insurance claim following car demolishing wall

[Purosangue]

Any advice appreciated ,

We have a neighbour , who has a bespoke stone wall , with fence , am elderly driver in an automatic , selected the wrong gear and shot forward , driving through the wall and demolishing 7m of it , ( length 21m x 1m height , with 1m feather edge fence above )

Their insurance company have accepted responsibility , I helped get the quotes , due to the bespoke stonework the entire wall will need to be rebuild using the new stone , there's a lead time of 7 weeks to order the stone , then it will take a local VAT registered building firm 5 days to rebuild the wall and fence ,
materials are over 9k after labour and VAT your looking at 13k

now the insurance assessor who has changed twice seems to be stalling , No other builder has quoted because its not a normal over the counter repair you cant walk into Jewson and pick up a set of bricks

its been over 9 weeks this is a vulnerable neighbour , is there a regulatory body who can step in and speed the process ? or force the insurance to get the original quote accepted

thanks

[KungFuPanda]

Unfortunately, there is no contractual relationship between your neighbour and the third party driver/their insurers. What you’re relying on is negligence/tort law. Therefore you can’t really report the insurer to any governing body for failure to act in a swift manner.

All I could suggest is to either rely on your neighbours own home insurer if they have one to undertake the works and then they reclaim their outlay from the at fault driver.

Alternatively, threaten to issue proceedings against the third party to jolt them into action.

[oyster]

I’m doubtful a car hitting a wall requires all 21 metres of it to be replaced.

As we all pay for insurance, I hope they’re stalling whilst they assess the massive vost to repair.

[Jim1556]

A few years ago near me, an elderly gent shot out of a junction, crossed the road, jumped the kerb, flattened a 2ft high wall and ploughed into the brick porch of a house (how is beyond me, but we think it might have been a medical event).

That took over a year to get rebuilt.

Insurance is many things, but fast isn't usually one of them...

[Sebring440]

oyster said:

As we all pay for insurance, I hope they’re stalling whilst they assess the massive vost to repair.

Massive cost to repair???

Did you read the original post?

[alscar]

“ Everything “ seems to take a long time to get done these days.
As you aren’t their customer and presumably don’t have any LPA or anything similar for your neighbour that also won’t help.
The Insurer hasn’t as yet nothing anything wrong so before you could even think about complaining to the Ombudsman you would also have to have tried and failed with the Insurers complaints dept.
Personally if it were me I would draft the email on behalf of the neighbour and get him to actually send it.
You could mention the time scale , his vulnerability the stress etc.

[pavarotti1980]

oyster said:

I’m doubtful a car hitting a wall requires all 21 metres of it to be replaced.

As we all pay for insurance, I hope they’re stalling whilst they assess the massive vost to repair.

Why are you doubtful?

[sunbeam alpine]

pavarotti1980 said:

oyster said:

I’m doubtful a car hitting a wall requires all 21 metres of it to be replaced.

As we all pay for insurance, I hope they’re stalling whilst they assess the massive vost to repair.

Why are you doubtful?

Because only 7 metres was demolished. I'm in exactly the same position - except that the driver was drunk, not old/confused. In our case about half of a brick wall was demolished - about 10m. The wall dates from between the wars and the bricks (colour and size) are no longer available anywhere.

The drunk drivers insurance are prepared to pay for the rebuilding of the bit he broke - which will leave me with a strange-looking wall - but aren't prepared to pay for the whole wall to be replaced. Accident happened last September, probably heading to court (fortunately I have legal cover via our house insurance).

[pavarotti1980]

sunbeam alpine said:

Because only 7 metres was demolished. I'm in exactly the same position - except that the driver was drunk, not old/confused. In our case about half of a brick wall was demolished - about 10m. The wall dates from between the wars and the bricks (colour and size) are no longer available anywhere.

The drunk drivers insurance are prepared to pay for the rebuilding of the bit he broke - which will leave me with a strange-looking wall - but aren't prepared to pay for the whole wall to be replaced. Accident happened last September, probably heading to court (fortunately I have legal cover via our house insurance).

