So angry. AIBU the driver who is now disputing he caused crash

[Eastie77Returns]

I was sitting stationery in my car when another driver drove into the side of my car causing substantial damage. He was an elderly man who emerged from the car looking quite confused and buffudled. He was extremely apologetic and we exchanged details. My claim was initially a no-fault claim but the other driver has now claimed that I drove into his car (impossible, I was not moving) and damaged HIS car. This despite the photos showing my doors are caved in and his car barely has a scratch. The incident happened outside a local business but the owners will not release the CCTV footage due to GDPR etc.

This will obviously impact my premiums going forward and NCB. I have been driving since the age of 17 and have never had an accident.

I have this person's number and am tempted to send him angry text message. I know this will not acheive anything. WWYD in this situation?

Are you still waiting for your car to be paid out for? Did you accept their offer, or are you waiting for their offer still? It doesn't matter who is at fault, your insurance should pay you then claim it back from the other drivers insurance if applicable.. they don't wait for payment from the other insurer before paying out.

My car was smashed up while parked, by a minor in a stolen car (so uninsured), I received a courtesy car and had it for 3 weeks, I heard nothing from them, so I rang them to chase payment, it was lost in the system, and they asked ME if the car was a write off.. I should have get my mouth shut as the courtesy car was fantastic.

As soon as they realised the error they paid me within a week, and came to collect the courtesy car straight away.

I had one like that - woman in a parked car opened her door into my car as I drove into the space next to her. My insurance took her to court and the judge looked at the evidence and believed me.

Put some signs in your car when you're at the gym asking people to get in touch with you if they saw what happened. Park as near to the entrance as possible.

You say 17 but haven't said how old you are. He's a dick, they'll investigate and you'll be vindicated.

Report him to the police for fraud

Call the police. If you have a police reference number they can review the CCTV and this can be passed on to the insurers also. Fight it and don’t back down!!

My husband was nearly run off the road by a lunatic high on everything a couple of years ago. Police at the scene said the claim likely wouldn’t go anywhere. All we had was a registration plate and a crime number….within 24 hours they had all the details they needed and HIS insurance paid out for our car to be sorted.

Do you have legal cover with your car insurance? We had a similar experience where someone else was at fault and then tried to deny it, it took months and months, maybe a year plus to sort out. We got to the point of having a court date and then they finally accepted liability. Our insurance still went up despite it not being our fault. Good luck and don’t give up!

Let the insurers deal with it but stick your ground. This happened to DH. A lorry drove into him from middlelane of motorway, as didn’t see him. Fully apologetic and took all blame at the scene. Then denied everything via insurance. My DH flatly refused the 50/50 that the insurance tried to negotiate. He remained adamant it was not his fault, so the case went to court. As soon as court orders were issued, the other party backed down and accepted fault. It took 18 months to resolve. But there was no way DH was going to accept blame for something he absolutely had no control over.

It might be his insurers pushing the false story rather than the man himself - seeing how far they can push it in order to share costs with your insurer. If he's changed his story that's totally shitty, but I have heard of some insurers instructing their clients not to accept liability and they could be pressuring him that if he admits full liability they may not fully cover the claim.

if you do post on the gyms facebook page make sure you dont phrase it like “i had an accident”. instead phrase it as “there was an accident”.

they may not want you making a sign but if there happened to be a sign INSIDE your windscreen, large so it can be seen, perhaps people may read it?

could you notify police and get a reference number and then go back to the gym and ask them to send the footage direct to the police quoting it? that way it will not impact on their gdpr rules. i’d do it soon as they may delete footage regularly. id also put in an sar to the gym. hell i’d ask the police direct uf thwy could phone them (get the phone number and hand it over to the officer).

they might not but does it do any harm to ask?

@Eastie77Returnsyou need to complain and get it escalated to someone higher in your insurance team. Appreciate there is little to go off with no witnesses, but we didn’t have witnesses either as it was first thing in the morning and there was no CCTV to back us up. The fact that there IS CCTV to back it up in your case is really good and you’ve had some really good advice from PP on how to obtain it. I also wouldn’t text him either (as tempting as it is - we had our guy’s address and he lived on the street next to us!).

My sort of similar incident was where a guy jumped a give way when I was already half way across and he hit the front passenger side of my car, knocked our bonnet out of line, and took out my entire headlight/indicator stack. It was completely his fault; the location of the damage to my car vs his, the debris on the road showed I was more than half way across whereas he had only just started emerging, where he’d stopped (he hadn’t even stopped at the give way, just charged across so took a while to come to a stop), not to mention his windscreen was completely iced over so he had very poor visibility. Like your driver, he too had acknowledged that it was his fault and had offered to pay without going through insurers (not a chance was I doing this given the extensive damage, plus my car had to be towed). Lo and behold upon me submitting a clear non fault claim, his insurers came back with ME being fully at fault, and my insurance came back and said I’d be lucky to get 50/50(!!!!!).

