Insurance company... stole our car!

[izzi81]

Well, my boyfriend's car anyway. I am currently completely disillusioned with insurance companies, it seems you pay them heaps of money only for them to be completely unhelpful when you need them. Let me try this on you all and see if you have nay suggestions!

Yesterday morning my bf went down to his car to find someone had crashed into it. He parked it in a public car park near his flat, next to a Somerfield supermarket. He asked in the supermarket if anyone knew what had happened and apparently it was a Somerfield delivery lorry which drove into it (the driver told them he had done it). The door is dented in, the wing mirror hanging off, and the drivers window is smashed. So we went down and took photos, then he phoned his insurance company. Which took a couple of hours, before we got info out of them. And it wasn't great - they couldn't get hold of anyone at the Somerfield depot to speak to about it. They also said because the car is quite old (R reg) they might decide not to repair it, just to write it off. So they'd give him what they think it's worth - about £500. He's a student, he's got no spare money, and for £500 he couldn't get as good a car as the one he has (or had!). So we were already fuming about the pointlessness of insurance in this case, because the compensation is in no way suitable for what has happened - which was completely not his fault but the fault of an idiot Somerfield lorry driver.

But the story doesn't end there! He was called again later on by the insurance people and had a conversation about what was to happen to his car in the short term. He wanted to drive it up the road to mine where it could be parked in the drive and safe from vandals. But they told him it wasn't roadworthy so he couldn't move it. He asked them what he was supposed to do then - it's in a public car park over a Friday night, open to anyone, and they said 'oh I don't know what you could do about that....' .

We were away over supper but he decided he was going to move the car anyway. It was his risk about taking it on the road, and it would be a 2min journey to mine. So we walked down to his car, and...... it wasn't there!

According to staff a Somerfield a recovery truck had come and taken it away. No one asked my bf if he wanted it taken away, no one told him they were taking it, he didn't give permission to have it taken, and he has no idea where it's been taken to.

I cannot believe a professional company would work like this. And now of course it's Saturday and difficult to get hold of anyone. We're not far off calling the police and reporting it stolen! He could have had things in his car that he urgently needed, no one checked to ask him.

I'm about as appalled as it's possible to be . I'm going to get him to complain to the insurance company's head office, and also to the regulatory body as well. But if any of you have any ideas - for how to find is car or how to complain - that would be very useful!
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[flat spot]

It doesn't matter that they've taken it away (aside from the personal belongings of coarse) . If they decide it's a write off due to being uneconomical to repair, they will give you a pay out and you'll probably find you can have the option of buying it back very cheaply to do yourself.

[MarJay]

That just is not on.

Insurance companies have always been twunts, but this is a new level of low.

Report the car stolen. Thats what I would do.
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[G]

Sounds like it'd be best to be contancting the delivery driver's insurance company, rather than yours.

Did you specifically tell your insurance company that you were claiming?

[izzi81]

nothing had been decided re. claiming - they told my bf that it might be a write off, it might be repairable, they couldn't really make a decision until they'd spoken to the Somerfield people. So there had been no decision made re. whether he was going to claim or not (his brother is quite mechanically minded and the vague plan was if it was going to be written off then he'd just get it fixed himself).

I just don't see how they can just 'help themselves' to the car, whether they plan to write it off or not!

I just went to the local Citroen dealer where my dad thought it might have been taken but they don't have a bodyshop there, so who knows where it's gone. The guy that I spoke to was very confused, didn't know why they would just take the car without asking, and said we should come down heavily on that, and did we know for sure it hadn't been stolen. I had to say that basically no, I didn't know that for sure! So when bf gets back at 4.30ish I'm going to get him to call the police...
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[Retro-Man]

you refer to the recovery truck as being something to do with somerfield, hve they removed it.

option a: somerfield are taking full responsibilty and have removed car for repair estimation, although they should have asked?

option b: someone at somerfield has decided it is a dumped car and removed it to a scrap compound?

are you speaking to your insurance company or your broker, as from your posts i get the impression you are talking to the broker, if so might be worth contacting the insurance company direct, they WILL know if they have had it recovered?

if you can't trace it by 5.00pm tonight then report it stolen.
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[izzi81]

as far as we can see it was nothing to do with Somerfield, as the people at Somerfield just said they saw the car being taken away, but they didn't know any more about it. The other thing that makes me think it's not Somerfield is that the car was taken away the same time it happened. Bf's insurance could have moved that quickly, someone stealing it could have moved that quickly, but I doubt Somerfield would have especially when we haven't even been able to get hold of the people who deal with their insurance stuff yet.

