Should I Do This Through The Insurance?

[mikesands]

Treacherous ice on an industrial estate where I was taking my motorbike's screen to be painted candy orange at a body shop (ironic this). Anyway picking my way out of the estate, I saw another car entering the road, and stopped. Attempted to signal to the other guy about the black ice, but he went for the gap anyway. Front end went round all right but his back end slid into my front wing. Only him and me saw the accident, but he seems to be accepting responsibility.

Damage if fixed properly by Lexus teesside is £2000 (new headlight is £700 :5:), but if we do this through the insurance, will I then get penalised on both my bike insurance and my car insurance. I think it could be fixed for about £500 - £700 by the guy I was going to see about the bike's screen. The Lexus bodyshop is proposing some weird scheme called 3rd party repairs or something where they take control, get everything sorted with the other guy's insurance, and I don't have to tell my insurer .... seems unlikely to me. (I have Lexus used car warranty)

Any thoughts?

Mike

[Nitmoi]

That sounds like a good scheme if it is legal. Lexus sent me a membership type card advising me to call them first if there was ever an accident. Perhaps this is part of their service.

[Bazza]

if it is not your fault then you will not get penalised

even if lexus do take control they will need to inform your insurers ? sounds as if they are touting for the work

most insurance companies handle everything for you including personal claims and hire cars, lets face it thats why you pay them

i would say give your insurance a ring and let them sort it out for you

[cdxdillan]

My advice would be very wary about not informing your insurance company,

I don't think its a legal issue as such, after all, a Lexus main dealer is hardly likely to blatently break the law or openly deal in dodgey insurance scams, however, somebody is going to have to foot the bill i.e. the other blokes insurance company, and they will want to know the ins and outs of a f**t about the incident before forking out, including the car they are shelling out to repair, they will also keep records.

Now, in these computer and internet days that we all live in it has never been easier for insurance companies to store and share details of claims etc. they will trawl this info if they're facing a large payout, they will also try and use any means possible to wriggle out and make an excuse to render your insurance policy void i.e. people not informing them of previous accidents.

A lot of insurance companies insist in the small print that you must inform them of any accidents whether it's your fault or not, or even if no claims have been made, or they may say something like you must inform us of any circumstances that may affect your policy, the get outs are endless.

If in future you rear end somebodys Bently and cause 40K's worth of damage you can rest assured they will be looking at get outs, including this minor prang even though It's not your fault.

your call.

[sparkyhx]

if it is not your fault then you will not get penalised

even if lexus do take control they will need to inform your insurers ? sounds as if they are touting for the work

most insurance companies handle everything for you including personal claims and hire cars, lets face it thats why you pay them

i would say give your insurance a ring and let them sort it out for you

you do get penalised for 'no fault' claims - just not as much as 'fault' claims.

with regard to not telling them - some insurers ask if you have had any accidents other will ask have you made any claims.

[manxy]

Hi, firstly you must inform your insurer if you are involved in any accident or not. Your insurance could be invalid for any future claim if you don't. A lot of Lexus dealers offer an accident service at the moment where they "take care of everything" Unfortunately you could still be liable for costs if you use this type of service and for some reason it goes against you or deemed knock for knock. Also as it happened on industrial land you have to be 100% sure that you can actually claim against the other driver as it is private land.

Hate to be a scrooge at this time of year but inform your insurance company and let them deal with it. After all you are paying them enough as it is.

Manxy

[JellyBean]

Hi, firstly you must inform your insurer if you are involved in any accident or not.

Do you really mean this?

[whysub]

Whatever you do, inform your insurers, and you will NOT be penalised if it is not your fault. It seems more and more body shops are offering this kind of "Bring it in, and we'll sort everything" service, and have not seen anything bad about this in the press, but you never can be sure.

It is also worth visiting the industrial estate and asking at the units if anyone at any of them recall the black ice there, and the council to see if it was reported to then for gritting, and even the police as there may have been more than obne incident down to this black ice that day. Take some photos of the road, and mark on the photos your position and his at the time of impact.

The reason for this is that I had a no fault motorbike accident. The other party admitted it was his fault (he had no option but to) but there were no witnesses. Three weeks later his insurers blamed the accident entirely on me. Fortunately, I had been back to the scene the day following the crash (despite my injuries) and took photos of where my bike had gone over and dug into the tarmac, his (amd my) skid marks, measured the road width, etc. Two days later they admitted liability. Without doing this, I'm sure it would have been settled knock for knock at best.

And if you are happy to have the car repaired at where you were going to get your bike screen sprayed, say so (I'd rather my friends bodyshop spray my van and bikes than anyone else, as he is superb). The insurers can only say no, but a £1,000 saving to them is still a £1,000 saving.

Good luck, and i hope all goes smoothly.

[plastic orange]

My son was reversed into in an Asda car park - driver said they'd pay damage, but after him giving her a few quotes, she reneged - so went through insurance - surprise surprise knock for knock. Insurance insisted on a repair costing £300 more than his highest estimate - he lost his no claims, but insurance company waived the excess :eerrrmm: .

Insurance is really just a donation :megaangry: .

Pete