Car write off advice

Just been through the process with my daughter who really mucked it up to be honest. Damage reported, took it for assessment, told it was a write off. Offered amount and paid, company come out and take old one away, if you ask they will give you a scrap value and you can buy it back from them. Hers was written off at 3850 and they said 950 to buy back, to buy a replacement was in the region of 4500. In the end they called it a Cat S (we were hoping for C) so I decided not to buy back and run it.

It really wasn't that bad but daughter didn't properly interact with the insurance company so they decided what to pay and just paid it without giving us a chance to say it wasn't enough money.
 
I phoned Beam this morning. The car will be picked up next week and assessed and then I'll be offered the market value of the car, but I'm going to refuse the first offer as it'll obviously be too low. I asked when it's likely I'll be paid the settlement fee and she said a couple of weeks, maybe a bit longer with it being Winter. So hopefully I'll have cash to buy a new (to me) car soon.

Just trying to sort out a car temporarily. They did recommend a company call Ax that they use for hire cars but their trust pilot looks horrendous.

Does anyone know a decent car hire company with not extortionate fees?
 
smr said:
Ok I have found a similar one, for £5,300. They're all around the £5k price. So should I settle for nothing less than £5k? If I refuse their first offer and they come back with another offer less than £5k do I refuse again until they meet that price?
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Yes.
smr said:
I'm quite sure its a write off.

How long does it usually take to get a settlement? Weeks or months? I'm going to have to get a temporary car somehow. I have been told that the AA or Beam who I am with use a company called Ax who can provide a temporary car. Not sure how much that would be.
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Varies from insurer to insurer.
pastymuncher said:
Whats the damage to it?
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This, it would help to see the damage, if its minor, might be worth buying it back or let them deduct 10-20% of the settlement and DIY IT if you're not bothered about visual apperance that much.
 
smr said:
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The actual bonnet looks fine and the front of the car, all of the damage is in the photos above. But as I said, I'm guessing it's a write off.
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suppose it depends what it looks like behind the panels, what sort of impact caused damage to both side wings but not the front of the car? Assuming it's not wrecked or bent then that probably wouldn't be outrageous to fix locally but for authorised insurance body shops it will be a lot.
 
smr said:
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The actual bonnet looks fine and the front of the car, all of the damage is in the photos above. But as I said, I'm guessing it's a write off.
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I'd have a go at fixing that myself.

You can either try and eBay replacement panels or try just mash them back into place, use some panel filler etc, respray yourself.

Ok I could never do it to factory, but it's just cosmetic the car won't mind

You could fix that pretty cheap.

The expensive bit might be the headlight unit as you can't really fix that, depends how common the car is.
 
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smr said:
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The actual bonnet looks fine and the front of the car, all of the damage is in the photos above. But as I said, I'm guessing it's a write off.
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So it looks like both the wings are damaged, headlight and there might be potential damage to mounting points for both wings, suspension parts just looking at how both wings wrap up at wheel level. It could potentially be a write off, if its I would either try to repair it yourself or buy the car back and sell it on (I would be interested, if you do drop me a PM :p).
 
I got side swiped by a pick up truck so my front left got hit by that but most of the damage on the other side is where my car has hit another parked car.
 
dont know what engine may have missed it but bought the future son in law 63 plate focus 1.6d navigator about a month back ,just over 100k payed 2900. from a dealer.
if yours still holds water it could go again , without seeing the front but bumper ,2 wings ,headlight and some fettling , as said mainly second hand panels and strangley most of the 30 odd focus we looked at were same colour:)
looking at it again im not certain the bonnet may have just been taken over with the catch but repairable as salvage., insurance will write off with age and mileage.
 
smr said:
I got side swiped by a pick up truck so my front left got hit by that but most of the damage on the other side is where my car has hit another parked car.
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Insurance will have to get it back to how it came out of factory or rather as close to it, as they can using geniune parts. The damage assessors won't touch the car, they'll only inspect it visually and submit the report to the insurer. One of the reasons, why a lot of cars are gettnig worse CAT rating than the damage actually is, as there's always potential for hidden damage underneath that you can't see unless you start taking the car apart, if that makes sense? But than again, if you were tasked with a job to assess how safe it is for that car to go back on the road, you would play it safe and assume the worst too, right?

I would refuse for the insurer to take the car (speaking from experience) until they provided me with a satisfying quote, the might argue that car is a safety hazard so its good if you've a driveway to put it into in case that happens. CAT cars are always worth less on the market, as it is a bit of a gamble.
 
I wrote off my 2017 E Class last year - my own fault. Smashed the front right corner into another car - I reckon with the airbags, headlight, wing, bumper, possibly bonnet and anything else it was at least 10 grand in parts. I last saw it being driven away at 3am on a lorry, submitted the claim and 8am and by 9 am they’d registered it is being written off…

Admiral paid me out within a week at a very good value I thought, although to my surprise the car was re-MOT’d in October…
 
Penfold101 said:
I wrote off my 2017 E Class last year - my own fault. Smashed the front right corner into another car - I reckon with the airbags, headlight, wing, bumper, possibly bonnet and anything else it was at least 10 grand in parts. I last saw it being driven away at 3am on a lorry, submitted the claim and 8am and by 9 am they’d registered it is being written off…

Admiral paid me out within a week at a very good value I thought, although to my surprise the car was re-MOT’d in October…
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It was most likely auctioned off on copart
 
Wouldn't surprise me if it's written off but magically hasn't being graded as a write off by the insurance company. Seen a few like that recently. But looking very much like yours will be a write off.
 
Well surprisingly its a Cat N write off so no structural damage.

Ive been offered £5,300 settlement or

RETAINING

If you would like to purchase your vehicle back from The AA, a retaining fee of £1,150.36would be deducted from your settlement payment making the total amount payable £3,888.64.

just out of curiousity how much would the repairs cost, ballpark?
 
very hard to tell without seeing better pictures both from front and under bonnet. certainly you would get a good holiday , plus the car back within payout.
noticed you can even get repair brackets for the headlights now so if the bracket is broken but the glass ok its still a goer.
just need to check chassis legs are not bent, but doesnt look that bad.
other option is retain the car and bang it on ebay as salvage , plenty of folk would buy it repair and put it on facebook market probably within a couple of weeks.
 
I would keep the car + £3,888.64

Hard to guess repairs cost, with only that 2 pictures...
But fixing yourself, using used parts that don't need paint would be relatively cheap
 
If you can locate second hand panels the same colour then you'll save a fortune. Check the colour code for you vehicle so you get the exact colour. You;d be surprised how many different shades of the same colour there are. Have a look on eBay and gumtree for starters.

Here's a random headlight listing for example: https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/355200331516
 
smr said:
Well surprisingly its a Cat N write off so no structural damage.

Ive been offered £5,300 settlement or

RETAINING

If you would like to purchase your vehicle back from The AA, a retaining fee of £1,150.36would be deducted from your settlement payment making the total amount payable £3,888.64.

just out of curiousity how much would the repairs cost, ballpark?
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Depends on how handy you are and how fussy you are.

If you are handy and too fussy probably not that much.
 
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