My bf spoke to the insurance company directly yesterday, but we haven't been able to speak to them yet today (oh the joys of stuff like this happening at a weekend ). We've got the 24hr phone line for them but it's always engaged and bf can't afford on his mobile to sit on hold for 10mins. He's away till 4.30 or so, when he gets here I'm going to get him on our land line and sit and wait until he can speak to someone!

I've tried calling the local 24hr recovery places and they don't know anything about it, but they can't really check anything until Monday anyway. God I hate weekends! No one can tell me anything!
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[mchaggis]

I'd report it stolen, someone has taken it without your consent and you don't know who, nor where it has gone. The insurance company deserve the shit-storm that'll stir up if they've taken it without even asking you. What a bunch of money-grabbing cheeky barstewards!
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[Knowlsey]

You should have had the choice to remove it yourself before they took it upon themselves to remove it for you, because of this you will get a bill from the recovery company wich you are supposed to claim back from the insurance.Unless the insurance company have paid this and will be claiming it from the supermarkets insurance when proof of the accident is proven to be there fault.That also includes storage prices

Even though they said the car is not in a fit state to drive, you still had the option of getting your own removal service to deliver it to a place of safety and away from a public area.

Tell them you want the vehicle returned back to you (all costs should be incured to them)untill they have fully assesed the damage as they did not have permission to remove it, until they agree a claim on your behalf that vehicle still belongs to you and not the insurance company, but I would check any clauses that may state that they have the right to take the vehicle for inspection, which is very doubtful, you should also have the choice of a repair service of your own, and if that works out cheaper than the insurance companies quote the chances are they will let you do it, as long as they inspect it when finished

[izzi81]

I suspect my boyfriend will explode if they attempt to charge him money for picking up the car!

Will try doing what you say, hopefully we'll get someone on the phone later this afternoon and I'll pop back and report on how that went.... I'd be happy for now just to know where the car is.....
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[mr.z]

This was done while you were at sommerfield right? by on of their blind drivers?

Speek to their manager, tell them its unacceptable the way its being delt with, make a big fuss, if not go to their head office, if you dont get any joy then tell them the local and national newspapers might be interested, supermarkets hate bad pulicity, this might get them on it a little bit faster!

TBH i'd be tempted to report it stolen too, they didn't attempt to notify you in anyway, for all you know it was stolen

Said it before i'll say it again, the real criminals in this world wear shirts and ties.
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[Kickstart]

Hi

Irrespective of who has taken it, it has been taken without consent. That is a criminal offence. Report it to the police.

All the best

Keith
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[Misc]

It might of been the police who arranged it to be picked up, they might of thought it was stolenor a hazard... Yer give them a ring.

[izzi81]

bf phoned the insurance company 24hr line late afternoon. At first the person he spoke to said that they couldn't find out any information on where his car was. So he told them if they couldn't tell him now where his car was, he was hanging up the phone and phoning the police and reporting it stolen. Person on the other end of the phone said oh wait I'll go and ask my supervisor, and 5mins later lo and behold gave him the info he was needing - where his car was, who had taken it, what was going on. Unbelieveable that the only way to get that information was to threaten them with the police - some insurance company!

So it turns out it was indeed the insurance company that took it. It is at a garage 20mins outside Stirling (impossible to get to without a car) and it's being moved to another garage in Glasgow on Monday to be assessed by the insurers. Thankfully someone was in at the local garage and we're going to look at the car tomorrow and get anything important out of it.

Now we know who took it there doesn't seem to be any point contacting the police, I'm not sure what exactly we'd expect them to do. But there will be a letter of complaint to Somerfield after all this, and also a letter of complaint to the insurers head office (NIG if you're interested!). I think we ought to ask for some kind of compensation but I doubt we'd get anything.
I suggested to bf that he talk to the Citizens Advice Bureau because I've always found them very helpful but somehow I don't think he'll have the energy to go tell them all about it. I would, I'm all about kicking up a fuss when you're treated unfairly! But it's up to him.....
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[Sparks!]

Go public with this, contact the local papers, if you try hard enough you'll get compensation from Somerfield AND the Insurance company... write them both a letter asking for compensation for the inconvinence caused etc etc and taking without consent blah blah and say that if the matter isn't resolved within 4 working days that you'll be speaking to the local newspapers and taking further action.

this usually scares places like somerfield, for the sake of a bit of compensation (which theyve got insurance for anyway) they will more than likely cough up to stop the threat of a bad report on them, if the delivery driver has admitted liability etc they dont really have a leg to stand on.

