car insurance claim - please help!!

mac66p

Sorry if this is a bit long winded but fell the whole story should be told to get my point across & see if anyone put there can help or advise as we feel abandoned by our insurers
Our car was stolen during the early hours of Sat 22nd March after a shopping trip / night out overnight stay with a friend in Edinburgh
The police were very helpful, sadly I cannot say the same in regards to our insurers!

The AA claim to have a 24 hour, 365 day a year emergency claim line yet when we called to report our car stolen we were told that our insurers (CIS) were all off for the Easter holiday weekend so our claim wouldn’t be processed until Tues 25th March

Thankfully the police found our car that very day so when I called to update the insurance of this fact they hadn’t even started processing our claim!
We thought that as our car had been recovered things would start to progress with our claim. NOT!

A week later our car is still in a holding yard approx 100 miles away from where we live!

We have NO access to our car as we have no means of travel to where our car is being held so we are unable to check if our belongings are still in the car - there is over £300 of stuff in the boot after our shopping trip - we have NO WAY of knowing whether the items are still there and NO ONE from the insurance company have taken details of the contents!

The police still have not had access to the car to fingerprint it! Whoever it was that stole our car kindly locked it behind him/her before abandoning it and the police obviously did not want to cause further damage by breaking into it to gain access. We have both keys to the car.

The insurers say that the cost of repairs may not be ‘viable’ - our car is considered old as it is an L Reg but it is VERY well maintained and only has approx 45,000 on the clock. We really feel that the insurers WILL NOT take this into account when valuing our car in regards to repairs as they will only pay 60% in repair costs to what they consider it is worth - the only damage that we are aware of is to the steering column as the hooligan who stile it has ripped of the ’cowling’ to access the wiring below, we can only assume to enable them to hotwire it

It is now a week later and we are still waiting on the insurers sending out a mechanic to assess whether our car is viable for repair

If our car is not considered viable for repair we have been told that any personal belongings will be sent to us - I’m sorry but I want to be able to go and collect items myself! Surely we have the right to access & recover our property? After all, there is items in the car that hold personal/sentimental value that whoever recovers our goods to send onto us may not consider worthy of return?

Even though we are Fully Comp. we are NOT entitled to a courtesy car. The booklet states that a courtesy car will only be made available whilst the vehicle is undergoing repairs. A courtesy car is not available in cases of total loss or stolen and unrecovered.

Our car was stolen and recovered, so does that not imply that we should get a courtesy car? The book does not state what happens in this case?
It is costing my husband nearly £20 a day for taxi to his work as the buses don’t run early enough for him to get to his work on time! No-one it seems is accountable for this!

We had the offer of a loan of a friends car until such times as our case is settled - in order for us to add a replacement car onto our policy will cost us in excess of £100 a month!!! WE cannot afford this!


We really feel as though no-one is helping - please advise to our rights and what we can do from here ! :mad:

thanks!

John_Pierpoint

I know this is not very helpful, but if you had been third party only and prepared to stand on your own feet; you could probably have reclaimed your car by now.
How much would it cost for one of you to go to "rent a banger" and then travel to reclaim your car, if National Express or Megabus does not go there.

There is virtually no chance of the police catching the thief, any finger prints are "stale" by now and don't expect them to treat it like a murder enquiry! All you have achieved, so far, is an eventual modest write off payment and loss of no claims bonus.

Let us know how you get on. Something similar happened to me, but fortunately the car was found after a week in ASDA's car park on the other side of town; It seemed to have been used by "joy-riders". As I was 3rd party, I just had to go and collect it and pay 15 GBP for a second hand replacement door lock.
(Elderly D*g*nh*m Dustbin).

DaisyFlower

Firstly, if you have no means of transport to go to the car why are you complaining that you want to retreive your own personal property - surely that contradicts itself?

The insurers do work to a set criteria when valuing a car against the repair in order to keep their costs down - without seeing the damage you dont know they will write it off. If they do class it as uneconomical to repair they will make you an offer. If you disagree with the offer then you will need to prove the cost to buy a like for like vehicle and liase with the insurers.

A lot of policies only offer a courtesy car whilst yours is being repaired as it is the approved repairer who loans you the car so thats not unusual. If your car can be repaired you should get a courtesy car at that point.

With regards to your contents, most policies have very limited cover for contents so you need to check what you are actually covered for in that respect.

As for putting a replacement vehicle on cover, they will charge. It is not their fault your car was taken and they will charge for temporary changes in line with their terms and conditions. Expenses to and from work wont be covered but I assume you know that.

TBH there doesnt appear to be too much of a delay bearing in mind that the Bank Holiday meant until last Tuesday most places werent operating. They have arranged for a mechanic to go and assess re repairs, the police were held up fingerprinting as you had not been able to give them the keys so its only the 5th working day today.

V_tricky

How awful! I can see why you'd be so :mad: although I don't necessarily think that your insurers are the baddies here. Their policy wording is nothing unusual, and if you weren't happy with the terms...

The AA do have a 24 hour claim line, and if your car was in an accident, at 3am, and you needed an emergency uplift, I'm sure they would have been able to arrange it. With Easter holiday weekend though, most if not all repairing garages would have been closed, so there would be little your insurer could do, even if they were open.

