Have I been ripped off ?

[Howard]

I was expecting you to say the guy wanted £2k or something. £250 for a "proper" bodyshop repair is absolutely fine and if I was in your brother's shoes I would be very happy to get away with it so cheaply.

 

[Cyber-Mav]

If it was me I would want the whole bumper resprayed. The mobile outfits cant normally do as good a job.

depends on what sort of car was hit. if its an old banger with half the panels already dented/scuffed no way would i offer more than a cheapo repair. and if its a expensive car then id say go insurance route to be safe with no chance of come back or scams.

 

[ATiRubyfan]

Basically this. Whenever I've had any work done on my car I've always gone to the same place. I've moved away now and it's about 1.5 hours drive away but I'd still go back there to get work done. I've tried other places and always had an issue but never with this place.



You can check it at the roadside with AskMID.

ASKMID says the vehicle is insured.

Seems to me your issue was that they were from Eastern Europe. If they had both been from England and spoke English in front of you would you even looked up the company details of the bodyshop.

Not my fault them lot nick our cars and catalytic converters.
If the guy went to a Chinese body shop, I wouldn't have raised my eyebrows. The very fact that both the driver and the bodyshop owner were from the same country as they spoke the same language in front of me after I suggested coming down to £250 can be seen as suspicious. Who knows what they said.

Op hit another car. Op drove off. Op didn't want the insurance involved.

Enter stage left, old boys claiming the Eastern Europeans won't be insured and the car is on fake plates.

Please enlighten me on the context.

I didn't. Please re-read my post. The driver suggested going through a body repair shop rather than through insurance.

 

[ATiRubyfan]

Thank you all for your inputs. Let's put this to bed for now.

For future reference, if this happens to anyone , what are the steps that one should take ?

 

[grudas]

"them lot nick our cars" lol. Get out of your box. There are criminals from every country and part of the world.

 

[tom_e]

Not my fault them lot nick our cars and catalytic converters.
If the guy went to a Chinese body shop, I wouldn't have raised my eyebrows. The very fact that both the driver and the bodyshop owner were from the same country as they spoke the same language in front of me after I suggested coming down to £250 can be seen as suspicious. Who knows what they said.

Behave.
I could go and speak French to someone, doesn't make me French or going to rip you off.

 

[Gaygle]

Not my fault them lot nick our cars and catalytic converters.
If the guy went to a Chinese body shop, I wouldn't have raised my eyebrows. The very fact that both the driver and the bodyshop owner were from the same country as they spoke the same language in front of me after I suggested coming down to £250 can be seen as suspicious. Who knows what they said

Yeh... you've shown your true colours there. I kinda hope they did rip you off now.

 

[Haggisman]

Thank you all for your inputs. Let's put this to bed for now.

For future reference, if this happens to anyone , what are the steps that one should take ?

The strictly legal steps:

• Exchange insurance details
• Inform your insurance
• Wait for the other driver to claim from your insurance
• Let your insurance pay hugely inflated claim to bodyshop
• Both pay increased premiums for the next 5 years

The sensible steps which most people would take:

• Apologise profusely and offer to pay for the repairs yourself
• Hope the other driver accepts
• Let the other driver get some quotes from their preferred bodyshop(s)
• If the quote seems acceptable/affordable
  • Pay for said quote
  • Don't say anything to your insurance
  • Move on with your life
• If the quote is too expensive for you
  • See legal steps above
• Don't be a racist ****

 

[dlockers]

The strictly legal steps:

• Exchange insurance details
• Inform your insurance
• Wait for the other driver to claim from your insurance
• Let your insurance pay hugely inflated claim to bodyshop
• Both pay increased premiums for the next 5 years

The sensible steps which most people would take:

• Apologise profusely and offer to pay for the repairs yourself
• Hope the other driver accepts
• Let the other driver get some quotes from their preferred bodyshop(s)
• If the quote seems acceptable/affordable
  • Pay for said quote
  • Don't say anything to your insurance
  • Move on with your life
• If the quote is too expensive for you
  • See legal steps above
• Don't be a racist ****

This happened to me along time ago, and I even topped up the chap by about £50 to sweeten the deal and thank him.

Oh, also leaving the scene and hoping you'd get away with it until your brother challenges you and you get caught is not on the list.

 

[Haggisman]

This happened to me along time ago, and I even topped up the chap by about £50 to sweeten the deal and thank him.

Oh, also leaving the scene and hoping you'd get away with it until your brother challenges you and you get caught is not on the list.

Especially if you're dumb enough to leave your car parked next to the one you've hit and expect the owner not to see the damage on both cars and put 2 and 2 together

 

[tom_e]

As an aside, in my experience at least the odd claim/points don't actually make a massive difference to your insurance.

