Insurance woes... and rant!
Discussion
R1 Loon said:
How do you propose that an insurer challenges the whiplash claims? There will be a full medical report supporting the claim and no doctor will go against it.
To run a claim to court (win or lose) will cost in excess of £5000 in fees, these fees are rarely if ever awarded to the insurer even on winning and they still end up paying the compensation and the other sides costs if they lose.
Effectively arguing the toss simply costs more. This is where the legal profession and spurious claimants have all of us over a barrel.
They could easily reduce what they pay out. If the insurance companies stuck together on it, it would work. I don't know for sure, but there's a minimum payout mentioned of £1700. Reduce this ammount?? Have more detailed medicals?? Higher penalties for dishonest claimants to discourage others from committing insurance fraud?? It seems to me like the whiplash claims total more than the damage payouts!?To run a claim to court (win or lose) will cost in excess of £5000 in fees, these fees are rarely if ever awarded to the insurer even on winning and they still end up paying the compensation and the other sides costs if they lose.
Effectively arguing the toss simply costs more. This is where the legal profession and spurious claimants have all of us over a barrel.
More detailed inspections of damage to cars, and more detail on prices charged at repairers, who are obviously overcharging insurance companies, which again, could ammount to insurance fraud??
They don't do themselves any favours in not sending their own assesors out to view cars. They mostly rely on repairers quotes, who are whacking on a huge chunk of money!!
If they are losing that much money, why are they not doing anything about it other than charging Joe Bloggs more!!??
eldar said:
ZOLLAR said:
Unfortunately at the moment many of the reasons for increases in cost at the moment are beyond insurers control.
Like selling accident victims names to no-win-no-fee lawyers who claim for the whiplash for the driver and 5 passengers?The problem is accident management companies and No win no fee etc, if they didn't exist there wouldn't be such hyperbolic claims and insurers wouldn't sell details to no win no fee lawyers, at least by doing it we control some of the information.
ZOLLAR said:
If insurers don't do it somebody else will, so its better to make money out of it which can be put back into the business.
The problem is accident management companies and No win no fee etc, if they didn't exist there wouldn't be such hyperbolic claims and insurers wouldn't sell details to no win no fee lawyers, at least by doing it we control some of the information.
If the insurance co's didn't sell the details at all, they'd control the information better. Time they stopped rolling over, and invested some time and money in sorting out a long term solution. The problem is accident management companies and No win no fee etc, if they didn't exist there wouldn't be such hyperbolic claims and insurers wouldn't sell details to no win no fee lawyers, at least by doing it we control some of the information.
Its obvious to everyone, even the ins co's the claims 'market' is crooked and needs fixing.
rash_decision said:
They could easily reduce what they pay out. If the insurance companies stuck together on it, it would work. I don't know for sure, but there's a minimum payout mentioned of £1700. Reduce this ammount?? Have more detailed medicals?? Higher penalties for dishonest claimants to discourage others from committing insurance fraud?? It seems to me like the whiplash claims total more than the damage payouts!?
More detailed inspections of damage to cars, and more detail on prices charged at repairers, who are obviously overcharging insurance companies, which again, could ammount to insurance fraud??
They don't do themselves any favours in not sending their own assesors out to view cars. They mostly rely on repairers quotes, who are whacking on a huge chunk of money!!
If they are losing that much money, why are they not doing anything about it other than charging Joe Bloggs more!!??
Who do you think sets compensation levels? Clue: It's the Courts, not the insurers.More detailed inspections of damage to cars, and more detail on prices charged at repairers, who are obviously overcharging insurance companies, which again, could ammount to insurance fraud??
They don't do themselves any favours in not sending their own assesors out to view cars. They mostly rely on repairers quotes, who are whacking on a huge chunk of money!!
If they are losing that much money, why are they not doing anything about it other than charging Joe Bloggs more!!??
Who do you think applies thepenalties for fraud? Clue: It's the Courts, not the insurers
Own damage claims are managed to hell, someinsurers even own their own network of repair centres to limit the cost of these.
Assessors going out to every claim would cost more than could be saved. However detailed photographs by the repairer of th edamage is sufficient to get a good idea of the need for repair and to challenge an pre-existing damage.
Also, the idea of insurers clubbing together wouldn't work, that would fall foul of Competition Law and the fines for cartels are astronomical.
eldar said:
ZOLLAR said:
If insurers don't do it somebody else will, so its better to make money out of it which can be put back into the business.
The problem is accident management companies and No win no fee etc, if they didn't exist there wouldn't be such hyperbolic claims and insurers wouldn't sell details to no win no fee lawyers, at least by doing it we control some of the information.
If the insurance co's didn't sell the details at all, they'd control the information better. Time they stopped rolling over, and invested some time and money in sorting out a long term solution. The problem is accident management companies and No win no fee etc, if they didn't exist there wouldn't be such hyperbolic claims and insurers wouldn't sell details to no win no fee lawyers, at least by doing it we control some of the information.
Its obvious to everyone, even the ins co's the claims 'market' is crooked and needs fixing.
R1 Loon said:
Own damage claims are managed to hell, someinsurers even own their own network of repair centres to limit the cost of these.
Assessors going out to every claim would cost more than could be saved. However detailed photographs by the repairer of th edamage is sufficient to get a good idea of the need for repair and to challenge an pre-existing damage.
That's good and well, but that doesn't explain why a personally paid for repair, costs say £1000, but when you disclose it's an insurance claim, the price almost doubles!!!Assessors going out to every claim would cost more than could be saved. However detailed photographs by the repairer of th edamage is sufficient to get a good idea of the need for repair and to challenge an pre-existing damage.
rash_decision said:
That's good and well, but that doesn't explain why a personally paid for repair, costs say £1000, but when you disclose it's an insurance claim, the price almost doubles!!!
Which is why insuresr either ask you to use an Approved Repairer or will put you into a main dealer where we have agreed labour rates, rather than the ones people seem to choose who like to do this.Chicane-UK said:
Had my renewal through the other day - it's gone up 25% on last years, and they neglected to include the additional years no claims I've accumulated over the year.
That'll be a phone call on Monday then. Sigh.
Unless you've got less than 5 years NCD, an extra year claim free doesn't accrue any more discount.That'll be a phone call on Monday then. Sigh.
Noger said:
Just had my renewal through. Am fuming, it is now £237.52, up from £222.68 last year. Gits 
I used to work for them as well !
Could be worse my wife's went up from £430 to "We don't cover that type of car anymore", the most realistic giving the cover I wanted is £670 and I still work for them. I used to work for them as well !I heard a PI lawyer, or someone who does PR for them (which is probably only marginally harder than being the PR agent for the Night Stalker), on Radio 4 this morning.
They were talking about the "guilty party" paying the costs. Shame they don't seem to know the difference between civil and criminal
They didn't seem too happy at the proposals !
They were talking about the "guilty party" paying the costs. Shame they don't seem to know the difference between civil and criminal
They didn't seem too happy at the proposals !
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