Car hit by another driver - private settlement?

I've got a tiny dint and a two inch long scratch on my rear wing - £480 to fix it!

Even if its his fault and you go through insurance (or if you notify them at all)  it'll still affect your renewal as you are now seen as a higher risk.

Have you checked to see that he actually has insurance, tax and MOT?

Edit: what Rockhopper said, check tax, mot and insurance now. I assume you took pics of him and his vehicle?

You are meant to tell your insurance of any accident - whether you claim or not.

Depending on damage amount / cost is whether I go through insurance or not. I dinked our van door on the driveway this year - so just did it with a local body shop for £800. Anything more = insurance

Depends on the level of damage, age of car, all that good shit. If you notify your insurance about it they'll put your premium up, because they're bastards.

You are meant to tell your insurance of any accident – whether you claim or not.

+1

And when the young driver realises that a £40 blow-in won't cut it, you'll have to claim

If you notify your insurance about it they’ll put your premium up...

Not my experience of a collision if you aren't in any way to blame. Someone damaging your car to steal from it is a problem

I have experience of this. Some dozy old cow decided to drive into my car over 10 years ago. Anyhow she was keen to go through insurance, so I got some quotes. She seemed to think that it would be a few hundred pounds and the quotes I got were more like £1,000.

Anyway after the shock she agreed to pay, got the cash off her up-front before I took it to the body shop. I didn't tell my insurance company

One of my son's friends got driven into on a roundabout, the guy wanted to pay cash and they settled outside of insurance. Because he's young/naive/honest (delete as apropriate) he told his insurance company but obviously didn't make a claim. When it comes to renewal time surprise, surprise, his insurance cost has gone up massively.

So although your insurance details may say you need to notify them, from a moral point of view I'd object and not tell them, as insurnace companies are basically out to screw you any which way. My opinion obviously.

Similar thing happened to me. Young driver hit me from behind, left a small ding and didn’t want to involve insurance. I got a quote, they paid, job done. They made a mistake and paid for it. seemed fair enough to me.  If we’d gone through insurance they’d no doubt have paid a lot more and I’d have to deal with months of fending off ambulance chasing lawyers trying to get me to claim for injuries I didn’t sustain. Been there, done that, no thanks.

Taxi driver hit my dad - the guy drove with my dad directly to the paint shop that taxi drivers all use, paid for the fix on the spot and it was all done within about 90 minutes of it happening!

Neighbour hit my dad - I popped the bumper and wing back out, got rid of the paint transfer, and told my dad to let it slide for an easy life with the neighbours. That was stupid - I had missed the cracked headlamp and pierced AC lines. Argh

Just because he's not using his insurance, doesn't mean you can't involve yours. Easy to open a claim and have the lad deal directly with your insurance company to get it fixed. It's what you pay them for, and saves you the hassle of running around getting quotes (along with the hassle of dealing with the body shop, dealing with the lad, etc) as they'll just advise on where to take the car.

Two experiences of this.

The first time it was a young lad on a motorbike who didn't stop in time and hit the back of our car, he offered to pay to avoid insurance as he had only been riding a few days, the car already looked battered and so I opted for a chat on how silly he had been, and that on wet roads you need to be more careful.

The second time the guy gave my wife his details and she spoke to his dad who said he would pay after he rear ended her, we got a couple of quotes but I had already informed the insurance company, once the quotes were in, and one was at mates rates, they refused to pay up so we went down the insurance route to claim and they had changed their story to my wife making an emergency stop, it was caught on dash cam, that my wife was stationary in traffic and he didn't stop.

From now on we will let the insurance company do there job.

I'd go through insurance if possible, mostly because most people don't realise quite how much bodywork costs. Most of the population seem to think about 100 per panel covers everything.

Someone drive into my parked car last year. Wanted to avoid insurance, got a quote - over 3k of damage. I might have been more inclined to do it privately for less if she wasn't such a massive tool about the whole thing.

