DS17 has crashed his car, then cancelled his insurance help please !!

[iloveshetlandponies]

He only passed a few weeks ago and yesterday was driving home from school and he went into the back of the car in front of him. This was due to someone pulling out on the driver in front and my son braked hard but unfortunately did not stop in time and has bumped the back of the car in front

Luckily no one was hurt and the other driver was reasonable and exchanged numbers and agreed DS (aka me!) would pay for the damage rather than going through insurance . The other chap is going to get a quote for the damage and contact us today to sort

However in his panic my son decided he doesn't want to drive for a while and so went onto his car insurance app and cancelled his own policy 🤦‍♀️ (he has pay as u go with Veygo and it's still insured because I've got my own insurance on the car which you have to have when insured with Veygo)

But now I'm panicking in case the damage is not affordable / the car is a write off and the chap has no choice to go through his insurance. My son now isn't insured - although he was at the time of the accident - so what will happen ?? And it's not like we can just reinstate the insurance as he's now had an accident, Altho not reported

It sounds daft but in all my years driving I've never had an accident and never had to claim so I'm not even sure how it all works !!

Well, he’s paying to be able to drive legally. Thankfully car insurance is not optional.

And don’t call your insurers. I’ve found to my significant annoyance and financial detriment that when I rang my insurers last year for advice/options when someone scrapped and scarpered that my contact with them has appeared on “the database” and shows as a claim when I seek new insurance. Despite me deciding to not make a claim.

I suspect I’ll be progressing things to the ombudsman, but I feel a right eejit for making that call.

Yes this is what we want to avoid

I'm sorry this happened to you it's not fair

They want everyone to report stuff no matter how minor or if it's zero cost to the insurer . It's to have an excuse to price gouge even more when they already charge the earth

So I've no shame in neither party reporting if we don't have to . Fingers crossed

Insurance for my just turned 18 year old was just over £1000 for the year. Its not a given that it will be thousands. Depends on car driven, others on policy, where car kept overnight, and postcode among many other things. Most if his friends drive sensible low cc cars and I think the most any of them have paid was around £1750 for the year.

My warning came because I know someone who was pulled over by the police for driving an uninsured vehicle. Turned out that a very minor prang she’d had (and no damage to her car) had been reported to her insurers and as she hadn’t notified them, they cancelled her insurance immediately. So while I totally agree that they are all gouging bastards, unfortunately if you don’t report you are risking this.

Had the same issue with my DH. Minor bump no claim made. he told the insurance but we subsequently forgot about it. When i came to my insurance renewal and was asked about any accidents or claims i didn't put it down and not only did they then call me and charge me quite a bit extra for it but i also got a fine for NOT putting it on my renewal request. Same company so they were perfectly aware of it.

Well said, pity there weren't more posters like you. Too many just sitting waiting on the next thread so they can put the boot it.
Must be nice for them with their perfect never put a foot wrong lives.

Exactly what I'm thinking

Your always in the wrong if you go into the back of someone. You should be far enough back to stop.

Surely it's none of your business how the OP chooses to run her family finances. It is entirely up to her if she wants to pay it for her son and nothing to do with her question.

But her son wasn't within a safe stopping distance.

You are supposed to be prepared for the unexpected in that sort of instance

Tell him not to be such an idiot in the future.

If he pays his own insurance and has decided to no longer drive then fine but if he wants to drive, just start it up again and don’t mention the accident. He had a little bump from driving too close and not having the space to brake. It’s stupid but he’s a new driver and will now learn to leave space.

@Toomuch44

If the car had pulled out in front of her son’s car and he went into them, then it would be the other cars fault. But the son went into the back of the car in front because someone pulled out in front of that car. That only happens if you haven’t left enough distance between cars to brake, so that’s his fault no matter who caused the initial incident. He wouldn’t have hit anyone if he had left space.

