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 !!

he is also under obligation to report this incident within 24 hours, if he doesn't it's unknown if a claim will even pay out at that stage, he'd have to be able to prove it had even happened and explain why it wasn't reported.

I would never encourage anyone else to not report to insurance, but depending on the circumstances and after having 2 horrific non fault vehicle claims that have dragged on for months and months, (18 months the first one) there is no way I would now report an incident out of 'duty' if it could be settled amicably without involving the insurance companies.

I understand fully.

OP won't be doing anything, this is her sons policy, anything that is delcared or not declared will be 100% on her son to decide what to do.

yes and given he has. nothing to lose by notifying of a no fault no claim incident… how can the op be sure he hasn’t contacted his insurer?

I don't want to add to your stress OP but I drove into the back of somebody else's car at a roundabout. Nobody hurt, there was no paint missing off either car, no scratches, just nothing.

We were conveniently very near a parking area so I suggested that we swap details there. The driver made an enormous fuss about getting out of the car, holding her neck. I immediately gave my details and asked for hers, including name of insurance company. She didn't want to give it, said that she'd 'see what her husband said'. I said that I was going through my insurance and took photos of both of our cars.

Point being, even if there is no apparent injury, if your son was unfortunate enough that the driver he hit has had a change of heart and wants to claim for 'injuries' then that's out of your control.

We all make mistakes, I folded in a parked car door doing a 34-point turn about a week or so after my test. I was devastated.

Whatever the outcome, it's manageable and not fatal.

Wretched pages on here... I've just seen your update, OP, that's good news!

He probably panicked. He's young and obviously didn't fully understand what he was doing, hence OP asking for guidance/helpful advice

it's not necessarily no fault from his point of view though, he slammed his brakes on to avoid another car which is when OPs son ran into him, normally OPs son would be classed 'at fault' but not necessarily in the eyes of the insurance tbh, they are bonkers at the best of times, in the very least solicitors would get involved and neither insurance company would want to admit liability or take responsibility for costs, that's why claims drag on so long.. they are an absolute nightmare to deal with.

She doesn't know for sure that he hasn't, but that's the chance you take and is their risk to take at the end of the day.

My DH had similar one, technically he pulled out on a car at a junction and it clipped his front end, BUT the guy was quite obviously speeding and surprisingly took full responsibility. They guy offered to pay so we kept it out of insurance but he backed out and never paid, the repair was £400 and at that point was still within 24 hours and DH could have reported it but decided not to bother, as even at £400 it would be more hassle than it's worth, especially when you factor excess in the equation.

I had someone bump me from behind at an island, tiny split on my bumper, I didn't even consider reporting it, but the insurance stipulates that you report ANY incident of any kind, but there seems to be sliding scale on when it is appropriate and when it's not.

yes but you said the day after
which i was clarifying that it was 2 hours after 🤷

i know someone who separated from their spouse, but the spouse was still on the car insurance a few months later as a named driver because with everything going on, it wasn’t a priority to take them off, intent was to update at renewal. The spouse wasn’t going to be driving the car, so my friend didn’t think it was a problem.

my friend was in an accident, not their fault and they notified their insurance and put in a claim. The insurance company investigated, promptly rejected the claim and cancelled the insurance. Apparently the spouse had got a speeding ticket after their separation but as my friend didn’t know about it they obviously hadn’t told the insurance company. The insurance company said that as my friend had not been honest with them it was fraud because you’re supposed to inform your insurance of any ticket for any named driver. No matter that the soon to be ex spouse was not driving, was not even in the car when the accident happened. Basically insurance companies do whatever they can to avoid paying out a claim, and by the letter of small print of the insurance policy they had the right to do that. The car was a write off too, so my friend was really screwed

And now of course, my friend struggles to get cheap insurance as they have to answer “yes” to the question of whether you have ever had an insurance policy cancelled by the insurer, and many of the well known companies won’t touch you. Has to go via brokers and get specialist policies for higher risk drivers.

tl;dr - always be open and honest with insurance companies because otherwise you might as well not bother with them.

a good post

which will be ignored by the op i suspect

So relieved 😮‍💨

Thank you x

She knows best remember!! Naivety and ignorance is bliss… until the insurance company finds out 🤡

OP, please do come back in a year or two when your son has had a policy voided and can’t get insured again unless he fancies paying the equivalent of a small mortgage for it

Good news it's all resolved. I wonder if it's worth your donation going the advanced driving course? It's normally a few lessons and would really help with confidence before he starts driving again?

Just an idea.

@Hopebridge

Yes we're thinking this. he'll be without a car for at least a few weeks, (as we're now selling his car to pay for the other cars damage) so I'm thinking of getting him the pass plus course before he next gets behind a wheel . He's 18 in a few months so that may be a good idea for an 18th birthday present

I said pages back that someone I know had their insurance cancelled on the spot when their insurers found out they had been in a minor prang and not told them. They almost got done for driving without insurance. Insurance companies are awful but they hold all the cards and you are always taking that risk by not declaring an incident, even if you don’t make a claim. Getting new coverage after that was really difficult and cost a fortune. People often don’t know how much of a pain it can all be.

Agree. In my friends case it wasn’t even a deliberate case of withholding information - but they were still penalised and it seems it will follow them around for life.

That's a good idea. :)

This is why 17 year olds shouldn't be allowed to learn to drive.
Raise the age to 21 I say

Which sounds like a good idea until you realise the state of public transport in the UK, and the fact that some teens live rurally

Probably won’t hesitate to drive uninsured 😔

Insurance companies are awful

why? for having a t&c
and when they discover it’s not been complied with
implementing the consequence of not adhering with that t&c, which was made clear as being the case in the contract

Well, no. They have been repeatedly criticised for their business practices by the FCA, wider consumer bodies, and Parliament. Better regulation has stamped out some of these over the years but issues remain. They can be really hard to deal with, and consumer experience with the claims process is often bad - the ombudsman has expressed concern at the level of complaints around this.

Exactly this.

This is how insurance companies view it.

Your son will be found blameworthy for the damage.

Is he able to get his insurance re-instated?

He was covered at the time of the accident, so no worries there.

yes they are repeatedly criticised and rightfully so

but with regard to adhering to a very clear t&c in this context… i don’t think it’s awful

Yawn - can't believe this thread is still boring on when the issue was resolved some time ago.