Girlfriend hit another car

Psiko · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:07

Hi guys,

My girlfriend hit a car in her drive a couple of months ago when she was reversing. It left a dent and scratch about the size of a football 1 or 2 inches deep in the rear-right door. The guy she hit agreed to get a quote for repairing the damage which we agreed to pay.

We've recently heard the quote and are quite surprised at how large it is. The garage have said that the door will need to be reskinned and it will cost £800. We were expecting, perhaps naively, £200 - £300 max for such minor damage! I just wanted to check whether this sounds reasonable or are we being ripped off? The guy is going to get another quote anyway to compare.

Cheers.

kae2 · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:08

That's cheap to get a DB9 fixed that's for sure.

shoes · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:09

What kind of car? What kind of paint?

Frozennova · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:09

Had someone do a similar thing but they hit the wing of my car quotes we're £600 for than so £800 doesn't seem over priced to me

Psiko · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:10

Sorry! It's a Vauxhall Corsa about 5 or so years old. Silver paint.

Gaygle · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:26

Sounds about right. See if they can get a cash in hand price (for the garage).

I recently inquired about a small graze on my bumper/wing and it was, IIRC, between £250+VAT to £400+VAT.

ecksmen · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:27

Psiko said:
Hi guys,

My girlfriend hit a car in her drive a couple of months ago when she was reversing. It left a dent and scratch about the size of a football 1 or 2 inches deep in the rear-right door. The guy she hit agreed to get a quote for repairing the damage which we agreed to pay.

We've recently heard the quote and are quite surprised at how large it is. The garage have said that the door will need to be reskinned and it will cost £800. We were expecting, perhaps naively, £200 - £300 max for such minor damage! I just wanted to check whether this sounds reasonable or are we being ripped off? The guy is going to get another quote anyway to compare.

Cheers.

You can hardly blame them, I wouldn't spend my time finding the cheapest quote to save your girlfriend a few pounds.

Pay up.

SS-89 · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:30

ecksmen said:
You can hardly blame them, I wouldn't spend my time finding the cheapest quote to save your girlfriend a few pounds.

Pay up.

+1

Why didn't you settle it through insurance (assuming you have protected NCB)? Surely the premium increase would have been a lot less than £800.

Psiko · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:32

ecksmen said:
You can hardly blame them, I wouldn't spend my time finding the cheapest quote to save your girlfriend a few pounds.

Pay up.

Blame who? You seem to have misunderstood. I was asking whether the garage was charging a fair price. The guy she hit is one of my best mates so I know he won't be ripping me off. He's just doing me a favour by getting another quote and it's a pain in the arse for him because he'll be without a car for a couple of days while it gets fixed.

Psiko · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:35

SS-89 said:
+1

Why didn't you settle it through insurance (assuming you have protected NCB)? Surely the premium increase would have been a lot less than £800.

We may still settle it through insurance. At the time we (all) thought it would be a couple of hundred quid so thought there was no point involving insurance. The insurance has a voluntary excess of £500 on it, so it will probably still be cheaper to just pay out either way.

If £800 is a reasonable quote for this sort of damage then we won't bother getting another quote. I have distinct lack of car knowledge, which is why I turned to you guys.

Thanks for the replies so far.

bam0 · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:39

Psiko said:
We may still settle it through insurance. At the time we (all) thought it would be a couple of hundred quid so thought there was no point involving insurance. The insurance has a voluntary excess of £500 on it, so it will probably still be cheaper to just pay out either way.

If £800 is a reasonable quote for this sort of damage then we won't bother getting another quote. I have distinct lack of car knowledge, which is why I turned to you guys.

Thanks for the replies so far.

Pretty sure you only pay the excess on claims you make for yourself, someone else claiming off your insurance should be covered completely.

kae2 · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:41

bam0 said:
Pretty sure you only pay the excess on claims you make for yourself, someone else claiming off your insurance should be covered completely.

eh?

[TW]Fox · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:45

kae2 said:
eh?

He is right. Excess applies only to claims for loss or damage to your car.

Nice rolleyes.

Dogbreath · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:54

kae2 said:
eh?

Why the "eh?" and rolleyes?

crinkleshoes · 2 Aug 2011 at 13:59

Why not get a replacement door from a scrappy in the same colour? Would be a **** load cheaper and just as good as long as you get a decent quality one...

Psiko · 2 Aug 2011 at 14:08

bam0 said:
Pretty sure you only pay the excess on claims you make for yourself, someone else claiming off your insurance should be covered completely.

Ah, great. I didn't realise that. Will she still be able to claim given the accident happened on a private drive? I read through the policy document the other day and didn't see anything to the contrary.

I'll also look into replacing the door, although I'm not sure how keen my mate would be on that. Would it affect the resale value of the car? I assume it has to be recorded that the door was swapped?

SS-89 · 2 Aug 2011 at 14:12

Psiko said:
Ah, great. I didn't realise that. Will she still be able to claim given the accident happened on a private drive? I read through the policy document the other day and didn't see anything to the contrary.

I'll also look into replacing the door, although I'm not sure how keen my mate would be on that. Would it affect the resale value of the car? I assume it has to be recorded that the door was swapped?

Wait your girlfriend hit your friends car?

Hxc · 2 Aug 2011 at 14:15

[TW]Fox;19725778 said:
He is right. Excess applies only to claims for loss or damage to your car.

Nice rolleyes.

Quite a lot of policies have a smaller third party excess nowerdays though, Bell certainly do

Prophet · 2 Aug 2011 at 14:20

crinkleshoes said:
Why not get a replacement door from a scrappy in the same colour? Would be a **** load cheaper and just as good as long as you get a decent quality one...

The colour won't ever be a perfect match so will need respraying anyway.