I'm in trouble

[drintrouble]

Changed name as don't want to be found out.
I'm in trouble. Can anyone give me some encouragement/advice how to go about it.
Last winter I have passed my driving test. And 2 weeks later crashed my car into somebody else- totally my fault. Came out, gave the other driver, a woman, my details, all the info. She did not give me anything of hers, except, her husband's telephone number. I took a video and few pictures of her car. The only damage that I could see was broken plastic on the taillight. Rang her husband same evening, we spoke about the damage, but, strangely, he kept repeating that he was driving at the time of the accident! There were no other people in the car, just the woman driver. In the phone conversation the man said that the damage was not bad, he could buy light on ebay and, if I gave him the money, we could do it privately. I wasn't sure about it, but agreed. He rang me next morning and demanded £4,000. I was absolutely certain that that was over the top and asked if he could take his car to my mechanic. He refused. Then I said I prefer to go through my insurance.
When I checked my insurance documents, I found out it ran out literally 2 days before the accident. Totally my fault, but because if lockdowns and instructor shortages and tests not being available for months, I have bought insurance just for a month before my test, and completely forgot about it.
I have panicked, rang the man, told him that I am refusing to pay £4k and asked him to come with realistic price. Never told him that I did not have insurance.
Nothing happened for a year and yesterday my husband, who is registered on this car, have received a letter from an insurance company asking him to answer questions about the accident, mentioning the female driver- me.
I know I am in trouble BIG TIME, but how would you act? Tell the truth, but insist that the other car was driven by the female- letter doesn't say who the other driver was. I know that something dodgy is going on (from my side as well!), but what to do now? I have a female driver after the accident on a video, when she was talking to her husband. She couldn't leave the site of the accident fast enough.
Please, don't kick me for what I did, but I have thought £4k is excessive and have panicked about the insurance.
What would you do?

You weren’t insured from the day you passed your test. You have to immediately get insurance for a newly passed driver, you can’t keep driving on an insurance policy for a provisional licence. Jeez.

Is the car insured by your husband or you. Presume your husband if the insurance company are writing to him? I didn't know you could have two policies for the same car? Sorry just confusing.

I suspect she was never insured at all which is why the insurance letter has gone to her husband.

Unless she is the woman driving the car that was hit .

A lot doesn't make much sense...

The month's insurance - was that taken out by the OP or was it her husband adding her as a named driver for a month??

Also, the other party that she crashed into have not made contact for a year or so. The current situation is because of a letter from the OP/her husband's insurance company investigating the incident. It's unclear why they would be doing this - the other party definitely didn't want to involve insurance companies and lied about who was driving. It seems unlikely that they would have now contacted their insurance company about this, if they even have one.

Regardless of all of this, the OP needs to inform her/her husband's insurance company of the date of the accident and clarify that they weren't insured at the time. Because any current insurance policy is void if relevant information like that is withheld!

This with Bells on. Check RAC as people advised earlier You can pay with Tesco Vouchers/ or they have a sale on right now and you could add on legal advice and you can just phone them and tell them. Prepare all the facts/dates/ company names upfront so you have it all to hand

Usually insurers send you a renewal offer a month before your existing insurance expires. These letters usually offer to roll the insurance over so that you don't suddenly lose cover. And they sometimes say they will consider it renewed.
If you took it up it would presumably mean that you had continuous cover, but made a payment after the start date.

But if you then took out cover with a different insurer and were only out of cover for a few days, then that shows an intention to remain insured. Your legal advisor would know how much weight would be given to this.

Gather all your paperwork, including any messages from the other side which say it was just a red light. and the fact they haven't listed or sent any evidence of their £4k claim - just demanded the money and refused to let you get it assessed shows how dodgy they are.

There's probably a solution to this but you need legal advice before acting.

I think the best thing to do here is to be honest via email. Have it all in writing.

4K.. they were at it. And she isn't insured to drive that car either by the sounds of it or she is banned from driving but theres something going on there that means she wasn't allowed to be driving that car.

