Advice needed - they want to write off my Defender

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Originally Posted by jc109

I pay insurance premiums so that I don't (or shouldn't) need to do all that legwork myself. Yes, it would be the lopper who you'd chase (not their insurance company - isn't that up to him?), but why would you be so keen to do it yourself when that's precisely what you pay your insurer to do?

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I agree, you pay insure for your insurer to do the hard work.

I’ve always claimed through my insurance even when not at fault.

I guess you’ll have to crunch the numbers on out of pocket on going it alone.....you will be responsible for costs up front in the hope the judge one gives you the win and two makes the other party pay all legal fees....if other party is a low margin low profit small business they may just go done they bankruptcy route, not sure how that works for you.

Dig your heels in..the insurer needs to pursue them for the costs. Been thru this similarly myself. As said get another 2 quotes. Submit them to the insurer and go from there.

Yes, I would certainly be putting pressure on the insurer. Summitt on here convinced the insurer to replace the chassis on one of his Puma 130 and JD_NSW also eventually got a new rear crossmember fitted to his county. They will always take the easy way out and write a vehicle off if they can assuming it is not nearly new or a prestige car. The vast numbers of written off vehicles in Canberra after the hailstorm is testament to that, over 30,000 I believe.

Regards,
Tote

The answer to why they would wright it of is , they add the cost of the repair & the amount they will get payed for the wreck , if those combined are close to or more than market value they will write it off. My daughter & husband had two cars damaged with hail , the insurance sent them to there approved repairer for quotes & they were booth deemed write off's . The near new car had the most damage & needed replacing but the other a 10+ year old Hyundai husband only used to drive to work they would not have been able to replace for what the insurance were going to pay out . I took it to an independent repairer & got a quote which was half of the insurance approved repairer . We submitted it to the insurance & they repaired the vehicle. Daughter's husband did have to waver the life time warranty on the repairs for not using the approved repairer.

Have you asked to talk to someone higher up the tree at your insurance company?
If the banana isn't helping talk to the monkey, if he won't help go to the organ grinder & so on.
Start getting a bit rude, not offensive but rude.
Like, "Mate your not listening. Who can I talk to that will?"
Jonesfam

If they got paint all over your car , what about your house, have they got overspray over it as well. I remember years ago a friend was spraying his 48 LR chassis silver in a shed down the back of his back paddock with the doors shut & the wind picked up sucking the overspray out between the walls & roof & it went settled on two sides of the house next door.
Also I remember QCL ( Qld Cement & Lime ) had a new steel silo delivered & the company who made it came in when the job was complete they sent the painters in to touch up the paint damage . The overspray went over all the cars parked in the street , would have been 50 or more cars . They used clay bar's to remove it, worked a treat.


I would be talking to a solicitor about who should be paying & how you go about sorting it out, it may be quicker & cheaper in the long run. These people should have not entered your property, that should not have attempted to clean your car with out your permission .

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Originally Posted by 1950landy

If they got paint all over your car , what about your house, have they got overspray over it as well. I remember years ago a friend was spraying his 48 LR chassis silver in a shed down the back of his back paddock with the doors shut & the wind picked up sucking the overspray out between the walls & roof & it went settled on two sides of the house next door.
Also I remember QCL ( Qld Cement & Lime ) had a new steel silo delivered & the company who made it came in when the job was complete they sent the painters in to touch up the paint damage . The overspray went over all the cars parked in the street , would have been 50 or more cars . They used clay bar's to remove it, worked a treat.


I would be talking to a solicitor about who should be paying & how you go about sorting it out, it may be quicker & cheaper in the long run. These people should have not entered your property, that should not have attempted to clean your car with out your permission .

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Yes, paint went all over the carport and the house. It's still on the carport, and it shows up nicely on the gutter and roof sheets on that side, so that might be handy down the track. The house got hit too, but despite the guy's offer to come back and paint our stairs, handrails, etc., we didn't trust him to do a decent job, and we were doing that kind of work ourselves anyway so decided to just keep heading down that path. There's still plenty of evidence of the spray down the side of the house, but it's not noticeable given the similarity of the colours.

