Safe Speed Forums

Hi Guys,

I've been having a dreading time for the past couple of months with third party's insurance company and an Accident Management company (Accident Exchange).

Story is:

Third party hit my car while it was parked up. I came back to find the car damaged and with a note of drivers details. Car was sent to BMW in the morning who forwarded me on to Accident Exchange who said who will deal with the claim and give me a like for like vehicle until mine goes for repair etc.

This was all 5 months ago (1st March) - In the meantime i have been in their hire car which costs £285 a day. I have had to chase up AE nearly 2/3 times a week to get updates of the case but every time i called they seem to have been waiting for third party to respond. Third party initially admitted liability (verbally i've been told).

I had an accident investigator came over for me to give a statment - which this statement seemed to basically cover AE's rear end if they ran in to problems as he asked me at the end - why i needed a hire car etc. Also another accident investigator was appointed to the third party as they said that couldn't get hold of the driver, so they went to chase the person up further..

Meanwhile, on the 1st of July, AE notified me that third party with-drew liability and that they were not disclosing what their concerns/issues were. I got a friend who has soliciting background to give them a call in regards of the claim to find out that they have issues with their drivers indemnity / quantum? What do these exactly me and what position does it put me in?

I however went through my insurance (had to pay excess etc) around a week or two ago who basically said the vehicle was a Cat C salvage from the estimate BMW had given (As i mentioned to AE there was additional damage to the vehicle which was not on the first statment, so they did another estimate which came up to around 10k as oppose to their first agreed figure of 6.6k).

So at this stage, I decided to buy my vehicle back and sell on as it is (The wisest thing to do). Gap Insurance etc were all notified and they're sending me a cheque for the GAP and my finance company is being sent a cheque through my insurance.

.. Now i cannot get my vehicle out as third party is not looking to pay for the storage charges of the vehicle and nor is my insurance as they're saying "If this had gone through us we wouldn't of tolled up 5 months worth of storage charges" - which they are right and they said from day 1 that they wouldn't be liable for the storage charges.

What i want to know is that Accident Exchange could of taken the issue to court/instructed a solicitor to look at the case as it's been over three months - which is the period that they work with in to resolve liability.

I have been in the hire car which has been building up and up over the past 5 months - With AE just being really slow about the whole process!

It seems to be that Accident Exchange hasn't been fully doing their duty and chasing up the third party - nor giving me advice that such things can occur and have advised me to take the vehicle out of the storage etc.

What is my position?

What is Accident Exchanges's position?

Thanks a lot!

After reading this and a previous case about accident management companies, I firstly wonder what useful purpose they serve (they seem to be the leeches of the insurance industry and probably one of the reasons why premiums are going up) I wouldn't touch them with a bargepole if I had an accident, I would sooner fight the case myself. We never used to have them, which bright spark decided we needed them any way?

I realise this doesn't help you at all ,R34L15T, sorry just airing my views.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

That's fine mate.

I only went through them thinking my whole situation would be quick and seemless - but it's the opposite!

It's been 5 months of stress and headache - and continuing to be!

Hopefully someone can shed some light on the situation..

Thanks

The accident management company have made a right mess. If your car was driveable or easy to make driveable then you shouldn't have been given a hire car until it was actually in for repair or your insurance company should have repaired it then claimed from the TP. It beggars belief that they have let someone have a hire car for 4 months at £2000+ a week as that would have paid for another car several times over.

Definitely seek legal advice as you could be stiffed with the whole hire bill as it is arguable as to whether you should have kept the car so long. If it was a credit hire agreement then you could be in for a rough time.

I can't see on what grounds the third party could withdraw liability. They hit a parked car. End of.

Sounds like the accident management company make a pretty penny from inflated claims. I'd definitely put in a formal complaint with them, copied to your insurance company and the third party's insurance co.

I was wondering what the outcome of this was and also the thread viewtopic.php?f=13&t=24731&hilit=accident+management.

I was hit up the boot end by a third party on sat night and on monday, a very nice accident management company rang me, saying that the third party had admitted liability and the A.M. company were going to take away my car and give me a lovely rental car for 10 days (or more)....I will decline their kind offer and get my own garage to assess the damage and that way, I will definately see my car again.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

You might not be able to. If the A-M company is from the other party's insurers then you have to go through them. If it is a specialist car then you have a good chance of getting it repaired at a place of your choice but be prepared for them to be arsey about it. If it is an ordinary car then you'll not have much chance. Unfortunately you cannot deal with the insurer directly these days. It's infuriating as these companies just bump up the bill and treat you like crap.

It seems that you get better service if you contact your accident management company if you have a bump before the third party as a chance to report it!

Is it any wonder that insurance premiums are going sky high, with these "middle man" parasites, offering to hire cars out when they aren't always needed or wanted ( I declined mine but felt as though they really wanted me to have one) and then putting cars into expensive storage for ages, before anything is actually done. My car isn't worth a fortune and it's possible the repair costs will make it a write off, which would mean I would be offered less than it is worth to me, so I shall go to a local garage for a quote and if it puts it into the write off bracket, I will not be releasing it to anyone that I can't trust.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Just to update on this. My broker called the accident management company, telling them that I would prefer to get the job done by a local, trustworthy garage. They agreed to this, I got a quote from the local repairer and it was all sorted through them, job done, car back in two days, no "free" loan car needed and a good job done.

The moral of the story is, don't get sucked into the accident management scam if you don't want to. I believe that you have the right to have your car repaired by a garage of your choice and if it's still driveable, as mine was, it's worth sorting it yourself, knowing where your car is going, so you can be sure of not losing it for weeks on end and having a loan car forced upon you, which might turn out to be a lead weight around your neck if things go wrong.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.

Didn't they ask you if you felt you might have had a whiplash injury?

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Views expressed are personal opinions and are not necessarily shared by the Safe Speed campaign

Perhaps we all ought to make agreements with our insurance companies / brokers before taking out any new policies that we will refuse to use any AM group. Perhaps only use those ins companies that do not use AM groups too.
Perhaps we can compile a list ?
An ways to prevent involvement as has been shown here already. What other techniques can be or should be deployed to prevent their involvement ? Is there any time when they are beneficial?

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Safe Speed for Intelligent Road Safety through proper research, experience & guidance.

To be honest, I think that the rise of Internet insurance companies has something to do with it (the third party in this case was using an internet based insurer) The third party's insurance/AM company was difficult to contact (waited 40 mins in a queue one day before giving up) so people are probably glad of the lifeline when they contact you (the monday morning after the weekend crash in my case).

I believe that there is no need for "free" loan cars in many cases, most repair jobs can be completed in less than a week and unless you live in out of the way places or go to work at strange hours, most people can get a lift or bus for a few days. The five months in the case above is beyond a joke. It's obvious that we are all paying for these people's incompetence and keen-ness to get us all lumbered with loan cars for weeks on end, which they are obviously profiting from. I lost count of the number of times the loan car company contacted me offering this wonderful, "free" service.

In the good old days we just used to notify the insurance company, arrange repairs once the insurance company gave the go ahead and then claim your excess back off the third party, if they or their insurance admitted liability.

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My views do not represent Safespeed but those of a driver who has driven for 39 yrs, in all conditions, at all times of the day & night on every type of road and covered well over a million miles, so knows a bit about what makes for safety on the road,what is really dangerous and needs to be observed when driving and quite frankly, the speedo is way down on my list of things to observe to negotiate Britain's roads safely, but I don't expect some fool who sits behind a desk all day to appreciate that.