She drove a damaged car for a fortnight because she thought she'd have to pay for it
We handle a few hundred of these a year, and they almost always start the same way: someone rings us a day or two after the accident, and the first thing we hear isn't about the car. It's "I don't know what I'm supposed to do."
This is one of those files. The details are changed, but the shape is real, and it's the shape of most of our week.
The call
She'd been stopped. Someone came through and hit her, and they said sorry at the scene, and that was the last easy part of it.
By the time she called us she'd been awake two nights doing sums. The excess was money she didn't have sitting around. She'd heard that claiming puts your premium up, and she wasn't sure if that was true but she wasn't willing to find out. She needed the car for work and for school pick-up and there was no version of the week where she didn't have a car.
So she'd done what most people do. Nothing. Driven the damaged car around for a fortnight, feeling slightly sick every time she looked at it.
What we did
We took the other driver's details and went at their insurer rather than hers. That's the whole trick, and it isn't a trick — the person who damaged the car is responsible for putting it right. She didn't lodge a claim. She didn't pay an excess. There was no claim on her policy for anyone to re-rate her on later.
A replacement car was with her before the repairs started, and she kept it for the whole repair, not for a capped number of days.
Then we did the unglamorous part: the letters, the assessment, chasing the inspection, chasing the authority, chasing the insurer when they went quiet. Liability was accepted inside three weeks. Her car went in, the repair was done, and the file closed.
What it cost her
Nothing. Our fee goes to the at-fault driver's insurer along with the repair and the hire. That's how we get paid, and it's why we can say "no cost to you" without an asterisk.
The part we wish people knew earlier
The fortnight she spent driving a damaged car and not sleeping was avoidable. Nothing about her situation was unusual or difficult. She just didn't know that the repair was never hers to pay for, so she assumed the worst and sat with it.
That's the one thing we'd change. Not the outcome — the outcome is normal. The two weeks of stress before she picked up the phone.
If someone hit you and you're doing those sums right now, you can stop. Find out first whether any of it is yours to pay.