I escalated it as a complaint with my insurers, restated all of my evidence (location of my damage vs his, his visibility, the debris (all of which I had photos of), plus an aerial map view of the location and where I was compared to him etc) - complete overkill but I couldn’t believe they were even contemplating 50/50, and they agreed to contest it. His insurers argued and we ended up having to go to court where it was found 100% to be his fault.

I’m really sorry your insurers aren’t supporting you - it is so so stressful. Please get it escalated, it just needs another pair of eyes on it and hopefully you’ll get the outcome you deserve.

Thank you to everyone for all the advice.

I have submitted a SAR to the gym via the ICO site a PP posted. They have been spectacularly unhelpful so far, so frustrating. The other driver gave me his full name at the and I’ve since discovered from another gym goer that he’s been a member for 26 years and knows management so honestly not sure if they are trying to help him. The whole thing has left such a sour taste that I’ve decided to cancel my membership. I pay £££ in fees and they have just been obstructive.

I’ve printed a sign asking if anyone witnessed a collision and put an anonymous email address. I know 100% the gym will not allow me to put it up inside so I’m going to put it near the exit where the incident happened. I’m also going back on the day and time it happened as I hopefully the same people will be there leaving their morning class.

I have logged a police report online. Not sure it will really do any good but I think it’s at least a good idea to officially report it.

I am speaking with the insurance company today and advising that I’m not accepting 50-50. It’s ridiculous. The technician at the body repair shop that just fixed the car actually laughed out loud when I told him the other driver is claiming I drove into him. It would have been physically impossible given the position of the cars and the fact my doors were caved in.

Not sure my age is relevant but I’m 46. I have never had an accident.

So have you reported it to the police and asked them to get the CCTV footage? At the very least this man must have been driving without due care and attention, and there must be an issue around whether he's actually fit to drive at all.

The other driver gave me his full name at the and I’ve since discovered from another gym goer that he’s been a member for 26 years and knows management so honestly not sure if they are trying to help him.

As soon as you said before that the gym were being difficult, I assumed it was something along these lines. They have absolutely no reason not to release the CCTV footage to you/your insurance company, so chances are they are trying to protect him.. don't count on that footage as chances are it will have 'disappeared'.

I'd report to the police personally, and the DVLA like others have suggested.

I can't stand people like him, who lie and cheat to get away with doing something wrong, I'd be fighting this 50/50 with everything I've got, don't rely on your insurance company to do the right thing, they usually follow the path of least resistance IME.

FWIW this is why you should pay for legal cover on your policy, it hardly costs anything to add, but can be invaluable for situations like this where a solicitor will fight on your behalf.

I would do this personally. Log it with police as unsafe driving via 101. Also ask them to help obtain cctv as they are refusing to release it to you.

I’m assuming you took photos of the damage to your car as I know that is absolutely required. Did you take photos of his too? I think that will probably be enough to prove your claim, even without the footage.

Your Insurers will settle a 50:50 split unless you get the CCTV, especially if the other driver files a personal injury claim.
That cost will sit on your file and your premiums will rocket.
Sorry that you're in this situation.

This is from my experience of being insured by Aviva with full legal and the other driver driving into the back of me whilst I was stationary.
My insurance appointed legal adviser just rolled over and wanted to settle because of the cost of legal proceedings was more expensive for Aviva. My costs, current and future, were not represented.

Get the CCTV, fight, and get a dash cam.
This is why premiums are ratcheting up - because they don't represent your interests only the insurers.

I thought, from watching Mark Thomas years ago, that you were entitled to a copy of any CCTV footage you appear in, under GDPR, or whatever the law was at the time. Seems it may still be so, but it seems there are still ways they could refuse.

https://www.gov.uk/request-cctv-footage-of-yourself

Yep, I have photos of his damage. His Mercedes Benz basically had a small amount of damage at the front where his car rammed into and destroyed my doors.

Put leaflets at the gym under windscreen wipers

I have a voicemail from the gym's membership manager, calling to discuss my cancellation. Interesting that they have delayed communicating with me regarding the CCTV but can call so soon after I cancel my membership!

I honestly think you’re going to be ok, you’re not accepting his story and are fighting back, he was probably just trying his luck by denying it. I hate people who do that, they should just accept the consequences of their own actions.

I hope you get some witnesses, that should help.
Ive had two accidents where they drove into me and admitted it at the scene, then later changed their stories. Naively, because they’d admitted it, I didn’t think I’d need witnesses. I was lucky on both occasions that someone approached me and gave me their number ‘just in case’. Very lucky really, because both times my witnesses were solicitors! And one of them was so irritated by the lying driver that she offered me free legal advice if I needed it 🤣. (She’d had a similar experience). Thankfully I didn’t and it was resolved in my favour.

Surely if it's the side of your car that's damaged then you would have had to have driven sideways to drive into his car🤔 he's being ridiculous, just leave it to insurance