My Car has Been written off. Other persons fault. But the Insurance is trying it on by giving me a rubbish pay

Question

out. He's just offered me 2k less than what they were 8 months a go when my friends identical car was written off. Is there anyway i can make him bump up the price he's offering?

Answer 1

You don't have to accept their offer.

From the way that you word the question it sounds a bit like you are dealing with the third party rather than their insurers. If you are, don't, always deal with the insurance company and if you're fully comp your insurers should be dealing with them and recovering your excess etc.

Check your car value out on the weblink below. You should expect to be able to at least get the "private good" price and hopefully more like the "independent dealer" price

Answer 2

Insurance companies always try it on, they normally make up to three offers but if your car was low mileage, good condition etc, etc. point it out, they make statements like "this is our last offer" etc but just keep refusing till you are satisfied. If you cant agree go here and complain, this normally sorts them out, before you complain just let them know what you intend to do as its sometimes enough.

http://www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk/

Also check out and make a list of prices so that you can quote, try Loot or Autotrader, a good idea is to get the name of the person dealing with your claim and bug them every couple of days, eventually they get sick of it and in my experience they just settled. Just remember that they cannot refuse to pay you so just keep pushing, also check the small print of your policy.

The reason that you take out insurance is to make good your loss, send them a recorded delivery letter setting out what you require and keep a copy, make sure they are aware that you know what you are doing or they will just fob you off.

Answer 3

Firstly let's clear up some of the nonsense posted above me.

Insurance companies never "try it on." They are legally obliged to offer you the market value of your vehicle. To indemnify you, i.e. to put you back in the same position you were before the loss.

99 times out of 100 people over value their car. The insurer's engineer would have based his valuation on the market, probably local to yourself. He does this mainly by using Glasses or Parker's guide for a valuation going off the condition of your car and the mileage and then also refers to Autotrader to see how much they are going for.

Yes, he may have under valued it by a few hundrd and you may be able to negotiate it. But I absolutely guarantee you that he hasn't under valued it by £2,000.  

Answer 4

It's all part of the game.  Decide what you want and add £3K to it.  Say you'll settle for that figure, but you're prepared to sue their client.  They'll come back with another offer and so it goes on.

Answer 5

I've gone through the same thing -- still a bit painful,here is the resource help me a lot.http://carinsurance.expertsupport.info/a...

Answer 6

You have no obligation to accept the payout offer!

However, You will need to prove your valuation!!

look around and gather evidence of what identical cars on garage forecourts are up for.

Use www.autotrader.co.uk to do this and try and get upto 10 trade examples and submit them to your insurance company and instruct them to get a realistic offer.

Use traders examples only as they will be better examples of your valuation.

Answer 7

Email me make, exact model, mileage & age of your car & I'll tell you what it's worth, then tell me what they've offered.

Answer 8

To start I must tell you the sad truth: Everyone thinks their "baby" aka their car is worth alot more then it really is.

Insurance owes you the "actual cash value"  of your car. This means what your car is selling for locally.   Has he provided your proof of how he got his figures?  If he hasnt im sure he would be happy to. Why dont you ask so you feel better about it?

Actual cash value is not very negiotable.  It really is what it is.  Unless you find solid proof that your car is selling for much more in the area then they are not going to move their value up.

The fact that someone says its a "game" cracks me up.  How am i playing a game when i simply plug your vehicles information into my computer and it spits out a figure for whats its worth?  Insurance companies dont treat total losses as "games" and try to low ball you and negiotiate.. it simply is what it is.

Answer 9

I agree with Sunny wholeheartedly. Especially, deal only with the insurance company themselves, not the other party, and look up what the industry says your car is worth in Parkers. We all think our cars are worth more than they hard-headedly are.

Answer 10

If you've got legal cover you can go after your uninsured loses.

you don't have to accept the offer they give you. go to the dealership of the make of your car and get them to look up the price of your car. They have books with every model and what each one is worth at 1 year old, 2 years old, 5 years old etc. obviously the insurance company will try to give you less, but if your car is in good condition you should get what it is worth.