Recently my car was stolen and recovered.
Its book price was around £1000
The damage was a 'screw drivered-ed' door lock and broken steering lock and cowl etc.
As our baby was due any day, never having claimed before and having full protected NCD, I decided to let the insurance company fix the car.
I was fully comp and a courtesy car was supplied. Two weeks later, the 'approved garage' 'phoned to say that the damaged would cost £1500 to fix and that the car was a 'write-off'. I had to return the courtsey car and collect my own car at my expense from their garage some 20 miles away.
They refused to transoprt my car back to my house, under legael advise {trade union legal dept} I refused to hand over the hire car until my car was returned. It worked.
A 90p touch up stick {for the paint by the door lock}, a new £80 steering lock, a cowl of a scrapper {£1.00} and about 3 hours of my time, saw my car {a 7 seater} back on the road {I and my family had struggled with the 3 door Micra for 2 weeks}.
The garage , as it was an insurance job, had wanted to remove all the trim from the driver's side of my car 9 year old car, respray all the side, fit new trim, replace all locks on the car {steering, both front doors, tailgate, petrol cap and glove box}, new steering colunm etc etc.
No wonder car insurance is so much.
I fixed the car mysely for less the £100 policy excess.
So much for trouble free fully comp peace of mind insurance when they do this to you.
Had the garage done what I had done, they would have got a few hundred pounds in work. Insted they got nowt - or is this a scheme set up by the insurance companiaes to prevent paying out ?
Alex
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Alex
I see you say the garage, rather than the insurance company, phoned and advised you of this. Did you check directly with the insurance company and try to negotiate a more realistic repair (eg accept non-matching keys, spray the door only etc)?
I'm amazed that the Insurance assessor acepted this level of repair work from the garage. Perhaps being an 'approved' repairer they have a degree of autonomy - and this example should perhaps be brought to the attention of the insurance company.
Also, as no actual claim has been made, make sure that this is noted on your policy records - it may be your protected NCD has a X claims in Y years limit, and you don't want that compromised by a non-claim.
Regards
John
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The insurance comapny and the Garages are in cahoots.
One of the family 106s got a cosmetic shunt. Garage tried to write it off. For 1300 quid.
This was wrong so, like Alex he had to pick it up.
Local Peugeot dealer did the job for 300 quid.
Basically the Garage write 'em of. Then give the Insurance company a big back hander for the car.
My advice is *never* pay for fully comp insurance. You will almost never use it. If you do you suffer for years.
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Yes the garage phoned me John. I thought that if was daft to resprey the whole side too.
A good point about a 'non claim' - i must chkeck on this
Thanks
Alex
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The garage had no justification for changing all the locks. I would say it's the garage trying to fleece the system rather than the insurance company in this case. It would do no harm, and quite possibly a great deal of good, to complain to the insurance company aiming to
- ensure that there is no record kept of this aborted claim, which could otherwise put your premium up at renewal
- obtain a rebate on the your insurance policy on the basis that you were effectively only third party insured
- if they don't accept the above, recompense you for effectively doing their job for them (and charge for your time accordingly).
A subtlety of protected NCD is that you premium will still go up at renewal. You just get the full % discount on the inflated premium.
If you have a car worth 'only' £1000 or so, and have some practical ability (as you clearly have), comprehensive insurance is wasted money.
In case you haven't, it is worth reporting car theft/damage to the police. I had my driver's window smashed, I replaced it from a scrap car, and successfully claimed the enormous sum of £10.70 (glass and Safeways vac) from the theiving scum the police caught in the act in a jeweller's shop the same evening.
It's good you're back on the road without too great an expense. Many people have paid much more and come off far less wiser.
Rob
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"If you have a car worth 'only' £1000 or so, and have some practical ability (as you clearly have), comprehensive insurance is wasted money."
Try it with a 6 grand car.
Premium will be 600pa.
Excess will be nearly a grand.
You are effectively only isured for a total loss.
If you have a total loss more frequently than once every 10 years and can afford loss of NCD + 15 per cent loading for five years after a claim then by all means have fully comp. Otherwise don't. You won't use it.
Car Insurance is a con.
Now boat insurance. New for old, no NCD, no loading after a claim. That's what insurance should be like.
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Had a bit of body repair work to be done on my old Peugeot a few years back as a white van cut me up (too closely). It started off that white van company was not going to pay so I got a "private" quote from Peugeot dealer at about £250. Then the company decided that they would pay rather than face further action so got an "insurance" quote so that they could pay me back after I got the work done - Peugeot dealer wrote one out for £350. They were a bit vague about why it was £100 more.
So I put it through privately and passed on the insurance amount and pocketed £100
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Rob is absolutely right about protected NCD. I sopped doing mine about 10 years ago when, after a claim (first one I had made), the renewal arrived to show a 22% increase. It's a mistake a lot of people make and the insurance companies don't exactly go out of their way to correct this wrong assumption. Strangely enough, that claim was for a similar situation when the car was broken into. The repairing dealership insisted that all the locks be changed because of the central locking mechanism and, even though they included a door skin on the estimate, we ended up rejecting the car when, after the paint around the lock went matt, I investigated the repair more closely and discovered that the indent in the door had been pushed out. It was the original skin. When I complained to the insurers they were not the slightest bit concerned. My own company (which I will not name lest I am accused of Advertising) has spoken to several of the major insurers about using SMART repairers for some of the damage and they just don't want to know. We know that the majority of bumpers being replaced for instance are perfectly repairable at a fraction of the cost of a new one, but they seem clueless. it's crazy when they bitch about how much money they lose every year on Motor insurance.
