Shunted/Dunted

[Pudsey Bear]

When a Breedons road sweeper ran into our Bessie, I was allowed to pick the repairer.

 

[Sharon the Cat]

My 3 week old car is currently in for repair after someone reversed into it in a car park and admitted liability.
I called my insurer who is Direct Line. They are handling everything and dealing with the other driver's insurer Aviva for me. I don't lose my no claims and I don't have to pay an excess. Aviva sent me one text saying "stop the claim with your insurer as we will deal with it". Direct Line told me to ignore anything from Aviva and said I had nothing to worry about.
I currently have a hire car (I insisted on an EV as that is what I had just bought), rather than a cheap courtesy car. The most difficult thing has been getting the hire company to understand that petrol vehicles are not EVs. I'm glad I called Direct Line first.

 

[Sharon the Cat]

If your insurers do the repairs you will have to pay the excess, if other party do them without involving your insurers you won't.... But if it goes wrong you'll have to take them to court.

Not necessarily. My insurers are dealing with my claim and will claim everything off the other parties insurer. I haven't forked out a penny and have a nice hire car on the drive.

 

[Tezza33]

If your insurers do the repairs you will have to pay the excess, if other party do them without involving your insurers you won't.... But if it goes wrong you'll have to take them to court.

It is far better to let your insurance company deal with it
As a few others have said, if the other party is at fault, you don't have to pay the excess.
When our Hymer was damaged in Germany (we hit a deer), Saga allowed us to choose our own repairer, and we didn't lose our no-claims bonus; we chose the well-known Father and Son (Anton) team.
I didn't have to pay any excess

 

[trevskoda]

My 3 week old car is currently in for repair after someone reversed into it in a car park and admitted liability.
I called my insurer who is Direct Line. They are handling everything and dealing with the other driver's insurer Aviva for me. I don't lose my no claims and I don't have to pay an excess. Aviva sent me one text saying "stop the claim with your insurer as we will deal with it". Direct Line told me to ignore anything from Aviva and said I had nothing to worry about.
I currently have a hire car (I insisted on an EV as that is what I had just bought), rather than a cheap courtesy car. The most difficult thing has been getting the hire company to understand that petrol vehicles are not EVs. I'm glad I called Direct Line first.

Up to i think 3 mths you can refuse a repair and get a new replacement car, once a car has been repaired it looses about a third of retail value.

 

[alcam]

My 3 week old car is currently in for repair after someone reversed into it in a car park and admitted liability.
I called my insurer who is Direct Line. They are handling everything and dealing with the other driver's insurer Aviva for me. I don't lose my no claims and I don't have to pay an excess. Aviva sent me one text saying "stop the claim with your insurer as we will deal with it". Direct Line told me to ignore anything from Aviva and said I had nothing to worry about.
I currently have a hire car (I insisted on an EV as that is what I had just bought), rather than a cheap courtesy car. The most difficult thing has been getting the hire company to understand that petrol vehicles are not EVs. I'm glad I called Direct Line first.

Yes things appeared to have changed a lot.
I was connected to 3 different people today , final one being an Accident Management company .
First time I've had a claim dealt with this way

 

[RSD7a]

Accident Management Companies (all middle men make a living on taking a cut) are the prime culprits in rocketing premiums, especially when it comes to providing a hire (courtesy) car, at extortionate, eye-watering daily rates, which pushes repair costs through the roof. "You'll be needing a premium car sir" is a phrase I remember as they provided a massive Merc estate to cover for my mini Volvo which had been hit by a runaway car in a car park.

 

[alcam]

Accident Management Companies (all middle men make a living on taking a cut) are the prime culprits in rocketing premiums, especially when it comes to providing a hire (courtesy) car, at extortionate, eye-watering daily rates, which pushes repair costs through the roof. "You'll be needing a premium car sir" is a phrase I remember as they provided a massive Merc estate to cover for my mini Volvo which had been hit by a runaway car in a car park.

Is this a recent development?
Last insurance claim was about 6 years ago when my van was stolen .
As far as I remember I just dealt with my insurance company

 

[RSD7a]

Is this a recent development?
Last insurance claim was about 6 years ago when my van was stolen .
As far as I remember I just dealt with my insurance company

In my case it was 2015. And to make matters worse, some minor part was "temporarily unavailable" and I had to have the hire car for about 6 weeks. The cost to the other party's insurance company of the hire car easily exceeded the repair costs.

 

[Sharon the Cat]

Accident Management Companies (all middle men make a living on taking a cut) are the prime culprits in rocketing premiums, especially when it comes to providing a hire (courtesy) car, at extortionate, eye-watering daily rates, which pushes repair costs through the roof. "You'll be needing a premium car sir" is a phrase I remember as they provided a massive Merc estate to cover for my mini Volvo which had been hit by a runaway car in a car park.

The problem is that we, the end user and footer of the bill, have no choice in the matter.