The consensus on this thread seems to be if you try to do it privately it’s cheaper than through insurance, but still much more expensive than the other person expects so they often end up involving their insurance anyway.

Fair enough.  But what isn’t clear is if they are happy to pay the full cost of fixing it privately is there really any problem in doing that - or are you avoiding an insurance increase yourself at next renewal?

He’s keen to settle privately to avoid  his insurance increasing etc

He drove into the back of you, thus proving that his insurance should be increasing as he has proven likely to be the cause of a prang.

Fair enough.  But what isn’t clear is if they are happy to pay the full cost of fixing it privately is there really any problem in doing that – or are you avoiding an insurance increase yourself at next renewal?

There's no problem in doing that, but you're the one who has to do all the chasing instead of your insurance co AND you still have to declare the bump away, so effect (if there is one) to the policy will be about the same

AND you still have to declare the bump away,

The point being you don’t have to do what the insurance say about declaring and they will never know . . ?

Cheers everyone. As expected, there's a mixed bag of experiences and opinions. His tax and MOT are all good, but AskMID isn't submitting plates so can't check insurance. I'm happy to get say 3 quotes and see what he comes back with - reckon they'll be well north of a grand with replacement panels, paint matching and labour. Main concern is whether he's going to stump up the cash - am guessing hard notes paid into my bank before any work is completed?

Having said that, he might realise, as others have said, that the cost is too much and insurance is the only way.

they’ll put your premium up, because they’re bastards

Although not car related but our house insurance went up when we had a leak from the roof and my wife just queried whether our insurance would cover this. We didn't even put a claim in. 🤬

I got rear-ended a couple of years ago, my leased car was 2 weeks old. The driver asked if we could settle as her car looked worse off, I declined and went through the insurance.

Police not involved but in hindsight I think maybe I should have called them, as when looking at my photos of her car days later, it was obvious that she'd fitted after market huge wheels.

I'm guessing she hadn't told her insurance company about them (hence wanting to settle), and after some research I found that increasing the wheel size can have a negative effect on braking, maybe part of the reason she drove into the back of me.

Thankfully I was ok, but imagine if she was breaking to avoid a kid in the road.

Unless you know the person very well it's not worth the risk IMO, they could end up making a claim against you (e.g. that you reversed into him) and then when your insurance company get involved you'll have to explain why you didn't inform them about it in the first place. Plus you'll end up having to lie on future renewal forms in the bit about being involved in any accidents in the last X number of years, only a very small chance they'd ever find out but why take the risk of them denying a future claim or cancelling your insurance as a result if they did?

As touched on, if you go down the sorting outside insurance route, then in a month or so it all goes pear shaped and you report it to Insurers, they are going to take a dim view of why you didn’t tell them at the time.  Which would be (probably) a breach of policy conditions.  So they could be looking to decline cover. See the various travel insurance\non disclosure threads!

And the declaration about no accidents on future renewals. Are you comfortable lying?/not disclosing*?  See above.

*melodramatic, for effect.

Go through the insurance it’s why you both pay it.

What is the car worth and do you want to keep it? If it's old insurance may just write it off as the fixing plus their admin can cost more than value.

I’d go through insurance if possible, mostly because most people don’t realise quite how much bodywork costs.

This was my thought.  Modern car bumpers are designed to crush internally to absorb impact.  What might look externally to be something that could be fixed with a touch-up pen and a can of T-Cut - you haven't said the extent of the damage I don't think? - could easily run to four figures internally.  Opting instead to leave it, bear in mind it'll only crush to absorb an impact the once.

Admitting liability at the roadside is a big no-no, his insurers won't thank him for that (but yours will).  If he's naive enough to do that, he's surely naive enough to grossly underestimate the costs involved.