If it was me, I would be writing an email to the company explaining exactly what's happened, where you have went wrong and I would be including that they tried to scam you out of 4K and I would be sending the evidence in the form of the video you have which shows why they were trying to scam you out of 4K (because she isn't insured to drive the car either) be honest, but don't let them away with it either, they tried to rob you then have waited a year to put a claim in knowing full well that they are doing something wrong/illegal aswell. Cf.

I received a call after Christmas claiming that I hit someone's car. I didn't. I was in a different country to them at the time, as was my car. I have done everything by email and sent proof by email.

The OP had been driving for 2 weeks without insurance. Not 2 days. Her temp learners' insurance was no longer valid from the moment she passed her test.

It's crazy to go to all that trouble to get your licence, then right away start driving illegally.

Firstly are you sure this letter is from a proper insurance company. I would be suspicious because of how scam my this couple are.

I would state that you had the accident with the woman as the only person in the car. You have video evidence of this and video and photographic evidence of the damage.
Tge only thing you got groom her was her husbands telephone number which you rang the following day.

He said he would get a quote for the damage but didn’t think it was going to be too much. He did keep saying he was driving but you thought he was just not thinking.

He then came back with the quote of £4000 and as you thought that was too much you thought it would be best to go through the insurance company.

But you never heard from him or her again.

Thought it was a scam and for for about it.

My Dd went through something similar again a husband and wife team and the insurance company are looking to prosecute buy it takes years and in the meantime she has about 7 months of insurance tied up with this insurance company as they won’t release the remainder of her insurance when she sold the car.

I was in a similar situation where I was driving a courtesy car that I thought was insured by the garage but I needed to put oin my policy. I had a bump and it was just inside the 3 year mark when the other driver made a claim for a ridiculous amount of money and there was absolutely no visible damage. Luckily I still had the photos so I shared them with the other parties solicitor and settled on a much reduced sum. Mo action was taken for me having no insurance at the time.

Exactly what I said. And if you don’t respond to the email they ring you.

My feeling is that the OP will not be totally honest with the insurance company as I don't think her account here is all she makes out. Or maybe she's just not explaining it very well.

1 She says the insurance company contacted her husband. This doesn't make sense. It only makes sense is he is insured and she isn't (or wasn't) and that the car is his. Or if he added her as a named driver for a month before her test and both of them forgot to change it to a full licence after she passed her test. But if that's how it was, she ought to have said that .

2 I don't know why the 'victim' of the prang would make a claim one year after the accident. Especially as they didn't want to use an insurance claim in the first place (presumably as the driver wasn't insured.)

3 If the victim wants to claim what has happened since? To drive without a taillight (assuming this is a brake light or a side light) is illegal in terms of MOT and the former is illegal anyway. So it doesn't make sense.

Car I was driving is my DH car. He is the owner and has an insurance. We only have this one car. I have had an insurance as a second/learner driver on that car. The insurance ran out 2 days before the accident. I did not know about it at the time. I gave the female driver (wrote on the piece of paper, as she did not want to put it in her phone, which I found strange) my name, surname, tel nr, said who I was insured with. She did not tell me her name or her phone number. I wasn't sure if I should insist on that, but I took her husband's phone number (again, she didn't tel me his name). Somehow I was a little bit shaken after the accident and assumed everything will be sorted by our insurance.
Luckily, I took a little video of the damage and her talking to her husband on the phone.
We sorted our car without an insurance claim ourselves- it was a little dent to the front/side. She wasn't in a car when I crashed into her- she came out of the shop afterwards.
Accident happened 15 February 2022. I have passed my driving test 2 weeks prior that. Needed insurance on our car to practice before my driving test, but didn't want to pay for a year, as I was not sure I will pass and it was almost impossible to book driving test straight after lockdowns- who tried in Spring/summer 2022, those people know how bad backlog at the DVLA was.
Not sure why are you accusing me of lying.

Should add that there was no damage to either car (Dd went forward at a roundabout when the person in front for no reason slammed on their brakes) Dd was doing less than 3 miles per hour and sort of nudged the car infront

Unbeknown to the driver Dd remembered to take a photo just before she got back in the car. A month later she received a letter from the insurance company about the accident.

