Letter from solicitor threatening county court proceedings

The_One

The_One

The_One

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27 Dec 2003
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Back in june of last year early sunday morning my elderly father had a bump with a third party. A coming together in filtering traffic near the bus station

it put a small dent in the third partys rear drivers door and a small dent in my fathers front passenger wing.

My dad suffers from short term memory loss following an industrial accident that forced him to take early retirement so the third party wrote my dads details down himself then handed my father a piece of paper with his own details.

Both said wasn't worth claiming.

Anyway I advised to sit it out and see if we heard anything and if not just get it sorted without insurance as it wasn't much...

Nothing until today....

Had a letter from a solicitors representing the third party saying as weve been unable to claim damages off your insurance company were giving you 7 days to pay circa 2.5k for our client otherwise we will issue county court proceedings.

As parents are elderly its understandably shook them up somewhat.

Now in the letter they have my fathers registration number incorrect (It refers to a black vauxahall) my fathers car is a bronze honda jazz and they also have the insurance company wrong (They have admiral but my father is with co op)

So.…

Do we ignore it as they have the fundamental details wrong or if not whats advisable?
 
my dad was involved in an accident though the details of other party are correct just they have my dads vehicle reg wrong (Just one digit wrong)
 
Google the company, is it legit or ambulance chasers?

Why havent they been able to claim off insurance?

Who instructed the solicitors?

But 18 months since the bump before first letter? Id be denying all knowledge, tell them they have the wrong car, wrong details and **** off.
 
I would advise you to contact your insurer to find out what this is about, but I suspect the reason they’re not paying out is because they weren’t informed and presumably any attempts by them to contact you were ignored (if they bothered).
 
kindai said:
Google the company, is it legit or ambulance chasers?

Why havent they been able to claim off insurance?

Who instructed the solicitors?

But 18 months since the bump before first letter? Id be denying all knowledge, tell them they have the wrong car, wrong details and **** off.
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they have the reg incorrect which comes up as a black Vauxhall insured by admiral so I presume they are chasing admiral

this is first we have heard since it happened
 
The_One said:
proddow mackay are the solicitors ive already looked them up they are legit.....
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Id just write a letter back

"Dear solicitor man,

The details of the car are incorrect, we believe you have the wrong person, we do not, nor have ever owned the car in question. Likewise we are not insured, nor have ever been insured recently by that insurance provider"

With regards

Signed"
 
kindai said:
Id just write a letter back

"Dear solicitor man,

The details of the car are incorrect, we believe you have the wrong person, we do not, nor have ever owned the car in question. Likewise we are not insured, nor have ever been insured recently by that insurance provider"

With regards

Signed"
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This ^.
 
If youre that concerned about it send the letter to your insurance company and let them deal with it.

You failed to report an accident as per your policies requirements, so either double down and deny all knowledge or send it to your insurance company and lube up.
 
kindai said:
Id just write a letter back

"Dear solicitor man,

The details of the car are incorrect, we believe you have the wrong person, we do not, nor have ever owned the car in question. Likewise we are not insured, nor have ever been insured recently by that insurance provider"

With regards

Signed"
Click to expand...

That's good, because at no point are you lying.
 
I'd want some (independent from the insurance company ) legal advice on this - may well be that a simple "sorry those are not my details" reply will ultimately suffice....

However, that will really not look good if it either makes it to court with some other evidence or you for some other reason need to get the insurance company involved (with the non reporting side also being an issue as above). Remember that small claims relies on balance of probability so an error like having one digit of a registration wrong does not necessarily mean you can ignore the issue
 
I had a very similar thing a few months back, I was contacted via a Solicitor with a letter worded almost the same, my details, name, address etc except the vehicle details were for a car I’ve never owned sent a letter back similar to kindai’s above and heard no more about it.

But, in my case I’d had no accident or incident whereas your dad has..

I’d take advice on this but, given the details are incorrect and the time lapse I’d be surprised if it went much further.
 
I think i would pass it on to the Insurance company tell them about his memory and they should handle it. Considering he did actually have the accident the scope for things going wrong are high, what if they have photos.
Its what insurance is for, the small amount extra the premiums go up is nothing compared to the stress saved by letting them deal with it.
 
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