Just because 7m is demolished doesn't mean building 7 metres would put the person back in a position they were prior to the accident. An insurance company will always look to mitigate costs by paying for as little as possible

[Puddenchucker]

To give you some idea of what it can cost to repair an unusual / old wall, a 'crinkle-crankle' wall was recently repaired in North Norfolk.
The original estimate was £120k. The final bill was £224k

https://www.edp24.co.uk/news/24137006.fakenham-cri...

[Purosangue]

sunbeam alpine said:

pavarotti1980 said:

oyster said:

I’m doubtful a car hitting a wall requires all 21 metres of it to be replaced.

As we all pay for insurance, I hope they’re stalling whilst they assess the massive vost to repair.

Why are you doubtful?

Because only 7 metres was demolished. I'm in exactly the same position - except that the driver was drunk, not old/confused. In our case about half of a brick wall was demolished - about 10m. The wall dates from between the wars and the bricks (colour and size) are no longer available anywhere.

The drunk drivers insurance are prepared to pay for the rebuilding of the bit he broke - which will leave me with a strange-looking wall - but aren't prepared to pay for the whole wall to be replaced. Accident happened last September, probably heading to court (fortunately I have legal cover via our house insurance).

It does indeed need replacing in its entirety remember the home owner is the innocent party here and rightly wants it putting back as it was before or if not like for like , this is not some cheap brick job you can pick up from Jewsons ...aka property near sandbanks !

two builders turned up and didn't even bother to issue a quote , I know one of them so asked over a pint , They said it was too much trouble bothering with insurance jobs ,and the stone was not something they would tackle . The third building company have been brilliant , they barriered off the area , and tidied up the site as best they could . you couldn't patch repair this there are 5 stone pillars , 3 have been destroyed in the crash , so yes putting it back will require a full rebuild .

the crash happened on early May , bloody car was left in the neighbours garden for 5 days before recovery .

I was going to write a strongly worded letter to the assessor on behalf of the home owner ( sent by home owner ) explaining the lead time after authorisation is 5 weeks and expediently authorise the company within x number of days otherwise proceedings will be taken against the driver.

[alscar]

Purosangue said:

It does indeed need replacing in its entirety remember the home owner is the innocent party here and rightly wants it putting back as it was before or if not like for like , this is not some cheap brick job you can pick up from Jewsons ...aka property near sandbanks !

two builders turned up and didn't even bother to issue a quote , I know one of them so asked over a pint , They said it was too much trouble bothering with insurance jobs ,and the stone was not something they would tackle . The third building company have been brilliant , they barriered off the area , and tidied up the site as best they could . you couldn't patch repair this there are 5 stone pillars , 3 have been destroyed in the crash , so yes putting it back will require a full rebuild .

the crash happened on early May , bloody car was left in the neighbours garden for 5 days before recovery .

I was going to write a strongly worded letter to the assessor on behalf of the home owner ( sent by home owner ) explaining the lead time after authorisation is 5 weeks and expediently authorise the company within x number of days otherwise proceedings will be taken against the driver.

The problem is the assessor works for / on behalf of the Insurer not your neighbour.
Threatening proceedings against the driver I doubt will influence either the Assessor or the Insurer as they aren’t disputing liability on behalf of the driver “ merely “ the quantum of said loss and are already acting for the driver in settling the claim.
As per my previous reply sending something to the Insurer can be as strong as you like but obviously you need to remain polite and factual.
I would suggest dropping the threat of proceedings and concentrate instead on the time taken , the vulnerability and resultant stress for your neighbour plus mention of treating customers fairly ( TCF ).
If you really want then turn up the heat by simultaneously forwarding your note to their CEO and very nicely ask him to get involved.
I still don’t think the time scale involved is particularly outrageous though and caveat my suggestions with that thought.
Best of luck in getting this resolved.

[Purosangue]

alscar said:

Purosangue said:

It does indeed need replacing in its entirety remember the home owner is the innocent party here and rightly wants it putting back as it was before or if not like for like , this is not some cheap brick job you can pick up from Jewsons ...aka property near sandbanks !

two builders turned up and didn't even bother to issue a quote , I know one of them so asked over a pint , They said it was too much trouble bothering with insurance jobs ,and the stone was not something they would tackle . The third building company have been brilliant , they barriered off the area , and tidied up the site as best they could . you couldn't patch repair this there are 5 stone pillars , 3 have been destroyed in the crash , so yes putting it back will require a full rebuild .

the crash happened on early May , bloody car was left in the neighbours garden for 5 days before recovery .