If the vehicle is at a holding yard - perhaps it was sent there by the police? Recovery & storage charges are costly - and your insurer wont want it in storage for a day longer than it needs to be as there is a direct cost implication for them.

You have a couple of choices about your personal effects - either you can mail your friend & give the storage people authority to let them clear your car, you can send your insurer the keys (to send to the holding garage) and get them to clear your car, or of course you are at liberty to go and get the stuff yourself.

The insurers priority is to get the vehicle inspected, and to get you back on the road, or provide you with funds to buy a vehicle to get you back on the road. The personal effects that may or may not be in the boot are very much a secondary thing and they may well have a limited liability here anyway (check your policy, it may only be £100 or £150 cover). Even if they took all the details of the contents of your car - which we dont even know at this stage have been lost or not - there's nothing that they can do with that information anyway at this stage.

Until the insurers have inspected the car, they will be unable to tell whether the repairs are economical, although experience would probably say that a lot of stolen vehicle's are in a pretty sorry state afterwards.

THIS POST might help when you are considering how much your car is worth on the market.

Whatever happens whether your car is a total loss, or is repairable, I can appreciate that you want to be the one to clear your car, but it just wouldn't make sense for the insurer to pay for you to travel to go and clear the car, when they can just forward on the keys to the repairer/storage people and have them DHL your property back to you. Whoever sends your stuff should clear the car in it's entirety.

(That said, if I had things in the car that I knew was locked, I would be more inclined to make that journey if possible, just in case the storage agent had sticky fingers - I still wouldn't expect the insurer to pay for this though)

If after your car is inspected it turns out that the car is repairable, you will get a courtesy car for the duration of the repairs. If the car is not repairable, then you wont get a courtesy car. Your policy booklet does say this.

It's a pig that your husband has to incur such high costs to get to work, but the wording of your policy is very common across the market. If you want a courtesy car in situations like this, you will have to pay through the nose up front for it, and as you didn't, there's not really a lot that you can do here.

Can you drive your friends car under a Driving Other Cars extension on your own policy? This would reduce the cover to third party fire & theft only, but it may be worthwhile thinking about.

HTH

John_Pierpoint

Very useful link. I have finally understood why the auctioneer closing down a local garage that had gone bust, came to an old but running Ford Fiesta and started his patter with "Gentleman I must warn you this is a "C" car .........."

Presumably if the buyer tried to write it off for a second time, he might get a nasty shock, like 150 GBP ?

V_tricky

John_Pierpoint wrote: »

Very useful link. I have finally understood why the auctioneer closing down a local garage that had gone bust, came to an old but running Ford Fiesta and started his patter with "Gentleman I must warn you this is a "C" car .........."

Presumably if the buyer tried to write it off for a second time, he might get a nasty shock, like 150 GBP ?

Well no, not really. Any A or B salvage category should not be on the road - and are illegal, however C & the lesser used D category are just essentially cosmetic damage.

A car that's been a previous total loss MAY have a reduced value (20% deduction springs to mind, but don't quote me on that) - particularly if it's a newer model, however if it's an oldish car anyway, it often doesn't make a significant amount of difference

A car that's worth £500 pre accident value, that needs a new door skin may well end up a total loss. Of course the car itself is fine, you just need a VIC done , and an MOT and bobs your uncle.

John_Pierpoint

Many thanks for this reply, I think my education is just about complete now.
The message to the original poster seems to be: Go and inspect the car yourself. If your insurance company says it is a write-off, offer to buy it back for (say) 100 GBP if you can still drive it away. Get (say) a replacement door at a scrap yard. Get your "VIC" and perhaps a new MOT and you will be back on the road. You might even be showing a "profit".
After all the OP knows it is a good car, the insurance company thinks it is a real old banger, just like any average car of its make and age.

John

PS The only fly in the ointment might be the Chancellors determination to save CO2, by increasing the road tax on vehicles with higher emissions, as he tries to get the country's "fleet" down to an average of 130 grams per kilometre?

tinkerbell84

V_tricky wrote: »

Can you drive your friends car under a Driving Other Cars extension on your own policy? This would reduce the cover to third party fire & theft only, but it may be worthwhile thinking about.

HTH

DOC extension is 3rd party only. Theft would (presumably) be covered by the owner's insurance.


OP, how did the thief lock the car if you have both sets of keys?

raskazz

tinkerbell84 wrote: »

DOC extension is 3rd party only. Theft would (presumably) be covered by the owner's insurance.

No, the car would be in charge of someone not named on the certificate of insurance, so no fire, theft or accidental damage cover would apply under the existing policy for the vehicle until the vehicle was returned to the policyholder or named driver.

V_tricky

Sorry - an elementary mistake from me!?! :mad:

Only joking, but of course you're totally right -DOC does only cover TPO (in my defence, it's not normally my field!) either way, driving the friends car on DOC might still be a goer for the OP, after all - you're not *that* likely to have a theft within such a small prescribed space of time, and even much much less likely to require fire cover.

John_Pierpoint

tinkerbell84 wrote: »

OP, how did the thief lock the car if you have both sets of keys?

Probably one of those good old cars where you pushed down the button, slammed the door and went "Oh !!!!!!" as you looked at the key still hanging in the ignition switch.

Happy days.