Guys
Looking for advice! Was driving through town earlier tonight driving down a four lane one way street, left hand lane was stationary at red lights turning left filter lane, I was in second lane straight ahead filter light green, two remaining lanes to my o/s were turning right stationary at red.
As I proceed down my lane through the channel of stationary traffic on either side the passanger of a stationary ford fiesta in my right hand side lane of stationary traffic decides to open his door fully into my lane as I'm doing speed limit of around 30 burying his door into my o/s wing bringing the coupe to a halt there and then pretty much. The timing was perfect, instantaneous, as I came passed his rear quarter pannel I couldn't even really go for the brake before it had swung open and made contact with my indicator and we bang together. Traffic infront of him pulled away so I swung out and cut in across in front of him. As I go to get out he starts to reverse clumsily, looking rather annoyed, so I shouted something telling him not to bother (assuming he was about to try and do one) and he waved and said he was pulling in. Passanger who opened the door was looking dazed to the point of unconciousness, it must have been like an explosion in his face. He's very lucky he didn't lose his arm or head. I check on my passanger, she's ok but I think we're all a bit shocked.
Indicator ripped out entirely, wing crumpled down badly onto wheel arch which was depressing onto the tyre, front bumper clipped and distorted, little plastic bit under the headlight poking out, headlight amazingly unscathed as was the bonnet. Wheel and tyre ok, a small bit of scrubbing on tyre surface. Only thing on the fiesta was the door which was pretty mashed.
Seeing how drunk the dip**** passanger was - and also thinking he had come by some damage while seeing bottles of drink in the footwell - and that I also suspected the driver to be under the influence once he had popped out I said I was going to call the police due to the nature of what had happened and where it had; the city centre.
I call the police, he checks on his passanger. Finish the call and go over speak to driver again, he's quite apologetic and initially admitted fault, explains his passanger was drunk and shouldn't have opened the door when he did. Said it was alright, we both get passanger out of fiesta. I leave them and go to car for better look, call greenflag who won't come as I only have breakdown. Call insurance for recovery and get what seemed to be some out of hours cover company, phoned died before I could finish call. Back to their car, passanger's ok but holding his head a fair bit and talking drunken mince. Driver says he's covered, asking me what do I think will happen, I say that even though it's a rough deal I suspect that it will be his policy since it was the actions of his passanger. He is a bit down about this, and his car, and his mate, console him a bit and he is very sorry about my motor he says.
Mrs comes back with a hot chocolate, and the police arrive and take statements. Give an account of the above to the man, the woman pc deals with them. This takes a while, so in between times I've started to jack the car up and take the wheel off. He looks angry at points, I'm not sure if its at me because I got the police.
Get given incident number card, PC tells me other driver is insured and we can swap details but insurance can do it through them. Speak to guy again when he's finished his statement, back to nice again, we're all chatty and he's waiting on someone coming with his insurance documents. WPC finishes with passanger, who's now protesting his role in the matter somewhat, and do a breath test on me and the driver. We both blow nill. His friend appears around the time the police go, and driver and I swap insurance details names etc. Friend, and older guy more my age, starts to ask what has happened. I explain, and from the off he's giving it all 'well it's no his fault' etc. I'm just playing it easy. He can't get recovery, and I've not even tried to phone mine again with phone charging in car. Some cognative dissonance later on my behalf, and we all go over to fiesta which for some reason police had instructed driver to move to other side of the street (the first, left hand filter lane). His door is bashed pretty well, tell him to get rope which amazingly they had some, and tied it 'shut'. They leave and I go back to mine, luckily got cutters in the boot so go about cutting away the borked bits of liner away, find the disc heatshield has also snapped off at the top bolt, then set about wellying absolute lumps out of the inside of the wing with my boot as the metal I had on me was doing nothing. Eventually get lots of tyre clearance, and remove remains of indicator bulb that I found arching away inside the arch, wheel back on and back on the ground. Go to start it, two and a half hours after initial prang, and starter solenoid won't even click. Sit for half an hour for greenflag quite fed up now, quality guy arrives gives me a boost. Starts in a jiffy, sounds ok, his multimeter shows a varying 10~v charge. Give it fifteen minutes, while we're both having a look around the wing which is quite nice of the guy since it's in no way his remit, and we conclude that perhaps some loom has been clipped by the nasty kinks in the wing. Alternator still not producing enough charge, so I drive off, and get to my destination. There is a bit of steering play, but suprisingly ok other than that.
I'll add pictures shortly and I do apologise for the wall of text, but I would like to hear your opinion on the best way to approach this. Through my insurance in the first instance or theirs? I've never been in a claim accident before. Fully comp with a £200 excess. Car's an 02 e46 318Ci.
It's fixable by my hands, it's just not my fault! Tired, sore-ish foot and a sad looking car.