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How naive I was to think I had a protected NCD!
I had a small bump (£126) in Oct last, in my 2nd year with this co., and, as I had no excess, chose to make a claim.
My renewal premium, this month, had risen by £213, to £563!
I was able to re-insure with another co for £308, and had another quote of £327, so unsurprisingly, my previous insurers lost my business.
BUT, the crunch (!) is that, as a result of my previously documented encounter with a pheasant, my former insurers are also faced with another bill, for nearly £1000 ! !
If they had given a more reasonable quote, they'd have probably kept my business, and would (hopefully!) have had a chance to 'recoup their losses', as I have had a pretty good accident record over my 40+ years of driving. My heart bleeds..
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Thanks Rob, I look into what you say.
However when i 'phoned the Rozzers, they would not even come out to look at the car - clearly unless the 'joy rider' was to own up , he will never be caught.
Now insured third party !!!!!!!!!
Alex
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>>A 90p touch up stick {for the paint by the door lock}, a new £80 steering lock, a cowl of a scrapper {£1.00} and about 3 hours of my time, saw my car
>>{a 7 seater} back on the road {I and my family had struggled with the 3 door Micra for 2 weeks}.
However, you wouldn't have accepted this level of repair or the lack of replacement car if you'd continued with the Insurance job.
Also, you will need to retract the claim in writing and warrant that no future claim will result from this incident.
You may also need to refund the cost of the courtesy car, since the garage build this cost into their repair and may well have billed the insurance company - resulting in a loss of NCD.
I suggest you check quickly.
There are, of course, many examples of recommended repairers bumping up bills with additional work. It is unusual that they don't actually do the work, but whether or not the work is neccessary is always doubtful
They are supposed to receive regular visits from an inspector, but since these are normally independent it is not the best system and open to slackness and abuse.
However, it still works out as substantially cheaper for Insurers to use this method, then a more closely monitored or inspected approach.
Therefore, believe it or not, this holds your premiums down, rather than increasing them.
As for the person who pocketed the 100 quid - you are aware as to what you just admitted ?
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Agh my favourite rant again!!
Protected no claims = have a claim and your insurer put up the price next year anyway, when you move elsewhere you have to tell them you have had a claim, on the No claims certificate, your old insurer may write that you have had a claim therefore you lose!!
Make a no fault claim = your insurance still goes up you still lose
Make a no fault + personal injury claim = they are soooo gonna have you, the person at fault may never know you made in injury claim and is even less likely to know the settlement figure, therefore they get off with telling insurance companies 'yeah the other guys car was written off for £1500' no big problem you have to tell your insurance company no fault £1500 for car £5000 personal injury = big problem
Try to make a no fault claim through a solicitor (not going near your insurance company) is going to take time (lots of it) and you need to have the funds available to get you back on the road with a runabout until you get it sorted.
In summary save up a pot of gold to 'insure yourself' to pay for solicitor & runabout, get as cheap 3rd party as you can to keep you legal, Unless you end up in a wheelchair or something v.serious do not make a personal injury claim, no matter how much you deserve it, except life isn't fair and get on with it ... those immortal words ' Don't let the B#@$%&*S get you down!;
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As I have said, NCD is an irrelevance. It ranges in maximum value, it treated differently from company to company in event of a claim - it is meaningless.
Consider only the bottom line, that's all your insurer does.
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In the example given of a 22% increase with protected NCD, do you realise that it would have gone up 82 - 92% without protection?
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Yes, but its not relevant.
Which is better ?
1) 10 years NCD, 80% discount, Net premium $500
2) 1 years NCD, 20% discount, Net premium $400
Clearly number 2 is better, but the insurance industry makes millions of revenue out of number 1.
Of course it would have gone up without the protection, but that is only relevant if you cannot shop around - DD conviction, silly car etc. etc.
As people point out, in the event of a claim your premium still goes up, if you go to another insurer then you will get awarded years/discount according to their normal scale, not your existing scale etc. etc.
It was thought that it would help the driver of many years good behaviour who had one fault accident but was otherwise a good risk, but it got silly.
The whole NCD thing is one of the best marketing wind-ups the insurance industry has ever come up with.
Surpassed for brilliance by the whole protected NCD scheme.
Well, that and knock for knock which I have yet to meet someone outside the insurance industry who actually understands what it means, hot it works and the full implications. Most people seem to think it means a 50:50 accident.
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The point I was trying to make was that the protected NCD lulled me into making the claim in the first place. Had I been aware of the likely effect on my premium, I would, most likely, have had second thoughts.
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and the only consolation is that you are in a very large group of people who have been conned/mislead/fooled into thinking the same.
Ignore everything except the actual cover and the bottom line - nothing else is relevant.
It looks like I am being transferred back to the UK soon, and I may well start a campaign against the misleading insurers and the misguided insured.
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Mark (Brazil) wrote:
> It looks like I am being transferred back to the UK soon, and
> I may well start a campaign against the misleading insurers
> and the misguided insured.
You might want to consider investing in some Vaseline then.
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not me - company car man, me.
And before you think about taxes, I'm officially resident in the British Virgin Ils.
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I was referring to frost protecting your car door rubbers of course Mark!
When might you be returning to the UK then? Whereabouts to?
You have seen how much you get shafted for a decent sized company car these days haven't you?!
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> You have seen how much you get shafted for a decent sized
> company car these days haven't you?!
I am, what they call, "tax equalised". i.e. in response to your specific question - nothing.
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Have you managed to find any?
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