Gutted with insurance decision - any advice?

Off-topic
1

Hi, I’m not a regular poster on the board mainly due to lack of time but I do find the membership a useful source of information and do help out when I can, just in case you’re wondering “where the hell did he just come from?” :).

So, I was involved in a minor accident last year when a car turned right across my lane to pull into the chippie for his Friday dinner. Courtesy of the new Street View on Google Maps I can now post exactly where this happened for all to view:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?f=q&source=s_q&hl=en&geocode=&q=long+drive,+ruislip&sll=53.93022,-4.042969&sspn=18.980914,57.128906&ie=UTF8&ll=51.557236,-0.397117&spn=0.009752,0.027895&t=h&z=16&layer=c&cbll=51.55717,-0.397233&panoid=E9GsEJDlX0DqtQoKFBHybA&cbp=12,49.66,0,5

On the day in question the traffic conditions were somewhat different to when the Google car drove down there. Basically there was a queue of cars in the right hand lane from the traffic lights at the end of the road backing right up past the paved area in front of Paul’s Fish Bar. The left hand lane for vehicles wishing to carry on straight or turn left was completely empty and as I approached the lights were still green for straight on and red for right turn. The car was travelling in the opposite direction to me and turned right into the paved area through a gap that someone in the line of stationary traffic waiting to turn right had left. I had moved to the inside of the line of traffic just before that area so that I could make progress up the left hand lane as I did not want to turn right at the lights. I slammed on the brakes as the car emerged into my path but I wasn’t able to avoid hitting him. I had slowed by then so there was very little in the way of impact, I stayed on the bike and kept it upright. Never had any pains or whiplash as a result (I’ve had more painful collisions walking!) but there was about £1k damage to my bike (cosmetic mainly) and a scratch on the car’s bonnet. Both the driver and I had fully comp insurance so had everything sorted out on that but disagreed on liability:

He claims I was undertaking and am therefore 100% at fault. I claim that passing a line of stationary traffic waiting to go in a different direction to myself is not undertaking when the road is wide enough (an is actually widening to become two lanes) and that he should have checked for oncoming traffic before crossing the lane.

Now, the downside is that he has a witness and I don’t. I have seen the witness statement and it does not differ from my account of the events except that it uses the word undertaking and deliberately misses out the fact that there are actually two lanes and the right-hand one was full of stationary cars.

My insurers (NIG) have now just sent me a letter enclosing two different witness statements from the same witness (one he provided the the car driver’s insurance and the other that he provided on request to my insurers). The statements are same except for the different form templates each insurance company sent him. The letter from NIG says:

Both of these statements hold you responsible for the accident as you have undertaken the line of traffic.
Based on this information we confirm you will be held liable for the accident and we will be settling the other parties (sic) claim in full as if the matter were to go to court we feel a judge would side with the Third Party based on the evidence enclosed.

This letter feels like an insult to me because there doesn’t appear to be any assessment of the event going on here. It just seems like “some bloke says it’s your fault so it is”.

So I’m stuck now because I’ve had to renew my insurance policy whilst waiting for all this to be sorted out and therefore I had to declare the accident as a fault claim pending outcome and still my premium came down against last year! I am just wondering whether I stand to gain anything from fighting this (or lose anything from not fighting apart from my pride and sense of justice).

If you have endured to read this far down perhaps I could benefit from the wisdom you may be able to shed on this case or any comments you may have for me!

Thanks in advance!

2

Sounds a bit rough…am a bit unclear whether there were two lanes or about to be two lanes?

Assuming there were two lanes at the point of impact, and you were correctly in the left hand lane going straight on, would defo have your day in court. He might have a witness but the bottom line is it was your right of way…end of.

That said - I am no expert - but don’t be bullied by an incompetent or lazy insurer if you are sure you have a case. (IMHO)

3

By the look of it, you were on the section that is still one lane.Unfortunately, that means that technically you were undertaking and therefore at fault.It’s bloody stupid, but there you are.

4

It’s a tough one to call. I know that road well.

For the benefit of people looking at Streetview - if you face the road in the direction TheUnforgiven was going in, the area between the sandwich board and the £2.95 banner is the entrance to the car park of the pub, whereas from TheUnforgiven’s description, I think the TP was pulling into the area beyond that, with the red paving directly opposite the writing on the road. The road starts to widen there and were I in a cage and had room to drive through that bit, passing cars queueing in the right hand lane, I would do so. I don’t know exactly where the single lane stops and the two lanes start to be honest.

TheUnforgiven- if you haven’t done so already, send your insurance company a map of the road and draw on it exactly where you were hit - I can’t advise you what to do if they don’t budge but then on the other hand, they might not understand exactly where it happened and reconsider if you send them new evidence.

