Car written off, insurance offering too little to replace - anyone knowledgeable aronud?

[PacificState]

DP and I were in a collision a week ago -- thankfully everyone concerned was fine but our lovely car was written off.

The other party has admitted fault.

We're now at the stage of looking at the cost for replacing our car - and our insurer, Admiral, is offering around £2k below the price of the exact replacements we can find on AutoTrader. Even more confusingly, Admiral says (and has sent us the PDF to prove it) that the £2k-under price is one they've gotten from Admiral's 'market value' tool.

I just don't know where this number comes from -- it doesn't bear any relation to what we're seeing on AutoTrader.

Admiral is also saying there's 'no haggling' about the amount they're offering us, because 'the regulations have changed' and 'we don't do that any more'.

If anyone knows more about car insurance than I do I'd be really grateful for some insight - basically, is it worth pushing for more or do we just take it on the chin (and never go with Admiral again, obviously).

Thank you!

Thanks again for all the advice. Just one more question for those of you who know how this works: before I put the complaint in to Admiral, should I ask to negotiate directly with the other party's insurer? (I don't know who that other insurer is - it might well be Admiral!)

op you haven’t clarified why the other party has accepted full liability
but you are having to claim on your insurance policy?

Honestly, we're just doing what Admiral told us to do: we didn't know we had the option of anything else. Is that the next question we should be asking?

FWIW Admiral have told us the cost will be recouped in full from the other party's insurance.

Has Admiral shown you examples of the car at the price they're saying it can be replaced at? I know they use their own calculators for car value, but they're not infallible and they should be able to prove they've got their sums right.

No, they haven't (and I don't think they could because I don't think they exist!)

We had an accident that wasn't our fault and our car was written off. It was a 10 year old Ka, and this was some years ago so the sums involved were not large but I was incensed by the offer they initially made (£1000) and bargained them up to £1400 in the end. I just kept going back and politely saying that I didn't think this reflected the value of the car for x, y and z reasons (for us it was low mileage, recently serviced by authorised Ford garage and in perfect mechanical condition, excellent interior condition, etc etc). Eventually they caved.

And yes, we were dealing with our insurers, I think. I guess they just reclaim what is agreed from the other lot?

Thanks @TheRainItRaineth Glad you got yours sorted out. Why is it so difficult? 😩

Just keep on at them. You have to make it as difficult as you possibly can for them. Also worth insisting on doing it via email as then you have a paper trail of everything that has been said. They kept saying things like 'the wheel trims are missing' but I had photos of the car directly after the accident with all the wheel trims in place!

They should. I’d send them a couple of adverts you’ve found for cars for sale similar to the one they’ve written off and ask for that much. The ‘we don’t haggle’ line is nonsense.

It's very easy to say 'just keep on at them'.
If it's anything like my last dealings with Aviva, you need A LOT of time (and a truck load of patience) to pursue these things.

IF someone answers the phone (they're very busy don't ya know, but your call is valuable), you have to go through security, then get passed to a different department (another hold queue), go through security again. More hold.

Many of these companies don't even have email addresses any more - you might get some webform which disappears into the ether. Or you can't get anywhere w/o going through a fucking chat bot.

Mine claimed they didn't have email addresses but I was on holiday with very little phone reception so told them I had to do it by email and hey presto, they did have email after all. OP can always claim she is away from home with little access to her phone or something. Or in meetings all day or whatever.

Yeah it's infuriating @mongoliandoll I'm lucky in that I do have some spare time (and I'm quite stubborn), but it absolutely should not be the case that we have to do this stuff given than we've been flipping paying them (and not claiming) all this time!

when they told you they didn’t have your email address and you told them they would have to email you given poor reception … presumably you gave your email then, if they’d told you they didn’t have it? 😕 @TheRainItRaineth

what i don’t get is that you’re not claiming against admiral!

I think it was the insurance company who said they didn’t have an email address themselves, not that they didn’t have PPs email address.

yes

op says they must email her as no reception
so if she knew that they didn’t know her email, presumably she’d have told them then?

they “magically” began to email her. does that mean the poster decided not to tell them to test them?!

@thanksicloud They didn’t mention anything about her email address.

I am not sure what you’re asking.

The OP would have given them her email address when setting up the policy.

They didn’t say anything about not having her email address. They told her that THEY didn’t have an email address.

i wasn’t referring to the Op

maybe read the last few posts…

I meant to write PP, not OP. My mistake.

No need to be snippy, it remains the same - the poster you were referring to would have had to give an email address when she took out her policy. Her insurance company told her that they didn’t have email, when she told them she was away from home and couldn’t use her phone, they then magically did have an email address that she could contact them on.

Maybe read what she wrote….

I think you have misunderstood, @thanksicloud .

@Error404pagenotfound is correct.

Her insurance company told her that they didn’t have email, when she told them she was away from home and couldn’t use her phone, they then magically did have an email address that she could contact them on.

i got all that but at the point the insurer said we don’t have your email, was that in the same co variation where the PP was saying she was only contactable on email, and then did they say “oh actually we have it”?!

Nobody said they didn't have my email! They obviously did from when I set up the policy. They claimed that I could not email them as they didn't have email addresses for conducting this type of negotiation. But it wasn't true because as soon as I said that they couldn't phone me, they magically could do it over email.

Mine claimed they didn't have email addresses but I was on holiday with very little phone reception so told them I had to do it by email and hey presto, they did have email after all.

when did they claim they didn’t have your email…. before or after you told them to only contact you via email?!

Are you not reading any of the responses, @thanksicloud ? It seems perfectly clear to everyone else.