Should I claim on my car insurance or pay for the damage myself?

[Mavan1984]

Hi

Yesterday whilst I was getting my car out of a tight spot, I scraped the side of it along a wall. This left a huge scratch and dent on my passenger side door.

I went to a few body work garages today and was quoted about £700 to repair the damage. I'm absolutely gutted as thats way more than what I thought it would be.

I've spoken to my insurance company and they said that I can claim against my insurance. We only have the one car, my husband is the policy holder and I'm a named driver. We have 15 years protected bonus.

They've asked us to take the car to an approved garage to get a quote and then we can decide if we want to proceed or not.

Our excess is £250 so I know we will lose that but will my premium for next year increase by a lot? What will happen to our no claims bonus?

In short, am I better off just paying the £700 and getting it repaired myself or should I go through insurance?

Any advice will be much appreciated. We have luckily never had to claim before so we have no idea about how to go about it.

Thanks.

I'd personally take the hit yourself. Your premiums will sky rocket. But honestly if it's not affecting the driving off the car, no rush in doing it

anything under 1k ish I’d try and take the hit myself
and don’t beat yourself up about it-
these things can and do happen

You may as well go through the insurance. Now you have told them what you've done you will be considered a higher risk and they will put your premiums up at next renewal anyway, even if you don't claim.
Ask me how I know😀

Thanks for the replies everyone.

In the long run will the cost of premiums end up being a lot more than £700 if I do claim? If that's the case I may just have to take the hit.

I'm gutted with it being so close to Xmas as well....

It’s going to go up anyway now you’ve notified them of it. They record every bit of contact and will use it to bump up prices, unfortunately. So I wouldn’t worry about that.

I would claim it through them, if I were you. It won’t make any difference to increases since you’ve told them already about it, no matter whether you claim or not - they know. We had to claim last year and our policy went up by £250 for the year. If yours does that then it’s cost you, £250 excess and £250 increase. 500 is less than 700 overall.

Now you’ve told them you will have to declare it at renewal anyway for the next 5 years. Your premiums will increase either way so get it sorted through insurance now.

I agree, you've told them now so you may as well not pay out more than the excess in the short term and maybe start saving towards next year's premium

If you have protected no claims then you won't lose your bonus but bear in mind that the premium will probably still go up, and your no claims may only be protected if you renew with the same company (check the T&C on your policy, this is a case where the small print is really important!).

Once you know what the situation is with your no claims, you could simulate a renewal quote online. It won't be exactly the same as whenever your term is up, but it should give you an idea.

You might be pleasantly surprised though. We had an accident, caused by a foreign lorry driver which took months to settle, and we were still considered "at fault" when our renewal quote came through, and it was only £100 more for the year.