Insurance claim hassle

[AyBee]

A third party drove into me so rather than deal with it myself, I passed it to a claims management company (thinking they took a fee for handling my claim) mainly because I'm busy and don't have time to deal with the hassle myself. I have a witness and was stationary when hit so 100% non-fault. Turns out that the claims management place need me in a credit hire car in order to recoup their fees so they told me to go to my own insurer because I didn't want to do credit hire.

I passed the details to my insurance saying I wanted my car fixed at a place of my choice because it's not a mainstream car and that I needed a car for this weekend. They've just told me that I can't have a car because I'm not getting it repaired through one of their approved repairers and would need to go through credit hire to get a car. I tried to save the industry a bit of money and now they want to send me down the route I didn't want to go down. At a bit of a loss as to what to do now...

[AyBee]

Which is where things don't add up:
Option 1: Claims management company gives me a car, lets me get my car fixed where I want to and costs the insurance industry a lot;
Option 2: Own insurer lets me get my car fixed where I want but doesn't give me a car but is cheaper to the industry.

Where's the incentive to try and keep costs down for the industry?

[AyBee]

Driver101 said:

AyBee said:

Which is where things don't add up:
Option 1: Claims management company gives me a car, lets me get my car fixed where I want to and costs the insurance industry a lot;
Option 2: Own insurer lets me get my car fixed where I want but doesn't give me a car but is cheaper to the industry.

Where's the incentive to try and keep costs down for the industry?

So what you want now is the insurance company to pay for the repairs, pay a higher rate at a bodyshop of your choice, pay for a courtesy car and pay the claims management company their fees?

You've already involved a claims management company before giving the insurance company the chance to sort things.

How do you know your bodyshop is better that the one they'd use?

Most people just want their car fixed. They don't know what is a good bodyshop and what isn't. They just was the insurance company to give them a replacement car and fix their own.

The incentive to keep down costs comes when you come to renew. When you declare the non-fault accident next year your premium will go up. The more expensive the claim the higher it will push your premium.

The claims management place is no longer involved, so there are no fees to be paid there. The car's a Lotus, I want somebody to repair it who knows what they're doing, I don't think that's too much to ask. I want a car for a weekend, I'm not requesting like-for-like. All this should be paid for by the third party's insurer since this wasn't my fault, again, not too much to ask for in my opinion, I just can't seem to get this to happen...but if I go to a claims management place, they'd stick me in a like-for-like straight away and the total claim cost will shoot through the roof!

[AyBee]

thescamper said:

OP have you tried talking to the third party insurers, sounds like a cut and dried case to me, talking to the TP insurers explaining the situation that you are happy for just any car and in doing that and only having it for the weekend and not for the full period is mitigating their losses you may be able to swing it.

Thanks - didn't know whether this was worthwhile trying...

[AyBee]

dacouch said:

Contact the other Insurer direct, most will bite your hand off to provide a like for like car and use the repairer of your choice as you have refused the claims management company and credit hire as these inflate their costs massively.

If you don't know the other Insurer's details you can find who they are, the contact number and policy number for a small fee here www.askmid.com

Thanks - have sent them an email giving them the chance to provide me with a hire car to keep their costs down. Will follow up with a call tomorrow if I don't get a response.

[AyBee]

LoonR1 said:

AyBee said:

Which is where things don't add up:
Option 1: Claims management company gives me a car, lets me get my car fixed where I want to and costs the insurance industry a lot;
Option 2: Own insurer lets me get my car fixed where I want but doesn't give me a car but is cheaper to the industry.

Where's the incentive to try and keep costs down for the industry?

The correct answer has already been posted, it I'm intrigued by the regular comment around "the insurance industry". Why do you think any company is responsible to the whole industry for its actions. For example, do you think Aldi have said "blimey we could be adversely impacting Tesco, by undercutting them on price, which won't be good for the industry, so let's not do it"

Or Tesco saying "by opening all these mega stores and smaller Metro / Express type stores we could be killing off the small corner shop, which wouldn't be good for the industry, so we'd better not do it"

Not sure I understand what you're saying LoonR1.

Update: I got in touch with the other guy's insurance and he told me they hadn't been able to get in touch with their insured. Having told him I'd wait on hold while he tried again, he got through and having initially denied liability, changed his mind when he was told of the consequences (funny that) Car being sorted at last!

Edited by AyBee on Friday 27th February 11:44