Stress

[simont]

Direct Line rang me up yesterday, told me my car was a write-off, and let me know what paperwork would have to go where as a result.

Today I rang them back to ask them the one question I hadn't remembered to ask at the time, which is how long I get to keep the hire car they supplied me with. The woman I just spoke to had managed (or, more likely, her computer system had managed) to lose all my details, but said that the usual procedure is that I have to give the hire car back five days after receiving the settlement cheque.

That doesn't seem very long! I had guessed they'd at least let me keep it for a few weeks while I sorted out finding and buying a new car. I can of course start that process in advance of receiving the cheque – but I could easily imagine that not everybody would have the spare money to do that. So I'm less impressed with DL this week than I was last week.

On the plus side, my neck is definitely getting better. Can't credit DL with that one, though!

Comments

[samholloway.livejournal.com]

You were hit from behind, right? In that case, it's very much the other driver's fault.

Get onto their insurance company and ask to be provided with a hire car. They are legally obliged to keep you in the position you were before the accident - i.e. able to get around in your own vehicle!

I've been hit from behind twice and I always found it much easier to deal with the other party's insurance company (while still keeping my own notified).

Your own insurer may offer you a long-term hire car on a 'credit hire' scheme. Avoid this at all costs. It puts you in a very dubious position should there be difficulties settling the claim - you then become liable for the hire costs (effectively, your own insurance company will sue you).

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Poor car!

Incidentally, you don't necessarily have to accept their judgement that the car's a write-off - quite often they'll deem cars to be 'rolling write-offs' meaning they're beyond economic repair at the level set by the insurer, but if it's still running and you think you can get it fixed to MOT standard, you can opt to take the cash and sort it yourself. That's what d_floorlandmine did when his little Nissan NX got pranged, and they claimed that one dented side panel made it a write-off.

[simont]

Interesting advice, but in my case I don't think I can usefully dispute it – there are actual functional problems (one rear light cluster was shattered, which is easily fixable, and also the boot was bent so far out of shape that the rear wiper no longer meets the rear windscreen) and also they said the chassis was bent. I certainly wouldn't be confident that I could get it repaired to MOT standard, though I can see how if it was just one dented side panel it might be a different story.

[valkyriekaren.livejournal.com]

Oh dear, does sound like you took a bit of a knock. A twisted chassis is basically not fixable.

[pvaneynd]

It is fixable. My brother had to handle the result of the son-of-big-chief taking his right of way on a tram. However the tram is always right, not only in the eyes of the law, but also for physics 101: weight car: 1E3 Kg, weight tram >>25E3 Kg.

The car 'could not be' a write off, so they fixed the U shaped car. However I would not like to drive that or even be close to that car being driven...

[xraycb.livejournal.com]

Do you have a fancy stereo system (ISTR that you had a hard disk mp3 system at some point) in the car? You might have to negotiate specifically to get it back, best to do that before they formally write it off.

If you can be bothered, try to reject their first settlement offer. If your car had full (main dealer?) service history, then it's probably worth a little more. You can check parkers, autotrader and pistonheads classifieds for an idea on price.

[simont]

I went to the garage at lunchtime and rescued the stereo :-) but thanks for the reminder – I would have forgotten if my dad hadn't mentioned it on the phone last night.

I checked with Parkers just now, actually, and they reckon it's actually worth less than Direct Line are offering. (In favour is a good service history and low mileage; against are some old scrapes from stationary objects that I never bothered to get fixed...) So I've probably done all right there.

[hsenag.livejournal.com]

Are you looking at replacement cost rather than resale value? The former is what you're entitled to, of course.