I've lined up a solicitor. Reluctant to pull the trigger on that before I've heard back from the insurer. No word since Monday...

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Originally Posted by jc109

Yes, paint went all over the carport and the house. It's still on the carport, and it shows up nicely on the gutter and roof sheets on that side, so that might be handy down the track. The house got hit too, but despite the guy's offer to come back and paint our stairs, handrails, etc., we didn't trust him to do a decent job, and we were doing that kind of work ourselves anyway so decided to just keep heading down that path. There's still plenty of evidence of the spray down the side of the house, but it's not noticeable given the similarity of the colours.

I've lined up a solicitor. Reluctant to pull the trigger on that before I've heard back from the insurer. No word since Monday...

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Pull the trigger??? I'd be switching the rate of fire selector to full automatic, and gathering together a few spare magazines...

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Originally Posted by justinc

Pull the trigger??? I'd be switching the rate of fire selector to full automatic, and gathering together a few spare magazines...

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Yes, I know I should probably be much the same. There's a few things I've not yet revealed on here that might give a clearer picture of why I'm not barreling ahead.

Firstly, I'm overseas right now for work and won't be home for a couple of months at least. Then there's the fact that this incident actually took place late last year. It was about one month after my other car was rear-ended. It was two days before my seriously ill father passed away, while I was overseas... Emergency trip home for funeral, etc, and some minor leg-work on this. The painter actually called my wife while she and I were driving out of the crematorium after the service telling us "Christmas is coming" hurrying US up. Didn't go down too well. I flew back to work. Home again and spent all my time sorting out affairs. Tried to get quotes for both vehicles. Slow process, and wrong time of year. Go away for work again, and our house floods in early Feb. Been dealing with the rectifications for that since then. Yet to complete all works downstairs, although it's close. Got the rear-ender sorted first as we want to sell that car. It got knocked again on that same bumper maybe two weeks after the work was done. Carpark, I guess. Not worth claiming for that damage so it'll remain. Can't win a trick. And, of course, there's been COVID-19-related delays to everything. So, I'm kind of worn down and am pretty comfortable just taking a slowly, slowly approach. I am very confident that I have a strong legal position. Bullet-proof I'd think. I'll select full-auto when the time comes. Just working on putting all the pieces together right now so I'm ready.

Advice needed - they want to write off my Defender https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/misc/moderated.gif https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/cms/edit_small.png


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by barney
, 3rd September 2020 at 11:07 AM (0 Views)

https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by jc109 https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/bu...post-right.png
Cheers cripesamighty, I'll keep the clay bar in mind for future reference. I have one in the garage for the non-Defender car. Never bothered taking it to my pride and joy, funnily enough.


https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/misc/quote_icon.png Originally Posted by cripesamighty https://www.aulro.com/afvb/images/bu...post-right.png
The panel beaters you used sound like complete idiots to do that sort of damage. Good luck with it.



I should clarify for you and anyone else seeing this: the overspray was housepaint from the neighbour's place, sprayed by two numpties on a windy day when they should have packed up and gone home. My car was under our carport, so exposed at the sides. When the two blokes realised what they'd done they ran over and tried to remove the evidence by scrubbing at my car with Scotchbrite pads dunked in buckets of sugar soap, as my wife screamed at them to stop. Heaven knows what they were thinking.



If that's the case, you should be able to sue the "tradies" for damages,being for the damage to your car and other belongings (house, anything else the paint got on) from paint over-spray, trespassing and malicious damage.
Get some repair quotes from top repairers that can spray over aluminium and the cost of everything that needs to be replaced.
Get the name of their company from the neighbour and engage a solicitor to attack their insurance company or them personally for the cost of repairs and include the cost of the solicitor in the settlement.