What do i do?

[moneypit23 0]

Heres a little tale of woe and despair.....

I woke up yesterday morning to a knock on the door, somebody informs me that my car is covered in red paint. I can't see my car from the house so i go out and look. Sure enough, my car is covered in paint all along the passenger side so with steam coming out of my ears i go back to the house to get a bucket of water.

The red paint comes off easily but then so does the moonlight blue paint, exposing primer and metal. The plasic and rubber bits have also changed colour and in some cases, melted.

Feck!

I report it to the police. There are no witnesses no motive so i'm buggered.

The insurance tell me i have £300 excess so i go to get quotes. The quotes come back at £800-900 including all the colour-coding i thought i might as well get done. Not bad i thought, I'll claim on the insurance, thats what its for.

Not that simple.

I phoned the insurance today, my excess now appears to be £550 which is almost half my entire premium, apparently i'm a young driver at 23 thats what the extra £250 is.

What do i do?

I just quit work to concentrate on my final year at uni, talk about timing.

I don't want to pay the excess as the insurance lied to me about how much it was, i would'nt have taken out the policy if i'd known it was that much.

Anyway, it'll have to be fixed so does anyone know any very good bodyshops in the Manchester or Huddersfield area? I've been to Impact in Brighouse, they seemed very good and look like the right choice at the moment.

Thanks for reading

[dinkus 10]

That's one crappy tale :(

 

I hope the low-life scum that did it suffer a particularly slow and painful death.

 

As far as the insurance goes, there are usually 2 parts to the excess . There's the voluntary part (which sounds like it's £300 in your case). That's the amount that you get to choose when buying the insurance.

 

However, quite a few insurance companies also have a compulsary excess, which is usually fixed and age-related. It sounds like this is £250 for you :(

 

If it's not mentioned in your insurance documentation, then you could argue it, but unfortunately it's usually buried away in the small print somewhere.

 

Either way, at £800-£900 for a full re-spray, making a claim is still going to help out with the cost.

[h100vw 0]

Impact are a highly respected outfit. They have painted many show cars for Awesome and Dubsport in the past as well as their own.

 

Insurance is just a top fiddle fullstop.

 

I would say get it painted by whoever but don't go mad getting all the bits done. Paintwork cost is all down to the prep. Anything that is going to take time to prepare will jack up the manhours and cost significantly.

 

If you can do any of the work yourself or with help from friends, ie removing and re-fitting trim you could save money there.

 

Best of luck

Gavin

[CazzaVR 0]

That's terrible :( Really don't know what's wrong with some people.

 

Hope you get it sorted soon.

[dnac 0]

If I was you, I would get down to your local car spares place, buy a few cans of the correct colour paint and spray it yourself, being carefull not to get overspray all over the place. It will not look show quality, but will keep the rust out, then save up for the respray when you are back at work. If you claim on the insurance they are only going to contribute a couple of hundred quid after your excess is taken out, and then next year get it back when you renew by raising the premium due to the claim.

[Bally 0]

Thats facked no how you must be feeling, Ex GF had her car covered in paint stripper a few years back, tried to clean it up but had to get it resprayed in the end!!! :mad:

 

goodluck mate..

[_leon_ 0]

that makes me fuming hearing these kinds of stories. wtf is wrong with people? I think I agree with whats said about getting some spray and protecting the bodywork first. If its safe then at least you know the quality can be sorted at a later date.

 

Good luck too

[moneypit23 0]

Thanks for the replies and suggestions, still don't know what to do yet but i'll keep you posted.

[JoeNose 0]

It might be interesting to argue the toss about the £250 young driver excess - Ask them if that would still have applied if the car was stolen - if they say no, they are on very dodgy ground.

[vr6storm 0]

might be worth reading up on the malicous damage part of your policy too

[2cc 0]

Utter barstewards. I went hairless when mine got chipped. Probably have had heart failure at this. They just don't deserve to breathe the same air

[stevemac 0]

I always assumed that age weighted excess on insurance policies was because they think that younger drivers are more likely to have an accident.

 

Your age has no significance whatsoever in this particular case.

[dr_mat 0]

"young driver excess" also applies to theft because young drivers are more likely to leave the car in a less safe area, or dump it outside a nightclub in the centre of birmingham on double yellers..

Can't get out of the excess for a different type of claim - it's pretty water tight I'm afraid. You may be able to claim some compensation from your broker, however, if they didn't alert you to this on the phone and you paid before you saw the full policy details. But that would be something you'd have to chase through the small claims court, and would be completely unconnected with the insurance claim process. Plus you would have had 14 days after starting the policy (and getting the full details) during which you could cancel it without financial penalty if it wasn't what you were expecting, so you really have to read through the stuff they send you carefully.

[Garry 0]

Thats a real shame dude - I hate hearing stories like this