Looking for advice! Was driving through town earlier tonight driving down a four lane one way street, left hand lane was stationary at red lights turning left filter lane, I was in second lane straight ahead filter light green, two remaining lanes to my o/s were turning right stationary at red.
As I proceed down my lane through the channel of stationary traffic on either side the passanger of a stationary ford fiesta in my right hand side lane of stationary traffic decides to open his door fully into my lane as I'm doing speed limit of around 30 burying his door into my o/s wing bringing the coupe to a halt there and then pretty much. The timing was perfect, instantaneous, as I came passed his rear quarter pannel I couldn't even really go for the brake before it had swung open and made contact with my indicator and we bang together. Traffic infront of him pulled away so I swung out and cut in across in front of him. As I go to get out he starts to reverse clumsily, looking rather annoyed, so I shouted something telling him not to bother (assuming he was about to try and do one) and he waved and said he was pulling in. Passanger who opened the door was looking dazed to the point of unconciousness, it must have been like an explosion in his face. He's very lucky he didn't lose his arm or head. I check on my passanger, she's ok but I think we're all a bit shocked.
Indicator ripped out entirely, wing crumpled down badly onto wheel arch which was depressing onto the tyre, front bumper clipped and distorted, little plastic bit under the headlight poking out, headlight amazingly unscathed as was the bonnet. Wheel and tyre ok, a small bit of scrubbing on tyre surface. Only thing on the fiesta was the door which was pretty mashed.
Seeing how drunk the dip**** passanger was - and also thinking he had come by some damage while seeing bottles of drink in the footwell - and that I also suspected the driver to be under the influence once he had popped out I said I was going to call the police due to the nature of what had happened and where it had; the city centre.
I call the police, he checks on his passanger. Finish the call and go over speak to driver again, he's quite apologetic and initially admitted fault, explains his passanger was drunk and shouldn't have opened the door when he did. Said it was alright, we both get passanger out of fiesta. I leave them and go to car for better look, call greenflag who won't come as I only have breakdown. Call insurance for recovery and get what seemed to be some out of hours cover company, phoned died before I could finish call. Back to their car, passanger's ok but holding his head a fair bit and talking drunken mince. Driver says he's covered, asking me what do I think will happen, I say that even though it's a rough deal I suspect that it will be his policy since it was the actions of his passanger. He is a bit down about this, and his car, and his mate, console him a bit and he is very sorry about my motor he says.
Mrs comes back with a hot chocolate, and the police arrive and take statements. Give an account of the above to the man, the woman pc deals with them. This takes a while, so in between times I've started to jack the car up and take the wheel off. He looks angry at points, I'm not sure if its at me because I got the police.
Get given incident number card, PC tells me other driver is insured and we can swap details but insurance can do it through them. Speak to guy again when he's finished his statement, back to nice again, we're all chatty and he's waiting on someone coming with his insurance documents. WPC finishes with passanger, who's now protesting his role in the matter somewhat, and do a breath test on me and the driver. We both blow nill. His friend appears around the time the police go, and driver and I swap insurance details names etc. Friend, and older guy more my age, starts to ask what has happened. I explain, and from the off he's giving it all 'well it's no his fault' etc. I'm just playing it easy. He can't get recovery, and I've not even tried to phone mine again with phone charging in car. Some cognative dissonance later on my behalf, and we all go over to fiesta which for some reason police had instructed driver to move to other side of the street (the first, left hand filter lane). His door is bashed pretty well, tell him to get rope which amazingly they had some, and tied it 'shut'. They leave and I go back to mine, luckily got cutters in the boot so go about cutting away the borked bits of liner away, find the disc heatshield has also snapped off at the top bolt, then set about wellying absolute lumps out of the inside of the wing with my boot as the metal I had on me was doing nothing. Eventually get lots of tyre clearance, and remove remains of indicator bulb that I found arching away inside the arch, wheel back on and back on the ground. Go to start it, two and a half hours after initial prang, and starter solenoid won't even click. Sit for half an hour for greenflag quite fed up now, quality guy arrives gives me a boost. Starts in a jiffy, sounds ok, his multimeter shows a varying 10~v charge. Give it fifteen minutes, while we're both having a look around the wing which is quite nice of the guy since it's in no way his remit, and we conclude that perhaps some loom has been clipped by the nasty kinks in the wing. Alternator still not producing enough charge, so I drive off, and get to my destination. There is a bit of steering play, but suprisingly ok other than that.
I'll add pictures shortly and I do apologise for the wall of text, but I would like to hear your opinion on the best way to approach this. Through my insurance in the first instance or theirs? I've never been in a claim accident before. Fully comp with a £200 excess. Car's an 02 e46 318Ci.
It's fixable by my hands, it's just not my fault! Tired, sore-ish foot and a sad looking car.
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I'll phone them in the morning, I'm just suprised the police weren't interested in the guy drinking in the car. I thought that was an offense. 
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