Thread: Advice needed - they want to write off my Defender

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 .

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 .

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...

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...

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

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...

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.