Friend borrowed my car and had an accident.

[Bullbreedbliss]

So my friend, who is lovely, went on holiday to a remote area in the uk but she was worried as she has an electric car and there are limited charging stations so I let her borrow my car. Unfortunately someone drove into them and damaged the passenger doors. I can still drive the car but I can’t open the damaged doors and it looks awful. It wasn’t her fault as someone drove into her however it was her accident so we are having to deal with her insurance to get it fixed. We are approaching three weeks post accident and we are still waiting for the garage to take the car. First the garage said they were waiting for the insurance company to approve work, but that appears so have been authorised now so I don’t understand what’s taking so long. It’s frustrating as it’s her insurance company so it’s not like I can phone up to talk to them, and we are stuck using the insurance approved garage. I’m starting to feel quite anxious as she goes away abroad for six weeks soon and I feel like the longer we leave it, the less likely that it will be repaired. I feel guilty as I’ve been messaging her for updates and starting to feel like I’m badgering her. Moral of the story.. never lend your car out!

And what are you expected to do while it's sorted? Does your own car insurance offer any sort of legal protection additional cover?

Although friend didn't cause the accident, your car would not have been damaged if she hadn't borrowed it, so she has responsibility to sort it, but as she doesn't own your car I can't see how she could negotiate a total loss claim.
Good luck, messy, and not the sort of thanks you'd want for a good deed.

As the legal owner of the car, I think that you should be able to deal directly with the insurer. I had a look at an example temp comprehensive policy wording online and it (unsurprisingly) makes it clear that any payment for damage is made to the legal owner. This means you have status as an Additional Insured or Loss Payee in insurance law parlance, which is slightly different to your friend just nominating you as her representative. I’d suggest that you and she speak jointly to whoever is handling the claim to understand how they intend to handle communications going forward. You may have to produce evidence evidence if your identity and ownership.

What a mess.

Nope. When a neighbour hit my car, it took her insurers about a month to decide it was a write off. They faffed about, delayed, etc., Saying a garage would come to pick it up to evaluate it, then the garage arranged a collection time, didn't show up, then they decided they wanted photos - day after day of constantly phoning both the insurers and garage. Even when they decided it was a write off, it was more delays as the "engineer" who did the valuations was "Busy" and we had to wait in his queue. A complete nightmare.

The OP would probably be best started a claim through her own insurer and letting the insurance companies argue between themselves who is liable etc. She'll probably get better/quicker service dealing with her own insurers. Really should never have left it to the "friend" to sort out.

This stuff takes time, you can’t magic up the parts the garage needs, they will take time to come.

She has insurance, it takes a while, that’s life.

I wouldn’t take it as the moral being not to do someone a favour, you did a good thing.

Update.. she is offering to go half in any repair costs that aren’t covered by insurance. I’m not sure how I feel about that.

Complete edit - I was so wrong the first time. Completely no, you lent her your property and it was damaged in her care. She pays anything left uncovered.

I agree @angelinaballerina7 (was writing a reply to say this before you edited!)

Big fat no!! She has some cheek!

Moral of the story is don’t lend your friends items that are worth tens of thousands of pounds and will be a huge inconvenience to you if she damages. Which she has.

I can’t ever imagine being cheeky enough to ask to take someone’s car on holiday.

Why would there be any repair costs for a car that’s been written off?

Absolutely not! I get she didn't cause the accident but she'd have to meet this cost if it was her own car she was driving so she covers it for yours.

This is going to sound mean but I'll only lend my car to one person who I know could comfortably afford to cover any costs if an accident happened.

You’re not sure how you feel about that?!

You should feel fucking angry. You should find out about using your insurance, and getting them to claim from her. You should be seeing what legal cover you have on your insurance, and you should be ready to fight her in court if needs be.

You should also be telling her that she should be ensuring you have a courtesy car (whether she pays for it or it’s covered by insurance).

Shes got a fucking cheek!!!

Surely the insurance should cover every including a courtesy car?

@HotCrossBunplease i don’t know what I was thinking!

I had someone hit my car and could not open the back passenger door. Their insurance had to pay for my temporary car as the car is not road worthy if you cannot open the door. In an accident emergency services might not be able to get you out.

Because it’s a low category write off I think. Essentially it’s not economically viable to repair because the car is over ten years old. So the plan is to take settlement, buy the car back off the insurers then carry out the repairs if that makes sense.

They still open but the back one is hard to shut. You have to give it a proper big slam and it makes a horrible noise.

They won’t provide a courtesy cat after it’s been written off.My friend told them it was still drivable so never had a courtesy car in the first instance. It’s a pain for sure.

Car not cat. lol.

If it's not economically viable for the insurers to repair would the same not be true for you?

That said, if she's offering half to cover repairs on top of the settlement then maybe it's not as cheeky as it first sounds??

A car that has been written off is uneconomical to repair. Cheaper to buy a replacement. So it doesn’t make any sense, really. You will pay more to get it repaired than for a like for like replacement that has never been in an accident and is therefore safer. Is it legal to put a written off car back on the road?

It depends on the category of the write off. Low category write offs are still legal. My bil has a garage, so providing no structural damage, it will just be the cost of the doors and a paint. 🤞

If you haven't arranged it already, I'd still ask her to nominate you as an agent to act on her behalf. It sounds like you'll get advice from your BIL who's in the trade, but I'd want to negotiate the write-off value myself. Good luck.

Bear in mind getting spare parts could be a nightmare as they are hard to come by

So why aren't you accepting a settlement and using the money to buy a new car?