advice after crash (insurance)

i have been in touch with my insurace company.

i have a £300 excess, but the damage to my bike could be fixed by me for £30 for a new screen, as i would not bother painting the fairings.

so, how does the insurance work? i dont want my insurance to go up in price next year, & i dont want to lose my NCB


if its not my fault, i guess it will not cost me a penny ?

if it is my fault do i pay for the car & the bike to be fixed (& will it work out better just to fix the car?)

if its decided its both at fault what happens

[timwilky]

Hovis Mate,

Welcome to the insurance lottery. You will complete a accident report form citing the 3rd party responsible for the accident, and so will he as in he thinks you are responsible.

Assuming your insurance is comprehensive.

Now your insurance would fund the cost of repairs to your bike, his for his car and then either insurance company would then look recover their costs from the other party. In your case I would guess there would be a 50-50 settlement. and both of you would loose your no claims.

Your only way out is to hold him 100% liable and persuade your insurance company that they may have to be prepared to fight it all the way to the courts. Then even if they find him 95% liable and you 5% then sorry mate you loose your no claims.

Simply state on your report form that you hold him responsible in that he had aggressively attempted to cross a single track bridge against the flow of traffic, causing the first two members of your group to take avoiding action and continued to drive in this manner and finally positioning himself in such a location that you were unable to take avoiding action.

Do not mention comments from any 3rd parties. Simply state the facts. Good luck

Originally Posted by hovis

so, how does the insurance work? i dont want my insurance to go up in price next year, & i dont want to lose my NCB


if its not my fault, i guess it will not cost me a penny ?

if it is my fault do i pay for the car & the bike to be fixed (& will it work out better just to fix the car?)

if its decided its both at fault what happens

Now this is just my understanding as my 'little off' only involved my bike, however...

If it's not your fault it won't cost you anything as all expenses get claimed from the other party's insurance, therefore you've been involved in an accident but not made a claim.

If it's your fault you pay (well your insurance pays) for the bike and the car to be fixed, it'll just cost you your excess. The excess charge will be the same regardless fixing just the car or the bike too, so there's nothing in it really.

If both parties are at fault I believe it'll go 50:50, in which case you both pay half, which is a bitch as you've both made a claim, so both paid excess/lost your no-claims discount (if it's not protected).

So, option 1 is ok, the other's ain't so much fun

i am fully comp.

the place that fixes my bike will probaly get the bike fixed so it looks as new (paint all the fairings) which will be expensive, if his insurance pays thats ok by me
but, IMO i would not bother

Originally Posted by pheasant_hunter

If both parties are at fault I believe it'll go 50:50, in which case you both pay half, which is a bitch as you've both made a claim, so both paid excess/lost your no-claims discount (if it's not protected).

:

both pay half of what?

i dont realy want to claim for my bike as i can fix it my self
looking at costing me £30 max for a new screen ( although mine held up on the way home at mph so not to much of a rush to even do that)

[Stu]

Above posts are not quite right/clear IMHO
1)you do not pay your excess if they claim of your insurance
2)It's likely both parties will be sharing responsibilty so you have to fight for 'repair your own' (as you know)
3) If you get left with a small % liability - you won't nesessarily lose NCB ask you insurance company what their policy is 10%???
4)If you're at fault your claims history will reflect value of pay out but maybe worth claiming for your bike if your yellow curvy is w/o and you buy back salvage
5) Give Riders support a call 020 8246 4900

[fizzwheel]

Originally Posted by timwilky

Simply state on your report form that you hold him responsible in that he had aggressively attempted to cross a single track bridge against the flow of traffic, causing the first two members of your group to take avoiding action and continued to drive in this manner and finally positioning himself in such a location that you were unable to take avoiding action.

Do not mention comments from any 3rd parties. Simply state the facts. Good luck

IMHO this is good advice from Tim and if I were its what I would be saying, if your insurance company do get in touch with me its what I'll be saying as well.

At the end of the day stuff like this is what insurance is for, so let your insurance companies argue it out.

If they find him at fault, they'll fix your bike and put it back as new and you wont have to shell out a penny and it wont effect your NCB.

If they find you at fault, then your insurance company will fix his car and you'll loose your NCB, you can then either I think, claim off your own insurance as you have comprehensive insurance for the damage to your own bike if you want.

I dont know how it works for knock for knock, but I suspect that the insurance companies will sort it out between themselves and you loose your no claims bonus as well.

If your not at fault you can claim your excess back from the other driver.

Have you get legal protection cover on your insurance if so, dont worry they'll sort all this out for you and you wont have to do anything.

I cant see your insurance company bending over and coughing up for the damage to his car if they can help it, as you did a grand job and dinged every panel down the side of that car and its not going to be cheap to put right.


Hope that helps.

i did it all over the phone this morning, & explained what hapened as fizz & tim said, so i guess its just a matter of wait & see

thanx for everyones help & input,

another small thing, im going to replace the race can, but what about the cowl, numberplate no rear footpegs etc
& the front tyre is on its way out, should i replace it b4 the garage gets it?

Judging from this post and your last one, you seemed unsure over how liability would go. That makes me think that 50/50 is a likely outcome.

Although your costs are potentially minor(£30), the merc drivers will be high as you did a good job on a lot of areas of bodywork.

In my interpretation that means you share the cost of repairing both vehicles...i dont think he would accept repair your own! If this is the case then obviously you may as well reapir/replace all the bodywork etc.

Of course this would also mean that you both have to pay excesses, lose no claims and have a hefty hike on next years insurance premiums

Therefore IMO contact your insurance company....damage on the merc is too expensive not to! Unless you get lucky and get 0% liability, which from what i can tell seems unlikely, it could be expensive

Damn beaten to it by Hovis

the merc was a mobility car,

if we have to pay for each others vehicles i may need to borrow vipers forks