Nobody wants to be involved in car accidents and we all try to avoid them but periodically, car drivers find themselves caught up in accident of some kind. Hopefully they are only minor incidents involving minor damage to the vehicle or third party property.

But, in the event of a person meeting with the accident and incurring damages whereupon they have to lodge a claim with their own insurer or against the person at fault’s insurance company, the hassle can begin.

Not knowing how to proceed is the first and probably the hardest obstacle to overcome. After all, it takes time, and involves completing forms and pursuing insurers for progress. Everyone wants their claim resolved immediately. In fact, their claim is the only one they are concerned with – who cares about all the others feeling the same way. You want your car back.

So, first bit of advice is to recognise that you are not the only person the insurers are having to deal with – don’t be too impatient. Yes, it is fine to chase them for progress but if you are insured on a third party fire and theft basis, be aware that the other person’s insurance company is going to want you to jump through a few hoops and prove their customer was indeed at fault.

They will want their customer’s view of the accident before admitting liability and the police, if they were called to the scene.

A group of collision repair businesses around the UK is to shortly launch an independent  quality assured repairer network.

Membership of the Vizion Network will be aimed specifically at the prestige vehicle market and will be restricted to repair businesses that have prestige manufacturer approvals, BSI Kitemark accreditation and operate the same repair management systems.

All Vizion Network businesses will have specialist prestige vehicle manufacturer trained technicians and each business will have its own BSI Kitemark for vehicle body repairing assuring they all adhere to the same processes.

Qulaity of workmanship will be supported by thorough BSI audit and inspection processes.

By using the same repair management system, customers of Vizion members repairers  will be able to benefit from the improved operational efficiency, transparency, and consistent management information.

Vizion’s founding members are Eamonn Dunne of Brooklands, Paul Austin of Balgores, Trevor Barefoot of Exway, Gene Clark of Clarkes, Julian Allen of Motorvation, David Perkins and Graham Eyles of Apollo Motor Group and Gary Lindsay of Autoflow.

Eamonn Dunne of Brooklands will be chairman of the Vizion Network and has stated:

“Vizion has been created to meet a market need. We can no longer afford to have a fragmented, clouded approach to vehicle body repair. Now, owners, insurers and fleet managers can specify a Vizion Network repairer and be confident that their prestige vehicles will be repaired safely and effectively to a consistent high manufacturer standard.”

Anyone interested in keeping an eye on developments of this network can start y accessing the website currently under ocnstruction by clicking here. 

This could happen to any one of the millions of drivers whizzing around on UK roads.

In fact, 35% of all accidents were reportedly due to people failing to take care, look properly or concentrate.
 
Failing to look properly was the most frequently reported contributory factor.

Four of the five most frequently reported contributory factors included reference to driver/rider error or reaction.

When it comes to fatal accidents, the most frequently reported contributory factor (33%) was due to a loss of control.

Younger drivers, particularly males, are statistically more likely to have contributory factors related to speed and behaviour, whereas mature drivers are more likely to have factors related to vision and judgement.

It is clear from such statistics that certain driving behaviours are more often found in particular driver types and age bands making it difficult to argue with insurance providers when they quote higher premiums for the younger male drivers and those unfortunate enough to suffer from certain medical conditions.

Pedestrian casualties living in the most deprived areas were reported at a rate of 70 casualties per 100,000 population whilst only 21 casualties per 100,000 population in the least deprived areas.

Source: Department for Transport - Road Casualties Great Britain: 2007

Personal injury claims cost the insurance industry an enormous amount of money year in, year out and the costs continue to rise.

Fradulent personal injury claims are so prevalent that personal injury investigation is one business that is bucking the trend and continuing to prosper as insurers look to assure monies paid out are appropriate and indeed legitimate.

In such economic climates as currently being experienced across the globe at the moment, insurers are bracing themselves for a steep climb in the number of claims, genuine and fraudulent, as the recession takes hold.

David Williams, claims director at AXA, says:

“Surveillance is highly sensitive but in the first 10 months of last year, private investigators saved AXA £39.86m. That’s 10 times the amount for the whole of 2004.”

The job is never going to be easy but it is clearly necessary and claims tend to be significantly reduced rather than rejected in their entirety.

There is of course the impression of shady characters, hidden cameras and tape recorders but in the main, investigators work on the theory that if people are not expecting to see it, they won’t, so it is unlikely you will even know they were watching you until the negotiations to settle the claim enter the final stages.

Remember, insurers will, in the end, pass all injury claim costs on to the customers, so the next time you hear a friend boasting about having conned an insurer by feigning injury, they have conned you really and you will end up paying for it.

Ronaldo has just found out that just because you have had your car repaired or replaced following an accident/incident, it does not necessarily mean your claim has been completed.

Ronaldo, Fifa’s world player of the year, thankfully walked away unhurt from the accident when he wrote off his £200,000 Ferrari following collision with the walls of a tunnel running underneath Manchester Airport runways and subsequently hitting metal handrails that protect an emergency exit in January.

The Manchester United and Portugal winger now finds the airports insurers, (Aon is broker and Allianz lead insurer) are in the process of claiming for property damage believed to be in the region of some £20,000 for repairs to the tunnel.

Just like any other insured person, Ronaldo’s insurance premium also covers damagae to third party property and as you see, the costs soon mount up. These costs do not take the additional time and expense incurred by the police and other emergency services involved in the associated traffic management during the incident and subsequent clean up.

Let’s also not forget of course, anyone else caught up in the traffic chaos, the accident undoubtedly caused when roads around such a busy airport were affected for a period.

AIRMIC, which represents nearly 1,000 risk managers, including 75% of the FTSE 100 believe standards are set to improve following publication of  a new best practice guide.