Thing is, if you contact the insurance company to ask them about whether he’s covered for the accident that happened before he cancelled, you are alerting them to the fact that there was an accident, which might affect future premiums.
So I’d do nothing until you hear from the other party, and see how much the bill actually is.
Also question your son to see if there are mitigating factors that would mean that you can negotiate to pay a reduced percentage of the bill.

Sorry, OP, what a PITA for you. I just hope he wasn’t looking at his phone - that’s what happened when a young boy hit the back of dh’s car - in crawling traffic. For some reason the police were nearby, checked his phone, and bingo.
Poor boy burst into tears, he was driving his mum’s car….

That's all very nice of you OP, but your son needs to pay to make this go away, not you, the accident was his fault as he was obviously following too close or not paying attention, and while cancelling his insurance was a silly mistake, he needs to get his head around the fact that his actions have consequences and he has a responsibility as to what needs to be done after an event like this. He at the very least shouldn't have done anything until he'd spoken to you, cancelling his insurance as a first step is just mind boggling, and the previous poster while harsh, was not wrong that he doesn't seem mature enough to be out on the roads.

Hopefully lesson learned, but I wouldn't be bailing him out of this one unless it was in the way of a loan.

This is not strictly true. If they stopped for no reason they can be at fault

Whoops! Lesson learnt..

how did he cancel? If he did it online I was be inclined to call and play dumb and say you clicked eh wrong button by mistake and to immediately reinstate the insurance😅

You need to be very careful going outside of insurance here op.

Its all well and good you saying I'm not going to report etc etc.

But there's nothing stopping this guy reporting it to his insurance a couple of months down the line if he fancies a payout for whiplash.

Also you think the cars only worth 1k doesn't mean that it won't cost close too or more than that to fix at the body shop.

I've just had a look at Veygo because of this post as my nephew is 17 and learning to drive, but it says this on the website, that it monitors your phone:

The app is designed to monitor your speed, hard braking and any interactions with your phone while driving.

Is this why he may have panicked and cancelled it?

Yeah… most people don’t do that though. There is a risk that he might, but most people just don’t. And he has already called the OP and even told her that his car is worth less than a grand anyway. He doesn’t sound like he’ll do anything like that.

Jesus. This is why we need to teach kids actual life skills in school. Financial planning, tax, pensions, insurance, to name but a few. What a stupid thing he’s done. 🤦🏼‍♀️

What if you’re just on the bus?? Or a passenger in another car? How does it know when to start paying attention to movement.
Doesn’t sound like it could be all that accurate anyway.

From the sounds of it, if an accident gets reported, they can check what was happening on the app at that time, it's obviously the equivalent of a black box without having a black box installed.

It could explain why he panicked and cancelled/deleted it. This is the full blurb:

Once you’ve downloaded the telematics app, it’s important that you keep it installed and activated on your phone.

The app is designed to monitor your speed, hard braking and any interactions with your phone while driving. Essentially, the safer you are on the road, the lower your price will be.

The app also collects data which shows us how often and where you drive and where you park. We can then use this data to verify your information and help us investigate claims.

Should you have an accident, we may also use the driving data to ensure your vehicle was being driven in accordance with your policy terms and conditions.
^^
Following the activation of your app and throughout your policy, you agree to keep the telematics app activated and installed on your mobile phone. If your telematics app is inactive for 30 days, your telematics policy is at risk of being cancelled.

Please don't try to negotiate to pay a reduced bill if the other driver is being reasonable and is prepared to not involve insurance companies as you have requested. This happened to my Dad, a young driver ran into the back of him at some temporary traffic lights. The lad's dad arrived on the scene, looked at the damage, had a go at his son for being careless and then begged my dad not to go through his insurance promising he would pay for any damage. My dad trusted him but when he got quotes for the repairs the guy backtracked on his promise and started to say that it wasn't actually all his son's fault blah blah blah. Luckily, the accident happened right outside the local policeman's house and his wife had witnessed everything. It sounds like this other driver is being reasonable but if you start to try and negotiate and bring up mitigating circumstances, he might just think "sod it, I'll go through my insurance".