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Sorry for the dull question, but...
Shortly before Christmas I was driving around a Tesco car park, and as I turned right into the second row of parking a motorbike decided to try and overtake me and drove into the driver door of the car.
No one was hurt but the motorcyclist was extremely aggressive and threatening and obviously blamed me, although I’m sure he was in the wrong.
I contacted my insurance company (Direct Line) and put in a claim and they need to contact his insurance company, who now have to chase him for a claim form as he hadn’t reported it.
I’m fairly sure he won’t accept responsibility and as the accident was in a private car park it’s his word against mine and the decision is likely to be 50:50, but what does that mean and can I pull out of the claim (our excess is £400 and we’ll lose our 4yrs no claims for what I suspect is only a couple of hundred pounds of minor damage)?
Ask the store for any CCTV footage (although it may be too late now)?
Sorry to hear about your accident.
Not sure about the rest but I'm prety sure you can't pull out of the claim now. Technically you have to report anything which might result in a claim to your insurer, even if there's no damage or you decide to get it repaired yourself. If you did decide to withdraw your claim your insurer would probably still knock off your NCD and you'd be left having to pay for repairs too.
Did you get the biker's name, insurance details and reg no?
If you know who his insurer is you could, I think, notify them that you want to make a claim against him. I think this is the case but am not a expert in this field so please double check.
Way too late for CCTV, they only keep it a few days unless something is reported IIRC. It's only his work against yours if there were no witnesses. He may claim you didn't indicate etc or appeared to be stopping, making it partially your fault in a sense, but ultimately he shouldn't be overtaking in a car park which should be obvious. I'm fairly sure you can stop the claim, the insurance company work for you and you're the one bringing the claim, not the other person, but once they contact the other persons insurance it will get a a lot more sticky to fix. Best bet is to call and ask your insurance.
You won't lose all no claims for a claim, only 2 years normally IIRC/
Mirror, signal, manoeuvre.
FWIW the motorcyclist drove into you end of story. Whilst he can claim you turned right whilst being overtaken he was the one in the wrong and you should not admit any liablity or accept knock for knock.
Muddy - doesn't quite work that black and white (non-indication means the overtaker has no reason to suspect a right turn, so overtake is not out of the question, just ill advised), but that's the tack I'd try to take too if I were the OP.
Because it was in a private car park, I've been told that the highway code doesn't count and so it's down to accepting liability or witneses, but because he was so agressive anyone who might have seen it ****ed off while I was trying to calm him down 🙁
FWIW the motorcyclist drove into you end of story.
& he may well claim that the car was stationary & pulled out just as he was passing it
without witnesses - I can't see how you'll succeed to have him pay up
You only lose your NCD if your insurance company has to compensate you or anyone else. Call them and tell them that if the 3rd party is either not claiming nor contactable you don't want them to do anything as your damage is not worth it.
Then wait for the m/c to put in a claim (not sure how long before a 3rd party has to lodge a claim).
We did this a few years ago, didn't lose NCD.
You only lose your NCD if your insurance company has to compensate you or anyone else. Call them and tell them that if the 3rd party is either not claiming nor contactable you don't want them to do anything as your damage is not worth it.
Don't be to sure of that. Motoring forums are full of complaints from innocent parties to accidents having their premiums increased. According to the Insurance Industry once you've made a claim then you are more likely to make another. That's what they say. Nothing to do with increasing income, sir! And there's sod all you can do about it - the Insurance Ombudsman backs the companies.
you can "pay off" a claim and it then goes down as a "no loss" and as such is regarded as a non-claim and thus doesn't affect your no claims.
Whether you can pull out and thus get your car fixed at non-insurance rates is something your insurer only can tell you, can't do any harm to ask.