Who is responsible for covering the cost of this? Car damage related.

[KitKat1985]

I drove DH this evening to pick his car up from the garage where it had been in for the past week for repairs. The garage is a warehouse in a line of warehouses and there is a shared car park area in the front of the warehouses. When DH went to pick up his car the car had been parked in the car park in the shared car park area in front of the garage. However when we went to pick it up it had obviously been hit by someone in the car park and the bumper had been dislodged, and they had driven off without leaving their details. The garage are keeping the car to do the repairs and said they will review their CCTV to see if they can see who hit DH's car, are obviously the ideal scenario is that they can identify who hit DH's car and get them to cover the repair costs. However in the (probably likely) event they don't find out who hit it, who covers the cost? We could argue the car was in their care and therefore they should cover the cost of any damage, but I'm guessing they could counter-argue that the damage wasn't caused by them and therefore they are aren't liable for the damage. Thoughts?

www.gov.uk/compensation-victim-uninsured-driver

This is for hit and runs too

Thank you for that link BananaFace.

I’d say the garage is responsible. DM actually had her car stolen from the garage while it was in for repairs. The garage claimed on their insurance as it was in their care at the time of the theft.

Thank you Watto. That's reassuring to know. x

The garage should have a Motor Trade policy that will cover vehicles in their ‘ care custody and control .’ They can claim off that if the other driver can’t be found.

my dad had a very similar issue and garage didn't want to pay. Dad took the garage to the small claims court. The garage actually argued the damage was already there and they hadn't caused it so not their responsibility. Judge ruled 50/50.

How can the garage prove they didn't do it while driving it about?

Small claims court could be a good option.

I had one car broken into and damaged in a garage car Park after being repaired. THEY parked it there so I made them pay. Was an awful amount of hassle but I work in insurance and refused to claim off my own as ‘cars left at customers own risk’ didn’t fuckin well apply if they parked it there.

Just last year, my car was in a Volvo main dealers being serviced. Somone in a hire car reversed in to it 🙄
THEY voluntarily leapt to do it from their insurance and sorted it out, they then presumably claimed on his
So I agree. THEIR insurance should pay

Garages should have motor trade insurance but whether they can claim or not largely depends on the circumstances. What was the time scale between them notifying you the car was ready and you actually picking it up? Most garages would be willing to claim on their insurance but the decision ultimately isn't up to them.

However, you might have the argument that they didn't park the vehicle in their premises and therefore have left it somewhere without your permission.

Don't just jump to small claims as the pp suggested, try and work it out with them first.

Okay, general consensus seems to be they should pay, if person who hit the car can't be found. Will see what the garage say tomorrow when DH speaks to them, although they are not disputing that the damage occurred in the car park whilst in their care. The thing is I'm not sure if the car park spaces outside the garage are part of the garage property, or if it is technically a public car park for all the warehouses, which I guess might make a difference as they could argue if the latter that damage caused in a public car park isn't their responsibility. I'm hoping they will just cover the costs without any argument but I know that there's a chance they might argue this, so just wanted to gleam what the general consensus here was.

What was the time scale between them notifying you the car was ready and you actually picking it up?

One day. It was fixed yesterday but we had no way of picking it up yesterday (it's not a garage particularly local to where we live / work, but was the nearest approved repair centre to where DH was when he broke down and was towed there by the RAC).