Like you say, £500 wont buy a decent enough car so do something about it... Maybe its just me that thinks like this, I got £700 of debt written off from an insurance company after they fucked up, technically I still had to pay it or at least most of it, but I complained enough and was admant enough and shortly after got a letter saying that I no longer owed ANYTHING as they had wrote it off.... so it does work if you shout loud enough.

[stinkwheel]

Remember. None of this should cost YOU any money at all. It was a non-fault accident so you are claiming off the wagon drivers insurance. You should not be left out of pocket at all. Keep a record of any expenses you have incurred (including that mobile phone bill) and include them in your claim.

Demand a replacement car for the meantime until they have the claim sorted out, you are entitled to it. Remember it is not your insurance you are claiming off, you are claiming as a third party off the wagon drivers insurance.
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[syl]

[Kwaks]

You really need to raise hell with this one. NIG has for all intensive puposes stolen the vehicle (TWOC) and as you are insured with NIG I am pretty sure that insurance will have been done either through an insurance intermediary or a broker. Just remember you gave you money to their acting agent who takes a commission,so its time to make him earn it. Get him to do all the screaming and fighting for you.Make his life hell until you get satisfaction.

You are only one policy holder with NIG,they will treat you as such.
Your agent/intermediary has hundreds if not thousands of policies with them,they will listen to him.

If you had tpft insurance, tell nig you are considering claiming on the theft,that will make them listen as they have to cover that cost themselves with no chance of claiming back from sommerfield.Might escalate your problem to a higher authority

best of luck.
p.s. if nig are claiming back from somerfield then they do not have the option to W/O the car,that decision belongs to somerfields insurer

[izzi81]

thanks for the advice guys. My bf's dad gave us a lift to the garage where the car is - no way to get to it any other way! - to get stuff out of the car. My bf was none too impressed to find they'd taken off the plastic bag over the window (obviously to get in to remove the car) but hadn't bothered to put it back, so if it rains the interior will get soaked. He complained about that to the woman behind the desk but she didn't seem very competent to me, or in the slightest bit apologetic

thanks for the weblink, we might well give them a call if NIG aren't forthcoming tomorrow morning!

good point about the other expenses, I'll get my bf to make a list of money we've paid out (including petrol today to go find the car as well).

As for tpft, I think the car is fully comp, so a suggestion about claiming for the theft might be an idea as well! Any more fuss we can kick up can only be a good thing

I suspect there will be a lot of angry phonecalls being made tomorrow as it's Monday and people will finally be back in their offices. We're also going to write to Somerfield and NIG head offices and endeavour to get some compensation (I like the threatening them with the press tactic), and I'll make sure he gets in touch with their insurance broker as well to complain to them about the whole thing, try to get them to get involved too.

After all this I intend to make sure my bf is in profit for all the inconvenience! Seems only fair to me....
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[Misc]

Also try Citizens Advice, when some shop sold me a dodgy bike i mentioned these people & they gave me a refund right away, very helpful too.

[izzi81]

ok my boyfriend is proving to be rather useless with all this. He spoke to them on the phone this morning, and was told they couldn't give him a hire car until they'd assessed his damaged car. Did he complain about this? No. Did he complain about them taking his car without permission? No. And I know what's going to happen, they're going to write off the car, he'll decide not to make the claim, and he won't get any kind of hire car. He says he wants to complain by letter - which is a good plan because them we ask for compensation - but he says it's not the call centre person's fault there are these problems. Which is true, but in this case the call centre is the NIG person he is talking to! So he should tell them if he's not happy. Doesn't have to shout, just has to tell them. But he won't. So now he just has to sit and wait until they decide to give him a call about the car assessment. It's pretty annoying because this is why companies think they can act like this - people don't tell them they're unhappy with it.

I'm going to make sure the letter is very strongly worded that's for sure!
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[feef]

for the record...

NIG will give cheap insurance, but I've Never heard of anyone making a claim either With NIG or against NIG who hasn't found them difficult to deal with, and shit at paying out.

While insurance companies on the whole tend to be sharks, there is still some truth in the adage "you get what you pay for"

a
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[Mrs Kickstart]

Hi,

Cant help with your problem, sorry, but I do know at one time NIG were really cheap for Drink drivers but they had in the small print a excess more than twice the insurance.

Regards
C
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[izzi81]

my bike insurance is with NIG and it's up in March, I'm definitely thinking it might be better to pay a wee bit more and go with a different company!

I'm going to make sure letters get written, and we're going to the press if they don't give some kind of compensation, but I wish he'd express his annoyance with them a bit more...... they may be a bad company to be with but maybe that's only because no one ever does really complain when they do things like this! (I think you're right about the British Siggi...)
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[G]

Siggi:
Excess only counts for claims against your own stuff, not other people's claims against you.