or Scottish) and it is here that problems arise.

The term "third party" relates to contract law. The insurer is 1st party, the policyholder is 2nd party and everyone else is a third party.

An insurance contract between 1st and 2nd party makes provision for the transfer of vehicle ownership and disposal of the vehicle remains. This is a service the policyholder pays for.

When you claim as a third party, there is no mechanism for that transfer of ownership and the courts would never order it. Indeed, many third parties would regard this as not in their favour. Many write offs at the lower end of the market occur when repair costs exceed value of the car. However, some people can DIY or know somebody in the trade who will do the job cheaply so prefer to keep the salvage and take the money to pay for the cheap repairs.