Good luck in any case.

(Edit: misread who the OP was :P)

5

Make it clear you do not accept liability and want to make full use of their internal dispute processes. Also tell them that if they settle so as to find you responsible for the accident you will take the case to the Financial Service Ombudsman as you were no way at fault and want a fair outcome for all parties concerned including yourself and demand full compensation for any future impact on on the cost of insurance etc as a result of them erroneously settling against you.

Overtaking on the left is not a problem if it is done in accordance with the highway code. Draw the diagram making it clear what the queue to your right was doing. Refer your insurer to HC section 163 which includes the following bullets -

only overtake on the left if the vehicle in front is signalling to turn right, and there is room to do so

stay in your lane if traffic is moving slowly in queues. If the queue on your right is moving more slowly than you are, you may pass on the left

If there was a queue on the right queueing to turn right you are able to pass it, and undertake the front car waiting to turn right.

Also refer them to section 180 on turning right -

“Wait until there is a safe gap between you and any oncoming vehicle. Watch out for cyclists, motorcyclists, pedestrians and other road users. Check your mirrors and blind spot again to make sure you are not being overtaken, then make the turn. Do not cut the corner. Take great care when turning into a main road; you will need to watch for traffic in both directions and wait for a safe gap.”

Point out that the other driver did not do any of the things I have underlined.

Point out that the other party’s witness confirms your account and that undertaking is not the relevant issue as the HC endorses it in the circumstances you were riding in. Even if you had been undertaking illegally, which you don’t accept, the other driver did not make sure the road was clear before turning right and is therefore at least 50% to blame.

What is happening here is that it is not a large claim and the insurer is trying to dodge the costs of going to court as you don’t have a supporting witness and they do. It is a shame they can’t be bothered to read the HC and this is why you should take this through their internal dispute processes and to the Ombudsman. You are their customer, not the other party and they should be working for you, so make sure they do!

It is also worth writing to as many customer support services as you can, copies to the insurer to show you mean business.

I would write to BBC Watchdog, the financial pages of the Daily Mail (they are very good at getting good outcomes for customers) and your MP.

6

As usual Giuliano gets it right, though i’m not so sure about all the bolt-ons at the end.

I think you need to go quietly but thoroughly, keeping written records at all times, through the first part of the advice and see what that brings before shouting “foul”. You could end up looking a dick if what you started with the great HC references change the whole case around.

As far as the “accurate diagram” is concerned, spend twenty quid and buy an Ordnance Survey extract from an OS agent.(Google to find one). Measure and draw from that (or photo copy/enlarge the critical bit) and no one can challenge your accuracy. Simple step, but won me a car to car accident some years ago as my diagram was accurate, the other guys was not.

Last bit, buy I’m not so sure on this: I half remember that passengers in cars are not considered “independent” witnesses in law as they usually have some sort of personal interest shared with the driver.

7

Looked at your map of the road , and not knowing the road at all .i would of said that if the cars that are waiting to turn right were sitting cloes to the center of the road ,and that there is enough room for a car to pass on the left hand side and drive down to the junction ,then i would of made the same ,maneuver 'and if this is the case i think your best bet is to go and view the traffic and see how the cars behave to see if any body else drives down this section of road as you did , and if so is it the norm , then if you are proved right take some vido footage

8

Great advice, very thorough. I should’ve spoken to you when I had my accident! :slight_smile:

9

Excellent summary Guiliano…:smiley:

Unforgiven - sorry to hear that. I live less than a mile from there and that has been my exact same route home for years.
Can understand how easily this happened. There is always a queue for the right turn at the lights and plenty of room for cars to get through on the left (although most seem to bump up and drive along the kerb for a bit :w00t: )

How did the driver get a witness, who amazingly seems to favour him crossing lanes in rush hour traffic?
Did you see him stop and speak to anyone? Do a name check on the internet…helped me once before.

Hopefully you get a just outcome.

10

Might be worth discussing this with a firm like White Dalton, motorbike solicitors. Hope you get it resolved satisfactorily

11

Thanks for the comments everyone.

When I submitted my forms right back at the beginning I included scale diagrams that I had traced from the Google Earth satellite imagery (attached) and and account of the collision that included references to paragraph 180 in HC. It seems that everything I put forward has just been dismissed by my insurance company because the other party has a witness that says I was at fault.

I will get on to NIG on Monday though I’m not hopeful about getting through, I have not once been able to get through to the department that deals with claims in all the months that this has been ongoing. I always end up having to talk to some CS adviser who tells me that even they can’t get through to that department because the lines are always busy! Don’t think I’ll be using NIG any more!! But I’ll at least find out what their internal disputes procedure is and follow that.

