Claim advice

Okies, so, had a minor off on the motorway last month resulting in my broken wrist and some cosmetic damage to bike (as well as writing off my 32-hour-old Raid 2 and my jacket). About £120 on the bike damage, probably closer to £400 on kit. The other driver did a runner afterwards, so couldn't take any details.

Accident was quite unique in that I was behind the guy on the motorway. A car cut slightly in front of him (not dangerously so), and the guy decided that it'd be a great time to stop in the fast lane. Seeing what was happening I initially slowed down as if the guy in front was only increasing the gap between the car now in front and himself, didn't expect him to go to basically 0 (which witnesses at the scene said basically happened). After realising that the guy was braking much harder than me and that I wouldn't stop in time, I moved to the left to try to get into the middle-lane to pass him that way. Unfortunately, as he started moving again, he juked to the left a bit and wiped out the front-end of my bike as I was passing him, leaving it sliding down the middle-lane and me rolling towards the central reservation.

At the time I wasn't going to claim - I'm only TPFT and there's nobody else's insurance to claim against as he did a runner and was untraced due to lack of anyone getting reg plate while trying to avoid both a bike sliding along and me rolling and a lack of CCTV on the stretch of motorway. However, on going into my local bike shop the next day and returning the helmet (they now use it as a sales-aid showing what happens during crashes - it's sold them quite a few Raid 2s, funnily enough!) and chatting to them, they said I could probably claim through the Motor Insurance Bureau. I'd already planned on informing the insurers that day (didn't bother straight after, as I was in A+E till past 1am), so when I informed them of the off, I asked about claiming through this.

Guy over the phone was very helpful, went through all the details of it, sent me out some forms etc. and I sent them all back. I was told I'd be contacted within a week for someone to discuss it with me.

2 weeks on from then, I still hadn't heard anything. I called up the claims team and explained it to them, and they passed me to the relevant department, who informed me that they'd spoken to me 10 days previously explaining that my claim was rejected. I asked if they were sure, and the girl was adamant that I'd had a conversation in which things were explained to me at length. I then asked her why I'd be phoning to find out the status of the claim if I'd spoken to them 10 days ago, which stumped her. In the end she admitted that it seemed that it all seemed a bit suspicious and sent off an e-mail to their complaints investigation team to see what was going on.

Four days later, I got a letter in the post from the claims team, basically apologising for what had happened and informing me that I should never have been advised that I could claim for personal injury anyway. I was very confused at this point, as I never once mentioned the words personal injury when referring to the accident, and the focus on the original call was the damage to the bike. I called them and spoke to them again, and they said that any claim that I made through them would basically be rejected as if it went to court it'd only be 50% likely that they could prove it wasn't my fault for following too closely (despite having 2 witnesses on record). At this point, I basically gave up.

Today I got a letter through from the police. Crapped myself at first thinking it was a speeding ticket, but luckily no - it was letting me know that they'd closed the crash investigation. In the course of this letter it states,

"Every incident is unique and we assess each one carefully looking at all the information available. We have now completed this assessment and have decided that although the other party caused the incident we will not be taking any further action against the other driver in relation to this matter. We have therefore closed this investigation."

To me this sounds very much like the police are saying that the other driver was at fault, and therefore their 50/50 logic doesn't apply. However, I never wanted to make a personal injury claim in the first place, just an MIB claim to recoup losses on fixing up the bike. I'm not sure I want to start going through things with the insurers again as I'm leaving them for MCE in 10 days.

Any advice on what to do from here?

As with all insurance comps they are trying to get away with paying you out. If you can be asked/bothered to write letters and spend hours on calls to call center monkeys then pursue it further

Originally Posted by Neeja

"Every incident is unique and we assess each one carefully looking at all the information available. We have now completed this assessment and have decided that although the other party caused the incident we will not be taking any further action against the other driver in relation to this matter. We have therefore closed this investigation."

and in plain English this means " We could not be ars*d to look at the CCTV monitoring systems".

Sorry to here about the off mate, GWS.

I would write to the police and ask for all details and then contact your insurance company with regard to fixing you bike. There is a slush fund used by insurance companies (there is a proper name for the organisation that does this) which funds insured drivers against uninsured driver accidents.

Would be a bit hard to make an injury claim/compensation with no third party.

Along the stretch of the M6 it was on, there is no CCTV - police officer on the scene told me this straight away, said I was unlucky to come off there.

The slush fund is the MIB, which I mentioned when I first spoke to them, which they then turned down. Feels like a head-banging exercise to me.

[Luckypants]

Originally Posted by Dangerous Dave

There is a slush fund used by insurance companies (there is a proper name for the organisation that does this) which funds insured drivers against uninsured driver accidents.

This would be the Motor Insurance Bureau (MIB) that the OP is referring to. This is how folks get paid out when an accident is caused by an uninsured driver. Not sure if they will pay out in OP's case, but I think it will be worthwhile getting all the information you can from the Police (especially if the investigations conclusion is that the crash was caused by the car in front) and seeing if they would treat your case has being an uninsured driver incident.

Originally Posted by Luckypants

...especially if the investigations conclusion is that the crash was caused by the car in front...

Originally Posted by The Police

"...although the other party caused the incident..."

Pretty sure that that's the gist of this.

Originally Posted by Luckypants

This would be the Motor Insurance Bureau (MIB).

Thats it, thank you.

Originally Posted by Neeja

Along the stretch of the M6 it was on, there is no CCTV

Yes, but the car may have travelled 10 junctions or more and at one point it would have gone past a CCTV camera. There are CCTV cameras on most junctions from what I remember, if you were killed or a police officer they would have searched further and harder.

Originally Posted by Dangerous Dave

Yes, but the car may have travelled 10 junctions or more and at one point it would have gone past a CCTV camera. There are CCTV cameras on most junctions from what I remember, if you were killed or a police officer they would have searched further and harder.

Agreed on all that, but the car was a silver mercedes...there were at least two others around at the time of the accident, including one of the guys who stopped to help me, so the chances of picking out the right one are basically nil.

Curious thing, though, if I'm sat behind cars on the motorway now, I memorise the first 4 digits of the plate...just in case.

Originally Posted by Neeja

chances of picking out the right one are basically nil.

They old bill could have collected the registrations and instructed the local police authorities, only one would have collision damage surely!