Accidentally scratched a car - help?

[Idkw2d]

Hi Mumsnetters and a Merry Christmas to you all,

I am a new driver and have got myself in a situation.

As I was leaving an Asda car park this morning with my child, I managed to reverse too far back and scraped the side of someone’s very big car. I say big because it didn’t look like a scruffy runaround car, it was a big shiny car.

I am usually incredibly careful and slow, especially as I only passed my test in January this year. I am insured as an additional driver on my husband’s car and it’s just a small scruffy car that is easy to drive.

I have managed perfectly fine in this car park for years but due to a number of factors, I was somewhat caught off guard and managed to reverse too far (a driver was zooming up onto my right while another came right up to my backside). The car I scratched was sticking out of its parking slot by a fair margin, which is why I didn’t expect or realise what I’d done until it was too late :(

The bottom of the back of the car had visible marks where some black paint had come off and there was one very very very tiny scratch on the body. A few bystanders said “it doesn’t look too bad at all” and I took photos.

I waited for the owners to show up, told them what happened and gave my name, number, reg and home address. They said they would get a quote and get back to me, but if I didn’t want to pay then we could go through insurance. They said it could be around £200-300 to “paint over the panel”. said as it was my fault I was more than happy to compensate them. They haven’t gotten in touch yet so I’m still waiting.

Anyway, this is my first experience of anything like this and I have been a mess. I’m embarrassed to say I have cried over this multiple times today. I feel stupid for getting into a situation like this but even more stupid for now having to fork up what could be potentially a few hundred pounds.

Long story short, I had some questions:

1. If they ask me to pay, say, £300 and I agree, can they turn around and claim through insurance as well? I am a ‘new’ driver and worried about how this could affect my status.

2. Should insurance be informed regardless? I’ve heard conflicting info and don’t want to get in trouble.

3. Did I deal with this right? Some people have said I shouldn’t have given my home address.

4. Any advice or words of support? I feel so disappointed in myself today and am worried the owners will take advantage of the situation and charge me extra. I’ve heard and seen so many scams where people are forced to fork out exaggerated amounts for minor damage.

5. I’m also annoyed because they were parked in a Child & Parent spot when they clearly didn’t have any with them! Just makes it sting a little more lol.

Cctv cameras? Plus it's dishonest.

The side of my car’s back bit scraped the back of their lower bumper, I hardly went ass-first into the side of a car. It was a silly stupid mistake and I hopefully will never make it again as I’ve been traumatised enough after this mess I’ve put myself in.

It wasn’t an expensive car but it was bought for around £1800 and now it’s gone.

It was parked outside my house.

Tell me about it 😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨😮‍💨

I was looking but I clearly didn’t look good enough, but I wasn’t careless enough to cause a dent or worse damage - it was the paint being scraped off the bottom slightly. I posted a pic.

multiple factors involved - first and foremost, my own fault as I should have looked more, stuck my head out the car maybe a bit and been 100% sure.

secondly, a woman was zooming up (in a tight car park) on my right and caught me off guard in the middle of my manoeuvre while a taxi driver was sticking right up my backside. Possibly coupled with the fact that I only passed this year so I’m not superrr experienced.

but yeah, bottom line is it’s my responsibility which I did show as I sat there and waited 20+ mins for the owners to arrive with my kid in the car rather than leaving or just leaving a note and driving off.

OP is not the "utter arsehole" who damaged your car.

It's nice that you're personally above ever making any mistakes or miscalculations, and that you were an expert at driving with years of experience immediately after passing your test, but this is the real world here where accidents happen and new drivers lack experience and expertise.

You do have to share the road with everyone, including the risks therein, whether you like that or not.

I can be clear in real life because I’m not typing on Mumsnet where it’s a little hard to be exactly specific in writing, much easier to verbalise aloud for me personally.

ill explain as best I can.

i SCRAPED the SIDE of the car, i did not reverse directly into the car. It was a not a big long reverse, it was literally a matter of centimetres where i was too close to the parked car and the slight reverse made me scrape against its back lower bumper (like I said the car was sticking out, not parked too great but again not their problem!)

the taxi driver was behind me, a lady racing up my right side and then on my left were more parked cars. It was a really really tight space.