I’ll also give White Dalton a ring and see what they say. I may not be absolved completely from blame in this but I do feel that I am not 100% at fault. Makes sense what Giuliano says about them just wanting to close the case because it’s not a large amount.

Thanks again everyone.

12

I used Rider Support after my accident and got a brilliant outcome. I was only 3PFT so my insurance company didn’t care. It might be worthwhile getting their opinion. Good luck. Seems v unfair

13

Those diagrams look very clear. As long as there was room to safely pass the queue on the left, photos might help, and you didn’t hoon through the gap, I can’t see how you can be 50% to blame, never mind 100%.

14

Just thought I’d post an update. I spoke to a very friendly and helpful lawyer at White Dalton and the short of it is that he agreed with Guiliano’s assessment of the situation (insurance company just want to settle a low value claim without court costs) and told me that the only skin I have in the game (pride apart) is my no claims bonus and I will lose that anyway if a judge were to apportion me just 1% of blame.

His view was that I was probably not even 50% at fault but that he couldn’t see a judge awarding the car driver 100% liability. Therefore, no point pursuing any further, especially as when I renewed my insurance the new company didn’t remove all my NCB (just 2 years) when it wasn’t even protected.

The moral of the story: justice only ever has a chance of prevailing if it’s not too expensive!

Thanks again to everyone for your comments and help.

15

I hear where your comming from but your letting the driver get away with it scott free now. He will probably do it again to someone else knowing he got away with it last time!

just my opinion but I would chase the guy down and screw his no claims as well at the very least

16

So am I understanding it correctly that if you accept 100% liability they will (in your case) only take 2 years off your no claims bonus whereas if you fight it in court and get anything less than non-fault you’ll lose your no-claims altogether?

The other thing to bear in mind is that even though you will be able to say you have a no-claims bonus when you renew in future, you will still have to declare a claim which was 100% your fault. Not sure if this would make a difference to the premium offered to you…?

Either way, I’m quite disheartened to hear NIG tell you that you are in the wrong rather than admit that you might not have been but that they didn’t think it is worthwhile fighting. Hiding that option from you sounds pretty sneaky to me. :angry:

17

I agree with the sentiment but I would not be chasing the guy down but fighting the mammoth of an insurance company because they’ve already made the decision. What’s more firms like White Dalton, as helpful as they were to me, won’t represent me because there is no personal injury claim.If money were no object then I probably would pursue this to the end, sadly though I think screwing his no claims bonus will end up costing me money that I don’t have.

18

No, sorry probably not too clear. The outcome for me would be exactly the same regardless of the %age liability attributed to me (unless it was 0)

Yes, but I had to do that at my last renewal anyway because this case was unresolved and it didn’t affect the premium much so I’ll have to take that risk, it’s unlikely to affect me more than fighting might cost me

Yes, I am too. The lawyer at WD said that often what they do is accept “without prejudice” meaning that they agree to pay up without accepting the other parties claims as true. I thought about riniging up to find out if they had done that but decided against it in case they hadn’t!

I’ve got to say, perhaps all insurance companies are much of a muchness but my experience with NIG has been enough to move on to the next cheapest option if I’m ever offered cover underwritten by them again.

19

I had a prang in November and Elephant insurance (who I was with at the time) were very good at fighting my corner.

Granted, my case was a lot clearer (the other driver pulled out of a side road into my path) and after a week the other side claimed liability before revoking it again while they waited for their driver to obtain 2 witness statements - they never materialised but it meant I had to wait about 3 or 4 months to get my excess back, but Elephant were behind me all the way. I wonder what their attitude would have been if it wasn’t so clear-cut…

Unfortunately, you only find out how good/bad insurance companies are when you actually need them and then you’re not in a position to pick a better one if your original choice was bad!

(Edit: this was in my cage, not on my bike :rolleyes: )

20

I suspect you wouldn’t get 100% because whenever you pass another vehicle, even when the highway code says you can, you are responsible for doing so in a way that is safe. As you were approaching an entrance to parking, the court is likely to find you had a responsibility to pass that point slow enought to stop if someone turned across your path. In the same way as many filtering accidents are settled 20/80 or 25/75 this is likely to leave the insurer with legal costs which outweigh the benefit of takign the action to court.An important lesson for those using Bus Lanes etc.Glad to hear you have lost only part of the the no claims bonus. The trouble is now you will face up to five years of having both car an bike insurance weighted because you had an accident where the insurer did not recover all their costs (this is a seperate issue to no-claims bonus which is a marketing gimmick whilst the accident will change your risk profile). It will pay to give all the details when shopping around for insurance and make it clear it was a low value claim where you were not at fault that was probably settled to avoid legal costs.