RE: Police: Crash Gangs On The Rise

[IGL]

With regard to the standard crash at a roundabout, that most people seem to have at sometime in their life, Wife, Brother-in-law & Father-in-law, but not me, well not so far anyway, it is all about the method of determining whether it is safe to proceed. Lots of people at second place at a roundabout are intent on looking to the right to see whether it is clear, and are only slightly aware of the car in front out of the side of their eyes. When it moves, they assume it has gone completely, but due to the speed of modern cars, (from the right, i.e. time taken to travel between their entrance and your entrance is now very short), and the indecision and judgement of the car driver in front, they often stop, by which time it is too late.

My approach is to completely ignore the cars to the right until the car in front has gone completely. It is the car in front that is your primary obstacle and it is this which you should concentrate on most. After it has cleared, the cars to the right become the primary obstacle, so only then should you concentrate fully on them.

Similar methods can be used when turning right at a tee junctions, i.e. cars coming from the left are primary obstacles, only when they have cleared, is it worth looking at the cars from the right, "if there is nowhere to go, it is not worth trying to get there.

As for the fake crash creators, If you are involved, remember if possible to photograph the whole scene, or even movie it on you mobile phone to show who was actually there. A quick 360 degree pan might help, as these "family members" are sometimes not there at all. Get the other driver to sign a list of people involved at the time.

Ian

Edited by IGL on Monday 11th August 12:32

[LukeBird]

Fidgits said:

LukeBird said:

That's a bit odd. It was here, because I hit the 'add your comments' link.


Wheredered it go?

maybe it rear ended a dodgy guy on the way to the forum

Maybe!

[silly chap]

gti-ted said:

To be fair most of these scams are at roundabouts and the perps brake once over the white line giving you and i little or no chance of reacting in time.
I bet most of them are foreigners looking for a quick buck

i bet most of them aren`t foreigners.

[shoestring7]

IGL said:

My approach is to completely ignore the cars to the right until the car in front has gone completely. It is the car in front that is your primary obstacle and it is this which you should concentrate on most. After it has cleared, the cars to the right become the primary obstacle, so only then should you concentrate fully on them.

Edited by IGL on Monday 11th August 12:28

This happened to me on a damp slimy day last January. Bloke in front pulls way onto roundabout with high speed traffic at peak hour. I stop at line, look for gap (or the 1/2 gap I know is all I'm going to get), pull out sharpish, look forward just in time tosee the bloke in front had stopped.

Turned out some old biddy in a SMART has stopped dead on the roundabout in front of him for no obvious reason. Needless to say she bimbled off oblivious while we needed front and rear p/u's.

SS7

[Alfanatic]

R360 said:

Im sure i remember seeing a documentary about a guy who had claimed whiplash from around 50 accidents, I think his whole family were involved and he made a good living from it.

I think its disgraceful and i totally agree with some other comments on here, i hope they do themselves some serious injury, and them ask themselves was it really worth it?

That sentiment inspires in me a Clarksonesque moment of clarity: If the driver in front pulls away, then stops suddenly for no reason, and you know you can't avoid them, accelerate hard. *


...just in case.

• I'm not being serious. Much. Agree that you should make yourself as difficult as possible to become a victim to this type of fraud through good observations and safe following distances, but if the fraudster has any skill they'd probably be watching the car behind them particularly well and choose their moment carefully to take advantage of that one slight lapse of concentration you have or some or other distraction. Criminals participating in this activity should be easy to spot though. They'll frequently be victims of a rear end collision and the defendants will likely be unanimous in claiming that the victim stopped unexpectedly or executed some or other erratic manoeuvre that made the collision inevitable.

[drewcole81]

hayesey said:

how can people get away with doing this all the time though? Don't their names go onto a database when a claim is made in their favour? Surely it should be fairly obvious that the same people are making lots of claims or are they using false identities or something?

I wouldn't beleive that the "database" is all its cracked up to be.... I had crash around 6 years ago and it never appeared on anything, went through my insurance and there is no trace of it anywhere.

Didn't effect my insurance or my no claims.

[tinman0]

J111 said:

"The scammers often make innocent drivers crash into them so that they can claim for damage and injuries such as whiplash. Usually they will brake hard so that the driver behind goes into the back of them."

Hmm

Only a fool breaks the two second rule ?

If someone is trying to create an accident, the two second rule won't save you. Although we should always be alert about other drivers and their actions, if someone is trying to cause an accident isn't something we are on the look out for.

[IanHug]

hayesey said:

how can people get away with doing this all the time though? Don't their names go onto a database when a claim is made in their favour? Surely it should be fairly obvious that the same people are making lots of claims or are they using false identities or something?

I recall something on the telly about it a while back - the gangs they covered were using eastern European drivers that they paid to have the accident, so different driver each accident.