Whether you go via insurance or not you'll still need to get quotes.  Get at least one right now, tell him the price, see how quickly he backpedals.

if you go down the sorting outside insurance route, then in a month or so it all goes pear shaped and you report it to Insurers, they are going to take a dim view of why you didn’t tell them at the time.

Also, this.

I'm going to get a couple of bodyshop quotes to start with. Will also notify my insurer and tell them I'm initially looking at a private settlement (because the missus and I share joint policies on both our cars and I don't want to risk a non-declaration biting us on the harris in the future).

Just a thought. If you notify your insurer and they request the other driver's reg number and name as part of the process - is he not then put in the position of needing to inform his insurance anyway as there will be a crash linked to him on the common database?

In which case if he is getting a crash record anyway he may be as well reporting it.

This is Singletrack forum there is bound to be someone who works in insurance and can answer that one.

I was lucky - the only time I got rear ended - while doing about 25mph - my car was getting scrapped the following weel anyway.

I’m hoping they’ll accept me just notifying them and not demanding his details in the first instance. I’ll make it clear that if going private cannot be resolved, eg cost is too high, then getting into his insurer will be the way to go.

All things considered, id go through insurance.

I say that even though I reported a minor prang (guy drove slowly into the back of me when I was at stand still) and told them there would be no claim made, just giving them an fyi.

Next year I renewed as usual after a price comparison check, only to get a nasty letter from new insurer saying I hadn't declared a no fault accident. I had to declare that for the next 5 bloody years.

Even so, id still go through insurance.

Oh, watch out for the hire car "scam" if you do! That went on for nearly 2 years when sunshine hit my lads car! Theres been a few threads on here about it.

Beware - if you arrange yourself you will at best get a tiny wee courtesy car.  If you organise via insurer they will probably organise a similar car to yours whilst yours is in the garage.   If its only a few days you may not mind BUT its not unheard of for "we can do it by Friday" to turn into a phone call on Friday saying "we took your car apart and it needs parts that need to come from Korea and will be 2-3 weeks, and we won't schedule the paint job until the parts are here so maybe 5-6 weeks.  Next doors car was away of 12 weeks for fairly superficial looking damage but parking sensors etc needed to come in.  Next door to her (young kid up the street swiped both of them!) was even longer - it was bigger damage but probably the top end hire car costs more than the bodywork.

That said I had a friend who lost a fight with a bus, and the bus company had their in house coachworks people fix the car for her that weekend and it came back looking better than before the accident and she got some cash for her inconvenience - and the car fixed quicker than her own insurer could even organise a quote.  But that was a bangernomics car.

The point being you don’t have to do what the insurance say about declaring and they will never know . . ?

As others have said, if they do find out by whatever means and you haven't declared either to fix this, or on a future quote, then you're at risk of being in a world of shit. In the past where everything was written and paper, maybe worth the risk but in this interconnected world, I'm just too cautious. The impact on yours and his policy costs in future would be naught compared to not being able to insure in future or having to declare you've had insurance declined or cancelled.

from a moral point of view I’d object and not tell them, as insurnace companies are basically out to screw you any which way. My opinion obviously.

Insurance companies calculate your risk based on data and denying them access to information to accurately do that is also 'immoral'  As is lying on renewal forms. It's also technically fraud. Whether you consider two wrongs making a right, or, different levels of morality in this is up to you. My opinion obviously.

Insurance companies calculate your risk based on data and denying them access to information to accurately do that is also ‘immoral’ As is lying on renewal forms. It’s also technically fraud. Whether you consider two wrongs making a right, or, different levels of morality in this is up to you. My opinion obviously.

I don't disagree but at what point would you tell them?

You get the bike out of the boot and scratch the bumper by "accident".
You get out the door and your muddy boot scuffs the sill by "accident".
Your wedding rings scuff the paint behind the door handle by "accident".
You pick up chips to the bonnet and front bumper just driving along the motorway.

In theory you could claim for those, but hardly anyone would, and I doubt anyone would tell their insurance co if they didn't claim.