Had an Accident

[Deleted member 37751]

So then the owner's vehicle gets returned fully repaired, but now has an accident repair on record, so will affect the value.

That's only if the car is written off, not an approved repair.

There are hundreds of thousands of cars and vans on our roads that have been repaired by their insurance that aren't 'registered'.

 

[MancMike]

He'll still have to fill in the "any accidents in the last 5 years, regardless of fault" box with a yes.

Either way, it will cost the OP something at some point...

 

[elisetype25]

Not necessarily so.

Our insurance went down following a no fault accident.

I suspect that most insurances policies will default at a level where the behaviour/character of the insured party is unknown. This means that it is only after an accident can insurance companies accurately assess your risk. As a result those that make spurious injury claims will find their policies go up, while those that don't see them come down.

Regards, Neil

 

[E55BOF]

Not necessarily so.

Our insurance went down following a no fault accident.

My wife's went up. The car was parked up in a supermarket carpark, and a chap in a company BMW repmobile scraped down the side of it, in front of an independent witness. His insurers paid up without any argument at all, but her insurance still went up.

I pointed out to her insurers that it was no different from a car driving into our house - moving car hits stationary object on private land, driver wholly at fault - but her insurance still went up.

 

[elisetype25]

My wife's went up. The car was parked....

I can see why the insurance went up in your circumstance. The point I was making is that insurers will not be able to accurately assess the risk due to certain unknowns.

An incident in a car park when the car is unattended will leave these questions unanswered, and the fact that there is a correlation between accidents and claims, regardless of fault, means that insurances tend to go up! Hence the general perception on this thread.

However, where a no fault accident occurs with the potential for the innocent party to 'milk' the system, the insurance company can learn alot about the character of the client and adjust the premium in each case.

In our case, and the OPs, we were in the car at the time of the accident and therefore a potential injury claim could have been brought. The fact that no such claim was made means that the insurance company has new information which can be factored into the policy premium calculation i.e. no spurious injury claims expected from this policy holder.

Unfortunately in your case, although it was a no fault accident, the incident did not reveal any new information which could help the insurance company assess your risk, other than that those who have one accident tend to have more - hence the increase.

My original point, was that premiums do not always go up, rather than they never do. Hope this clarifies.

I suspect that the van driver mentioned in the original post may well see a significant increase in his premiums following the rejection of his claim for injury and loss. Although this would also be subject to whether he chooses to admit to this fact when renewing any private insurances, since the accident occurred in a company vehicle.

Regards, Neil

 

[FaeLLe]

On the subject of insurance I've recently discovered that adding a second driver, spouse for example, reduces in some cases the premium. I've done Comparethemeerkat with and without spouse and for the same vehicle, and the spouse added has reduced the premium.

What if the spouse is a new driver? Wouldnt it increase the premium in that case?

 

[itaintemeyouno]

What if the spouse is a new driver? Wouldnt it increase the premium in that case?

I went on to my wife's insurance policy. I was a learner and she had 6 years claim free driving. Her insurance went down by £50. I am 9 years older than my wife so this would have been a factor...

Also to add a data point. I had two incidents in my first year of driving - one not fault and one reported but not so far progressed that would likely be 50/50 (BMW driver scraped against my car on a single track road while I was there with my handbrake on - I was on my own he had 3 people in the car with him I had no damage, he had scrape down his rear door - he just decided to keep going in spite of there being no space - I put handbrake on to ensure I couldn't be accused of hitting him) as a driver of less than 2 years, my premium did go up but by only 2.5%.

 

[chazzn]

Buy yourself a car cam, mines paid for itself already after a woman did a similar thing and cut me up, she was doing a right turn and didn't give way. She's also getting nicked by the police for failing to give me her details.