A couple of months ago my wife had an accident in her car.
She was pulling out of a T-Junction turning right and all the traffic on the lane going the other way was stationary. She edged out to check nothing was coming from her left and proceded to pull out. An impatient idiot had decided he wasn't waiting with the other traffic so was overtaking all the stationary traffic. Because of his speed he left 20mtr skid marks and ploughed into my wifes car. Bear in mind he was travelling on the wrong side of the road going in excess of the 30mph limit.
His insurance decided straight away that he was to blame so my wifes car was repaired and we paid the excess.
His insurance company sent us letters stating that they accept full responibility and last week sent us a cheque for the excess.
The cheque was paid in and returned to us by the building society with them claiming it had been stopped. I rang his insurance company and they have now decided that they are not accepting liability even though I have a letter from them accepting full blame.
They are now claiming damages from my wifes insurance and I am not to happy.
Can they do this? and what should I do now.
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Marcos,
Although I am no insurance expert I would have thought it unusual for the other insurance company to admit "full responsibility". In my experience, even when matters are pretty clear cut they normally pay your excess, with a disclaimer. Is there no small print in their letters to this effect?
Presumably the other party is now claiming that there is nothing illegal in overtaking stationary traffic and your wife should have ascertained that the road was clear, in both directions, before pulling out?
C
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YOU shouldn't do anything, Marcos.
Your wife pays an insurance premium, they should handle everything.
Several previous threads on here about the dangers of handling things personally; you pay a premium for professional help, so leave it to them.
BR legal experts might well have a view about the feasibility of withdrawing a guilty plea, though.
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The other party's insurance company's letter reads " we refer to the above accident for which we accept full responsibility"
As far as I was concerened the matter was closed but his insurance company have changed their minds.
When I spoke to them the response was " we can do whatever we like" Nice!
The trouble is our insurance companys solicitor is a complete idiot and is just not interested in sorting it out.
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Marcos,
" we refer to the above accident for which we accept full responsibility".
Was it Richard Nixon who said 'When you have them by the (things that men have 2 of and women do not) thier hearts and minds will follow'?
Go for their throats - is your wife suffering from sleep problems, loss of appetite, does she need to visit her Doctor, take time off work?
Do not speak to them by phone - either write to them or get legal advice - maybe one of our legal members can expand on the reason that all of our insurance companies advise us, in the event of an accident, never to admit liability?
You have it in writing! I doubt if "we can do whatever we like" is an acceptable statement in law...I bet they would not put this in writing - phone conversations are useless in your circumstances.
Good Luck
Matt35.
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>>insurance company have changed their minds. When I spoke to them the response was " we can do whatever we like" Nice!
>>
1. report them to insurance ombudsman or whatever they are called.
The trouble is our insurance companys solicitor is a complete idiot and is just not interested in sorting it out.
2. report or threaten to report solicitor to the law society.
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1. report them to insurance ombudsman or whatever they are called.
No good. The Ombudsman is unable to accept complaints where the complainant is not a party to the policy. It sucks, but thats they way they work.
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>> 1. report them to insurance ombudsman or whatever they are called. No good. The Ombudsman is unable to accept complaints where the complainant is not a party to the policy. It sucks, but thats they way they work.
"or whatever they are called."
they are the association of british insurers, and the general insurance standards council.
go to
www.gisc.co.uk/Home/default.asp
www.abi.org.uk/default.asp
and then click on the information zone
www.abi.org.uk/Display/default.asp?Menu_ID=946&Men...3
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All very strange Marcos - does the letter 'admitting' liability contain the phrase 'without prejudice'? As I understand it, if it does the letter cannot be used in a legal sense so may be worthless if you decide to take this matter to law. As I see it it's only your excess that's the issue so why not let your insurers sort it out as already advised.
The main thing is that thankfully your wife's OK.
Good luck
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Marcos,
I appreciate that the main point of this thread is the other insurance company admitting liability and then retracting. However given the circumstances as you have described them I am really surprised that they ever admitted liability in the first place. It is also surprising that his insurance company wrote to you - normally they write only to your insurance company don't they?
Notwithstanding the guy who hit your wife appears to be a **** surely it is the responsibility of anyone pulling out onto a road from a T junction to ascertain it is clear in both directions before doing so. After all it could have been a police/emergency vehicle overtaking the static traffic and in any case it is not illegal to overtake static traffic unless there are white lines to prevent this happening.
Were the police involved - to measure the skid marks?
C
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Don't mess around.
Send them a letter telling them that you have their cancelled cheue. Explain that in 7 days you're taking out a County Court Summons.
Explain that you will not be communicating with them again and will accept no communication from them other than another cheque with some kind of guarantee that this one will not be stopped.
Also explain that you wish to receive a further £nn to cover your bank charges over the stopped cheque.
Forget the accident and the rights and wrongs of the incident. Focus on the stopped cheque. The accident is subject to argument, the cheque is not.
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I agree. If you sent them a cheque and then stopped it before it was banked, they'd be on to you faster than you could say "I'll get you, Dangermouse".
Don't let this rest. Good luck, and keep us informed.
BG
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