I was going to write a strongly worded letter to the assessor on behalf of the home owner ( sent by home owner ) explaining the lead time after authorisation is 5 weeks and expediently authorise the company within x number of days otherwise proceedings will be taken against the driver.

The problem is the assessor works for / on behalf of the Insurer not your neighbour.
Threatening proceedings against the driver I doubt will influence either the Assessor or the Insurer as they aren’t disputing liability on behalf of the driver “ merely “ the quantum of said loss and are already acting for the driver in settling the claim.
As per my previous reply sending something to the Insurer can be as strong as you like but obviously you need to remain polite and factual.
I would suggest dropping the threat of proceedings and concentrate instead on the time taken , the vulnerability and resultant stress for your neighbour plus mention of treating customers fairly ( TCF ).
If you really want then turn up the heat by simultaneously forwarding your note to their CEO and very nicely ask him to get involved.
I still don’t think the time scale involved is particularly outrageous though and caveat my suggestions with that thought.
Best of luck in getting this resolved.

thanks some good advice , causing a lot of stress for the old girl , she's already had a few unwanted characters accessing her garden . interestingly this is the second assessor , so not sure what happened with first one ?

[BertBert]

alscar said:

The problem is the assessor works for / on behalf of the Insurer not your neighbour.
Threatening proceedings against the driver I doubt will influence either the Assessor or the Insurer as they aren’t disputing liability on behalf of the driver “ merely “ the quantum of said loss and are already acting for the driver in settling the claim.
As per my previous reply sending something to the Insurer can be as strong as you like but obviously you need to remain polite and factual.
I would suggest dropping the threat of proceedings and concentrate instead on the time taken , the vulnerability and resultant stress for your neighbour plus mention of treating customers fairly ( TCF ).
If you really want then turn up the heat by simultaneously forwarding your note to their CEO and very nicely ask him to get involved.
I still don’t think the time scale involved is particularly outrageous though and caveat my suggestions with that thought.
Best of luck in getting this resolved.

Not the customer

[TwigtheWonderkid]

KungFuPanda said:

Unfortunately, there is no contractual relationship between your neighbour and the third party driver/their insurers.

Indeed, but the neighbour has a contract with their own house buildings insurer. And that would give impact cover. The neighbour should claim off her own buildings policy, get the job done, and then let her insurers fight it out with the tp motor insurer for recovery of their outlay.

Everyone is obsessed these days with claiming directly off the tp. Often it can work well, but you are buying a dog and barking yourself.

[alscar]

BertBert said:

Not the customer

Indeed but the poster is writing on behalf of the neighbour who is.

[LF5335]

alscar said:

BertBert said:

Not the customer

Indeed but the poster is writing on behalf of the neighbour who is.

No they're not. They are the third party whose wall was damaged by the insurance companies customer (the car driver).

Oh and TCF has nothing at all to do with individual claims whether customer or third party.

[Forester1965]

TwigtheWonderkid said:

Indeed, but the neighbour has a contract with their own house buildings insurer. And that would give impact cover. The neighbour should claim off her own buildings policy, get the job done, and then let her insurers fight it out with the tp motor insurer for recovery of their outlay.

Everyone is obsessed these days with claiming directly off the tp. Often it can work well, but you are buying a dog and barking yourself.

Would you have to be a customer for the FOS to intervene (assuming insurer's complaints process is exhausted)? It'd be an odd position where insurers were willing to deal directly with non-customers and could treat them as badly as they like without threat of FOS action if they did.

[alscar]

LF5335 said:

No they're not. They are the third party whose wall was damaged by the insurance companies customer (the car driver).

Oh and TCF has nothing at all to do with individual claims whether customer or third party.

Yes you are obviously correct and my reply should have made that clear but who the assessor actually works for is the important bit ie writing to him direct was what I didn’t think was a good idea.

What does TCF have to do with if not individual claims and why can’t the OP mention it ?
I’ve used the expression a number of times ( not even just to do with insurance ) and it seems to get some attention ?!

[alscar]

alscar said:

BertBert said:

Not the customer

Indeed but the poster is writing on behalf of the neighbour who is.

Sorry Bert for my incorrect reply - see my later post.