Car Write Off - Who Decides?
Discussion
Hi
Someone drove into my OH's car today.
It was parked and there was a note attached when she returned to it (there are some good people left in the world!).
The damage is extremely noticeable, badly scraped bumper, but isn't encroaching onto the main body of the car.
So, she contacted her insurers and told them what the situation was... I expected them to pursue the OTHER chap's insurers to get them to pay for a repair. Instead, they immediately said that this might be a situation where the repair costs outweigh the value of the car (it's only a little shopping runabout).
My questions:
Won't HER insurers simply be chasing up HIS insurers to settle this?
Who decides if the car is to be written off or not?
What is the process if it IS written off?
Many thanks!
If you wanted to go directly to the tp insurer, you should have contacted the tp first. Now you've gone to your insurers, assuming you have comp, they will deal with your claim and claim back any outlay from tp insurers after your claim has been processed.
Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
If you wanted to go directly to the tp insurer, you should have contacted the tp first. Now you've gone to your insurers, assuming you have comp, they will deal with your claim and claim back any outlay from tp insurers after your claim has been processed.
Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
What?Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
LoonR1 said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
If you wanted to go directly to the tp insurer, you should have contacted the tp first. Now you've gone to your insurers, assuming you have comp, they will deal with your claim and claim back any outlay from tp insurers after your claim has been processed.
Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
What?Your insurers will decide if it's a write off. From what you say, if it is, it'll be cat D, so they will either offer you the market value of the car or maybe allow you to keep the car and deduct an amount for salvage, and you can keep using the car with the scratched bumper.
You will then insure it third party only (as you've already had the value paid out to you) or you can get it repaired yourself and then you may be able to go up to comp again.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
If the insurers pay out a total loss claim on the car, but allow policyholder to keep it as damage is only superficial, they will usually only cover it tpo going forward. Unless it is repaired.
That's not true. They'll cover it anyway you want, as long as they're happy to cover previous total losses. Sterillium said:
Hi
Someone drove into my OH's car today.
It was parked and there was a note attached when she returned to it (there are some good people left in the world!).
The damage is extremely noticeable, badly scraped bumper, but isn't encroaching onto the main body of the car.
So, she contacted her insurers and told them what the situation was... I expected them to pursue the OTHER chap's insurers to get them to pay for a repair. Instead, they immediately said that this might be a situation where the repair costs outweigh the value of the car (it's only a little shopping runabout).
My questions:
Won't HER insurers simply be chasing up HIS insurers to settle this?
Who decides if the car is to be written off or not?
What is the process if it IS written off?
Many thanks!
Just to answer this. It doesn't matter who is responsible for an accident an insurer will write a car off if the repair costs exceed a certain percentage of the pre accident value (normally around 70%). Someone drove into my OH's car today.
It was parked and there was a note attached when she returned to it (there are some good people left in the world!).
The damage is extremely noticeable, badly scraped bumper, but isn't encroaching onto the main body of the car.
So, she contacted her insurers and told them what the situation was... I expected them to pursue the OTHER chap's insurers to get them to pay for a repair. Instead, they immediately said that this might be a situation where the repair costs outweigh the value of the car (it's only a little shopping runabout).
My questions:
Won't HER insurers simply be chasing up HIS insurers to settle this?
Who decides if the car is to be written off or not?
What is the process if it IS written off?
Many thanks!
That's it really.
You might be able to buy it back, or you might not. It might make economic sense for you to buy it back, it might not. Whatever you decide, the car will come back with a total loss marker against it (Cat C or D), if it is written off.
This happened to me. Speak to the other insurer and they will either repair, write off and pay you or give you the option to buy the salvage.
If you want to keep it if it is written off it will have CAT marker on it but in my case it made much more sense to keep it and I didn't care about the CAT status.
My insurer didn't load my next renewal as it was non fault and I dealt with the other side, I did make a point with the other side I was prepared to sort this quickly without an accident management company and hire car etc to get a decent resolution. It seemed to work.
If you want to keep it if it is written off it will have CAT marker on it but in my case it made much more sense to keep it and I didn't care about the CAT status.