[Mike400]

gti-ted said:

To be fair most of these scams are at roundabouts and the perps brake once over the white line giving you and i little or no chance of reacting in time.
I bet most of them are foreigners looking for a quick buck

This happened to me, was coming up to a roundabout, nothing coming from the right at all, guy in front takes off, I looked right to double check it was still clear as I took off, he brakes hard, I look back and see him stopped but too late. Bang.

Insurance company or police not interested, he gets massive payout for whiplash (even though at time of impact I must have been doing 10mph) I lose two years no claims and learn my lesson big time.

Technically it was my fault and I should have paid more attention, but on a completely deserted roundabout you wouldn't expect someone to take off then brake sharply.

Such is life

[Vipers]

I seem to hear about this on the telly a few years ago, at which time, the Police wasn't interested................

[v8 jago]

mike-r said:

Good excuse to get some 6 pots then.

Just heard that brembo have gone into partnership with these crims, So everyone now wants to buy better brakes so they can half there chance of not stopping. Making brembo a fortune

Edited by v8 jago on Monday 11th August 13:07

[cowellsj]

J111 said:

"The scammers often make innocent drivers crash into them so that they can claim for damage and injuries such as whiplash. Usually they will brake hard so that the driver behind goes into the back of them."

Hmm

Only a fool breaks the two second rule ?

Yeah, so basically they won't have to look too far for a victim then...

[Police State]

silly chap said:

gti-ted said:

To be fair most of these scams are at roundabouts and the perps brake once over the white line giving you and i little or no chance of reacting in time.
I bet most of them are foreigners looking for a quick buck

i bet most of them aren`t foreigners.

As if this government would ever dare release the true figures of just how much crime is generated by 'the new britons'...

[Orb the Impaler]

This has been going on in NE Manchester and Bradford for *years* now; I see it all the time.

Luckily the perps are very easy to spot, and everyone I know simply gives them a very wide berth. Doesn't stop problems at traffic lights though: car in front of you, car behind you (full of first car's mates). Car in front reverses into you and claims it was your fault. Witnesses in rearmost car. You get the picture....

Fair boils my piss.

[markmullen]

I'd like to run a unimog and go looking for these clowns, try brake testing me now

[Mike400]

Orb the Impaler said:

This has been going on in NE Manchester and Bradford for *years* now; I see it all the time.

Luckily the perps are very easy to spot, and everyone I know simply gives them a very wide berth. Doesn't stop problems at traffic lights though: car in front of you, car behind you (full of first car's mates). Car in front reverses into you and claims it was your fault. Witnesses in rearmost car. You get the picture....

Fair boils my piss.

My dad has mounted a discreet camera just above his rear-view mirror, with a recorder in the boot with a loop tape (i.e. once the tape is full it starts recording over itself.

Means he usually has the last couple of hours driving on tape.

Its a bit overkill and he only installed it because he could (bit of a geek / gadget freak / tinkerer type)

But its got me thinking of doing the same....

[DM112233]

johno_VR6 said:

Original Article said:

Drivers are being warned to look out for criminals who stage road accidents to claim money on insurance.

And how exactly do we spot these? Do they wear certain clothing??

yeah I thought that.

Rather than regurgitating meaningless piffle I wish journo's would make the effort to demand some explanation as to what that statement actually means...

otherwise Im just going to assume its token gesture lip service to the usual - *there's a problem that we cant really do much about so instead we'll just let the cost pass on to the law abiding end consumer*

[gti-ted]

Police State said:

silly chap said:

gti-ted said:

To be fair most of these scams are at roundabouts and the perps brake once over the white line giving you and i little or no chance of reacting in time.
I bet most of them are foreigners looking for a quick buck

i bet most of them aren`t foreigners.

As if this government would ever dare release the true figures of just how much crime is generated by 'the new britons'...

True

[Chainguy]

tinman0 said:

J111 said:

"The scammers often make innocent drivers crash into them so that they can claim for damage and injuries such as whiplash. Usually they will brake hard so that the driver behind goes into the back of them."

Hmm

Only a fool breaks the two second rule ?

If someone is trying to create an accident, the two second rule won't save you. Although we should always be alert about other drivers and their actions, if someone is trying to cause an accident isn't something we are on the look out for.

Exactly.

This happened to my Wife about a fortnight ago, when this guy in an ancient Ford Escort cut in front of her from the outside lane and just slammed the brakes full on all the way to zero mph when he was about a foot in front of her front bumper.

There was no other traffic on the dual carriageway at the time, so there would have been no witnesses to the 'accident'.

By pure luck, she managed to stop without hitting him, but it was close to within inches.

When she got beside him to see what the phuk he was up to, he just looked at her, laughed, and drove on.

Scum. Scum. Scum

[Kaelic]

Going on about it right now on Radio 2

Some guy had to drop the "couldnt speak a word of english" bomb lol


Thing is in the states they have these cameras for insurance use, why dont we get offered them here? I would happily take a cut in my insurance premiums if I had to agree to have a wee camera setup in the car to record the last hour or so of motoring.

what do others think?