The Association of Insurance and Risk Managers state the guide will give insurers the opportunity to demonstrate how they measure up to the criteria set out in the document. The association has embarked upon a series of discussions with leading insurers and already secured agreement with some of the major insurance companies such as AXA, AIG, Royal Sun Alliance and Zurich about applying the guide.

The document lays down 8 areas that determine the measure on the quality of the claims handling services of any particular insurer together with the factors which help to demonstrate the necessary evidentiary information to prove they measure up to standard.

The components are: Culture and Philosophy; Communications; People; Infrastructure; Claims Procedures; Data Management; Operations; Monitoring and Review.

The guide has been produced following a series of discussions instigated by insurers approached AIRMIC, asking for help in assessing their claims services. Airmic said it wanted the document to have two main functions – as a tool for insurance buyers and as a reference point for insurers.

John Hurrell, CEO says:

“Our insurer-partners have given this project their wholehearted support. They genuinely wish to demonstrate that they have an excellent claims service because that is, after all, why people buy insurance. The major brokers are also behind us.”

It doesn’t happen very often but when a person’s car is hit by a vehicle being pursued by Police, where do you stand with regards to claiming for damages and personal injuries?

In all likelihood, you will be able to claim against the insurer of the vehicle, irrespective of whether it was in fact a stolen vehicle, or being driven by a legitimate permitted driver. The fact that it was being pursued by Police at the time is irrelevant.

There are however, some complex legal issues involved and you would be well advised to seek legal advice.

If you are unable to identify the vehicle involved or there was in fact no insurance at all in place, you can submit a claim through the Motor Insurance Bureau (MIB) who will in essence, act as the third party insurer to compensate you but, if the incident occurred after 1 October 1999, this will be subject to you having to pay the first £300.

You should note that responsibility for the accident has to be agreed, or decided by a Court and on the evidence, your claim could possibly be reduced by a proportion, or possibly rejected if there is evidence that you, or the person driving your car at the time, is considered partly or wholly responsible.

The Association of Personal Injury Lawyers (APIL) attacked the insurance industry and the FSA over the practice known as third party capture.

It is a rapidly growing, controversial approach by insurers of approaching injured parties directly in order to settle the claim before a lawyer becomes involved.

The technique is used in order to speed up the claims settlement process and cut out costly legal actions and keep down claimant lawyers costs.

Claims by the APIL president, Amanda Stevens infers that insurers attempt to bully claimants into accepting lower compensation than they should be entitled to and that the FSA (Financial Services Authority) is not taking action against this activity.

Insurers insist that they deal fairly with the injured party and that the compensation offered is fair.

The FSA began an investigation into third party capture at the end of 2007, calling for evidence of bad practice from claimant lawyers and trade unions but has not, as yet,  publish any findings.

With the economic downturn taking a real hold, the arguments around third party capture is set to intensify with the practice likely to become more prevalent with insurers looking to reduce the cost of claims by offering speedy settlements, and legal costs.

Sometimes, thieves don’t bother to pinch the car, they just steal the number plates, causing other damage in the process for some reason which has to be claimed for from your insurance policy.

If you want to protect your vehicle registration plate from theft, consider fitting the plates with security screws.

In some parts of the country, local garages are setting up agreements with their Community Safety Partnerships to fit the special screws in order to help prevent thieves stealing your number plate, fitting them to another car, and then going on to complete other criminal activities.

It is a scam particularly popular amongst people that steal fuel from petrol stations and legitimate owners of the registration number can find themselves having to jump through quite a few hoops to get the plate back.

It isn’t too much of a problem for the average car owner but if you have personalised plates, it can be more frustrating.

It will be unlikely that garages will fit these screws for free, but they might, if you are say getting your car serviced or MOT’d at the same time.

It’s certainly worth asking and for your own protection, make sure you notify your car insurance provider if you find you end up changing your registration number.

Remember, it could also involve you in having to pay an admin fee to your insurer.

We all know that if you can avoid being involved in any car accident, then:

1) We are extremely lucky and;
2) No claims bonus builds up and insurance premiums will be as low as one can reasonably expect.

Most people sit back, daydream or just switch off whenever something is being discussed which is of no interest in their workplace. If it’s on the TV, they simply change channels.

But for some, the decision making process, and the way those decisions are formulated, can be interesting.

In this article I am to try and provide a brief insight into the work undertaken by expert analysts which helped the Government decide on the strategies to bring the number of road deaths down on UK roads by 2010.

Like all strategies, it must first establish a baseline to measure performance against. This is usually done by research and analysis of data/information. In this instance, it was data from 1994-98.

The Department for Transport laid out its objectives and commissioned expert analysts to conduct the independent review.

In order to develop effective strategies for reducing Road Traffic Accidents, experts needed to gain a better understanding of the causes of accidents and the likely injury outcomes of certain specific type of accident.

To achieve this, an “On the Spot” (OTS) project was commissioned to gather in-depth information at the scene of accidents.

Data was collected by expert investigators (who typically attended within 15 minutes of an accident occurring) in two geographical locations, namely; the Thames Valley and the Midlands. Their prompt attendance enabled them to collect vital data that might otherwise have been lost.

The data collection began in 2000 and more than 2,000 accidents were recorded on the database at the time the experts report was submitted.

To enable them to offer recommendations to help reduce the number of accidents, the database included some very specific causal data such as:-

• The road and environmental conditions at the time of the accident
• Examination of causes and resultant injuries
• The severity of any accident and injuries
• Types of accident
• Types of injury

The report runs to some 70+ pages and must have involved thousands of man hours to collate and put together.

 If you would like to learn more, further information can be found on the dft website by clicking here