Thanks for the kind words. Honearly I have beaten myself up enough and felt crap enough so don’t need the extra blame, I already blame myself 100%

thanks for your kind words, makes me feel like less of a fuck up ❤️🙏🏻

Oh no, nightmare! That is one for insurance.

One year dh had 3 insurance claims on his car in the space of a week!

First he hit a deer and it crumpled the front. It was still drivable, put in an insurance claim and it was booked into body shop for a repair the next day. That evening someone tried to break in and damaged the locks on the drivers door/scrapped the paint. So he put in another claim, was told he would have to pay the excess for both claims.

It went into the body shop and there was massive flooding in the area, his car was partially submerged and written off! Insurance company made him pay 3 excess payments for the 3 claims!

He can laugh about it now, but it was a nightmare at the time. Family bought him a t-shirt for Christmas that said "dh the deer hunter" on the front and "vorsprung deer technik" on the back 🤣

Hope your insurance gives you a decent payout!

Always always go through insurance , they could get a mate to give them a "quote" and do you out of a lot of money . They could claim you never paid etc etc . Plus you shouldn't have given your home address contact number and insurance details that's it .

This happened to me (my car was hit). I didn’t bother getting it fixed or asking for any money. If it’s their mate’s garage there’s the possibility of a false receipt so be careful.

Looking at your pic I probably wouldn't even get it looked at and you'd likely never hear from me again. I'd have taken your details in case there was something more serious that was missed on first glance.

In your shoes I wouldn't report something this minor to insurance, you're meant to but they're an insurance company so fuck em.

The other party is unlikely to go through insurance as well because it will just affect their premiums in the long run

Right, this is where you claim you've been a hermit for a week and it must've been stolen BEFORE you hit the other car! 😂

There will be accidents happening right now with more experienced drivers than you, so please try not to get too down about this.

If I can give you some advice though, never let another driver push you into a manoeuvre you're not comfortable with. It's always better to be safe and take your time.

I hope you've had a good Christmas despite all this x

Didn’t want to read and run - thank you SO much for the kind and supportive words of advice. Really appreciate everything ❤️

This is excellent advice. If you don’t feel comfortable making a manoeuvre and there are two of you in the road/small space/stupidly planned car park, you are better to pull over to the most sensible side and put your wing mirrors in and let the other person drive around you. The number of people who scrape their cars accidentally because they felt pressure from a waiting car in a car park is crazy.

OP don’t beat yourself up. If you look at the stats, speed is what makes you more likely to have an accident than lack of driving experience and loads of experienced drivers claim every single day. Chalk this up to experience and I hope you get the £1800 for a new car. Xx

Failing to look properly is the most common cause of accidents and I suspect inexperience probably plays a part in that. Speeding is a factor in less than 1 in 10 accidents.

OP you have accepted responsibility but still your posts are peppered with barbed jibes.

Their BIG car....Sticking out....Parked in the parent and child space...that the owners seemed the type to make SURE I pay up.

Why are you working so hard to paint them in a negative light when none of this is relevant. You are trying to minimise your actions and shift some of the blame

It’s called… having feelings.. feeling bitter… feeling like the pain of my own stupidity is amplified a little more by the sting of others also being somewhat careless… it’s called being human :) at the end of the day what matters is I am taking responsibility, not how perfectly I am taking it. Hope that helps x

I was an Insurance advisor before I was a driving instructor.

You only ever need the reg if going through insurance. Never need to pass on any personal details or speak to them ever again.

If you want to settle privately you can. You are meant to tell your insurance company anyway and it will affect your no claims.

I have only had my license for 11 months. Would I have any no claims to be affected in the first place? Sorry I’m just trying to understand the process x thank you!

You may be like me OP and have quite poor spatial awareness so I have to be extra careful when manoeuvring and parking. Sorry to hear about your car