DD could prove the vehicle was in good order when the woman drove it away.
Apparently they claimed Dd smashed into the back end of the vehicle at speed and the photo they had at the insurance company from this person was of a smashed up vehicle.

You have got to be careful nowadays. The number of people out to scam you is going up.

If she wasn't even in the car it's totally irrelevant if she's insured or not - as long as the car was insured by someone

We only have this one car. I have had an insurance as a second/learner driver on that car. The insurance ran out 2 days before the accident.

The insurance ran out the minute you passed your test

Car I was driving is my DH car. He is the owner and has an insurance. We only have this one car. I have had an insurance as a second/learner driver on that car. The insurance ran out 2 days before the accident. I did not know about it at the time.

So why did your H not get a reminder about the renewal policy? They contact the person at least 1 month before a renewal is due .

If it is his car and you are a named driver, then he was the one responsible to the renewal, not you.

You didn't say any of this in your first post. You said it was your insurance that 'literally' ran out 2 days after the accident, but some time after you had passed your test. So you ought to have changed the policy anyway from a learner driver to one who had a full licence.

She wasn't in a car when I crashed into her- she came out of the shop afterwards.

You said she was driving.

I apologise for saying you were lying, but maybe she wasn't driving it. Maybe her husband was driving but he was in another shop and you didn't see him?
All sorts of possibilities.

Neither add up. If she had temporary learner insurance that expired with her test - she would be 2 weeks out - but she would also be aware it was only a temporary short term policy because she’d only recently taken it out 6 weeks prior. And they’d contact her anyway.

This^

Your insurance would of been for a learner .

That's why you can't drive home after you have passed your test . As your only insured as a learner

You need to be honest, in my opinion and recognise that both yours and your OH will never be able to get insurance again on a house or anything else without going through a specialist broker. Once you have had insurance cancelled by the insurer for whatever reason you have to declare it forever and they will refuse to insure you. Best you can hope for is that they give you 7 days to cancel it yourself and find new insurance before they cancel it themselves. This means yoy cancelitand not them so its never cancelled by the insurer. In fact I'd be tempted to pay whatever penalties and cancel it now and take out new insurance declaring the previous bump.

Then you just hope that the police don't get notified and decide to follow it up.

Or you could just get your OH to say he has no idea about who was driving a year ago and hope no one finds out about your lies.... They will though.

I mean, if she is going to say her dh was driving then say your dh was driving, at least that sorts the no insurance drama out 🤷🏻‍♀️

To me, I think it'll be possible to divert this case based on the fact that the people are obviously crook. Or at least buy some time.

By the looks of it, you may get fined £300 and get 6 points on your license for failing to drive without insurance (and don't worry you're not the only one there. I accidentally drove for months without insurance) and then have to pay for their break light or whatever out of your own pocket.

But first it's important you make them acknowledge it was a) the lady driver and b) the official cost for the damage with proof by receipt or quote BEFORE even thinking of engaging with them on this.

Be extremely adamant about it. Otherwise you have nothing to go back on and you're really in up to your neck as the truth will be lost.

The fact they have something to hide gives you leverage.

Then once you have that info you can start to think 'what next' but I doubt it'll even get that far as they sound like they are trying it on.

All in all, I don't think your situation is that bad so try not to worry. Worse case is that it's expensive and you get 6 points.

www.churchill.com/car-insurance/magazine/driving-without-insurance

So why did your H not get a reminder about the renewal policy? They contact the person at least 1 month before a renewal is due .

This isn't the case ime when you just add a named driver to a policy temporarily. I do it for my friend every now and then and I've never had a reminder when the month cover is up.

However whether she was personally insured on her car - which was never the defence you or others seemed to think - is now totally irrelevant. You don't have evidence that proves anything when she wasn't even inside the vehicle at the time of the accident.

The OP has now said the car she drove didn't have anyone in it at the time of the collision.

But first it's important you make them acknowledge it was a) the lady driver

There was no driver