I've had to add 6 points and an at fault claim to my insurance on this years car renewal and my premium was still less than the year before. I'm a "relatively" new driver, had my car licence just under 3 years and my bike licence just under 6.

 

[Agent_Smith357]

Should have reverse parked.

 

[ATiRubyfan]

The strictly legal steps:

• Exchange insurance details
• Inform your insurance
• Wait for the other driver to claim from your insurance
• Let your insurance pay hugely inflated claim to bodyshop
• Both pay increased premiums for the next 5 years

The sensible steps which most people would take:

• Apologise profusely and offer to pay for the repairs yourself
• Hope the other driver accepts
• Let the other driver get some quotes from their preferred bodyshop(s)
• If the quote seems acceptable/affordable
  • Pay for said quote
  • Don't say anything to your insurance
  • Move on with your life
• If the quote is too expensive for you
  • See legal steps above
• Don't be a racist ****

Thank you.

Few years ago, I was sitting at lights and this car parks behind me in the queue. He then decides to ram into me. Initially, he wanted me to go with him to a quieter side street. I refused and asked him for his insurance details. He said he didn't have insurance and I called the Old Bill. The 999 operator told him to give his name and address to me and for me to do the same. He kept saying he would give me £300 quid to repair my cracked bumper but was more in a rush to run away as he went back to his car and was trying to drive off. He gave me a name and address and I gave mine. Turned out, his address was wrong and that same night, he or one of his mates came round to my house and scratched my front bumper badly.
Called my insurance and he lied saying he hadn't hit me. I sent my Dashcam footage and insurance came and picked up my car for repair. But, they only repaired the rear bumper as I had no proof of who damaged my front bumper.

I'll let you guess where he was from as well. Unless one is on the receiving end, it's so easy to take the moral high ground.

 

[ATiRubyfan]

Should have reverse parked.

Nothing would have been left of the car then! My brother's parking is worse than mine.

 

[tom_e]

Deleted.

 

[Haggisman]

Thank you.

Few years ago, I was sitting at lights and this car parks behind me in the queue. He then decides to ram into me. Initially, he wanted me to go with him to a quieter side street. I refused and asked him for his insurance details. He said he didn't have insurance and I called the Old Bill. The 999 operator told him to give his name and address to me and for me to do the same. He kept saying he would give me £300 quid to repair my cracked bumper but was more in a rush to run away as he went back to his car and was trying to drive off. He gave me a name and address and I gave mine. Turned out, his address was wrong and that same night, he or one of his mates came round to my house and scratched my front bumper badly.
Called my insurance and he lied saying he hadn't hit me. I sent my Dashcam footage and insurance came and picked up my car for repair. But, they only repaired the rear bumper as I had no proof of who damaged my front bumper.

I'll let you guess where he was from as well. Unless one is on the receiving end, it's so easy to take the moral high ground.

Not sure why you crossed out the most important point? Nothing to do with taking the moral high ground, and all to do with having the intelligence to realise that just because you've had negative encounters with one or 2 people who happen to be of a certain group that you aren't part of, doesn't mean everyone in that particular group also behaves in the same way.

The fact you've felt it necessary to bring up another negative encounter with someone from "guess where" in order to justify your stance makes it really obvious where your true colours lie.

 

[Lopéz]

Not my fault them lot nick our cars and catalytic converters.

I'll let you guess where he was from as well. Unless one is on the receiving end, it's so easy to take the moral high ground.

<Insert "I'm not a xenophobe or anything but...." here>

 

[ATiRubyfan]

Not sure why you crossed out the most important point? Nothing to do with taking the moral high ground, and all to do with having the intelligence to realise that just because you've had negative encounters with one or 2 people who happen to be of a certain group that you aren't part of, doesn't mean everyone in that particular group also behaves in the same way.

The fact you've felt it necessary to bring up another negative encounter with someone from "guess where" in order to justify your stance makes it really obvious where your true colours lie.

No, it was not the most important bit but in fact the least important bit.
I agree with you on one thing though. One or two bad apples don't make the whole basket bad. But, it teaches you to be wary.

 

[ATiRubyfan]

<Insert "I'm not a xenophobe or anything but...." here>

Let's play along.
My brother hit the car because the driver was from < ___ >

 

[Mark1989]

Seems fair to me, similar situation few years ago Mrs scraped side of a BMW luckily only did paint damage, cost us £250 as we settled it privately, she got a few quotes which was nice of her considering wasn't her fault

All we did was said we would pay the garage that did the respray directly instead of giving her the money. Got invoice and she got a copy all sorted.