My insurer didn't load my next renewal as it was non fault and I dealt with the other side, I did make a point with the other side I was prepared to sort this quickly without an accident management company and hire car etc to get a decent resolution. It seemed to work.
TwigtheWonderkid said:
If you wanted to go directly to the tp insurer, you should have contacted the tp first. Now you've gone to your insurers, assuming you have comp, they will deal with your claim and claim back any outlay from tp insurers after your claim has been processed.
That's not an irreversible situation, at least not in all cases. No, I'm not a lawyer, no, I don't work in insurance, yes, I was hit by a 3rd party, went home. called my insurers, received a call direct from the 3rd party's insurers an hour later, called my own insurer back and told them to stand down, no you can't call BS on that because it's the absolute truth.My car was extremely well-repaired, at a specialist over 100 miles away and not at the local bulk-buy body shop. I got an (expensive) equivalent car on hire whilst mine was collected from my house, repaired, and returned to my house (on a transporter). They even called me 2 weeks later to say that they had just discovered that their wheel alignment machine had a fault and they wanted to recheck mine, so they collected it on a transporter again, left me something to use overnight, and brought it back the next day.
LoonR1 said:
TwigtheWonderkid said:
If the insurers pay out a total loss claim on the car, but allow policyholder to keep it as damage is only superficial, they will usually only cover it tpo going forward. Unless it is repaired.
That's not true. They'll cover it anyway you want, as long as they're happy to cover previous total losses. TwigtheWonderkid said:
If your car is worth £1000 and it suffers £1000 of cosmetic damage, and your insurers write it off and pay you £900 (£100 deducted as you're keeping the car), they are not going to pay you £1000 the following week when you hit a tree, when you haven't repaired the initial damage to the car. If they did you'd have got £1900 for a car worth a grand because you had 2 accidents instead of one. They will normally restrict you to tpo until you spend some of the cash they gave you repairing the first lot of damage.
the new insurance policy will be exactly that a new policy , especially as the first claim was a total loss in their eyes.TwigtheWonderkid said:
If your car is worth £1000 and it suffers £1000 of cosmetic damage, and your insurers write it off and pay you £900 (£100 deducted as you're keeping the car), they are not going to pay you £1000 the following week when you hit a tree, when you haven't repaired the initial damage to the car. If they did you'd have got £1900 for a car worth a grand because you had 2 accidents instead of one. They will normally restrict you to tpo until you spend some of the cash they gave you repairing the first lot of damage.
No they won't. Any subsequent total loss accident will have the pre accident value reduced due to the total loss marker on the car and any existing damage will affect the value, but they will not restrict you to TPO. mph1977 said:
the new insurance policy will be exactly that a new policy , especially as the first claim was a total loss in their eyes.
A total loss doesn't mean the policy ends, quite often you can just add a new car to the existing policy after a total loss, or continue cover on your existing car. It's actually very rare for a policy to end after a total loss, as the FOS don't like these policies at all. The full annual premium is due before they pay out / deducted from any payout, but that's about it. Rtype said:
xjay1337 said:
So someone left a note and instead of calling the person, you called your insurance company.
Now you/your partner will have a fault-claim on her record, insurance costs will go up.
Now you/your partner will have a fault-claim on her record, insurance costs will go up.
this is one of my post's of the year.
ks. I work for an insurance company..... Yes I'm the man that writes your cars off.
Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
Wish said:
I work for an insurance company..... Yes I'm the man that writes your cars off.
Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
Your insurer may well restrict it, but most won't. My place certainly doesn't, nor do any of the other mainstream ones that I'm aware of. Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
Wish said:
I work for an insurance company..... Yes I'm the man that writes your cars off.
Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
With regards to the bold section, what would that job title be? As an engineer that sort of job sounds quite interesting. Cover will be restricted to tpo until the vehicle is repaired. If it's a cat C then the car will need to be inspected by a qualified engineer and a new mot sort. this is required by our company. 21 days is given then cover is cancelled. They will increase the cover time should you request wishing the 21 days.
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