Dealing with Insurance after Accident

[DeafBrad]

Hi Everyone,

My wife was driving my car. She backed up to leave a store, and before she could get moving forward another lady backed into her. No injuries, but my car is mangled. The lady said it was her fault, and she was in a hurry for an appointment. The other lady had Progressive Insurance, and my wife got that info, etc, and pics of our car and her car.

Our insurance told us to go through her insurance. So we called Progressive and explained to her insurance what happened. Long story short, the lady is not returning their calls, so they are like we are not going to pay if the client doesn't give her side of the story. Can they do that? That means anyone at fault can just ignore their insurance company's calls to avoid liability.

So Progressive is telling us to go through our insurance. This last lady giving this advice did not give the "I can be trusted" vibe. Is this a tactic to get out of paying for damages? While the other lady is not responding to her insurance's calls, it has only been a few days. We are not in a hurry to settle, and I could drive the car in the meantime.

Nor do I want to total the car and get a check. My car is almost 30 years old, but very low miles for the years, and mechanically it is good for a number of years yet. It was a slow speed hit, so no major damage as it was a side swipe. To make it whole, it needs a door, and a fender, and a mirror and of course, paint. One progressive lady said $2000 to repair.

I just want my car repaired. My car up to this point has had no dents! I even made peace with the fact I may end up doing the work if I want the car fixed, and now their insurance is talking like they will pay nothing if their client doesn't talk to them.

It is an old car, so we just have liability so it is not like we can have our insurance repair it. We are in WA state.

Any advice/suggestions?

Brad

 

[HangFire]

Can they do that? If you accept it, they can get away with it.

Get a lawyer now.

 

[mjhoward]

Auto insurance policies are a contract between the person purchasing coverage and the insurance company. Most all auto insurance policies have a "cooperation after a loss/accident" clause. If someone is not willing to return phone calls and is not willing to cooperate with their insurance company when a claim is made, then the insurance company has no way to validate the claim. That is why that clause is in place and why an insurance company can deny a claim if the at fault party is not willing to cooperate. If this person continues not to cooperate, then you only choice may be to go through your own insurance company and let them go after this person in subrogation. Hope this helps.

 

[doitmyself]

Any witnesses or any chance the store has a security video tape of the accident??

 

[Jim_Truett]

It sounds like both insurance companies are giving you the runaround. This can be problem with liability only coverage. If it was fully covered your insurance could repair the car and recover their costs through suborgation. It sounds like it is time to seek legal counsel. I also assume you will be looking at a total loss given the facts stated in your post. if you want to keep the car you will probably need to buy it back for salvage value and fix it yourself.

 

[JMJNet]

Unfortunately, that is normal and they have like 14 days or 30 days or whatever number of days to hear from the other party.

In the mean time, if you are in a hurry, you need to claim from your insurance and give them the info of the other insurance.
Your insurance will pay for your repair minus deductible and when they get the money from the other party's insurance, they will pay you the deductible assuming everything is the same.

What I have been doing lately if something like this happen is to have the other person called their claim number on the spot when/where the accident happened.
Get that claim number from her.
So, for sure when you call in the claim, you give them the claim no and they don't have to verify the other side of the story.

 

[Dave9]

If there are no witnesses (nor video of it) and that lady doesn't admit fault, you are probably screwed and will have to eat the loss. It is always best if you can get the police to come and write a report while observing where both of you were and where the damage is, or at worst whip out your phone and make a video and pictures before the cars are moved.

No they can't just refuse to pay because she won't return their calls, but they can refuse if you don't have any proof even if she does call them.

If you have proof you don't have to depend on her insurance accepting her fault, can sue her in small claims court then it is up to her to get reimbursed by her insurance.

 

[dishdude]

Originally Posted by Dave9
If there are no witnesses (nor video of it) and that lady doesn't admit fault, you are probably screwed and will have to eat the loss. It is always best if you can get the police to come and write a report while observing where both of you were and where the damage is, or at worst whip out your phone and make a video and pictures before the cars are moved.

No they can't just refuse to pay because she won't return their calls, but they can refuse if you don't have any proof even if she does call them.

If you have proof you don't have to depend on her insurance accepting her fault, can sue her in small claims court then it is up to her to get reimbursed by her insurance.


This.

 

[DeafBrad]

Originally Posted by Dave9
If there are no witnesses (nor video of it) and that lady doesn't admit fault, you are probably screwed and will have to eat the loss. It is always best if you can get the police to come and write a report while observing where both of you were and where the damage is, or at worst whip out your phone and make a video and pictures before the cars are moved.

No they can't just refuse to pay because she won't return their calls, but they can refuse if you don't have any proof even if she does call them.

If you have proof you don't have to depend on her insurance accepting her fault, can sue her in small claims court then it is up to her to get reimbursed by her insurance.


We have pics of our car's damage, and her car's damage and her car's license plate in a pic.

 

[dishdude]

Originally Posted by DeafBrad
Originally Posted by Dave9
If there are no witnesses (nor video of it) and that lady doesn't admit fault, you are probably screwed and will have to eat the loss. It is always best if you can get the police to come and write a report while observing where both of you were and where the damage is, or at worst whip out your phone and make a video and pictures before the cars are moved.

No they can't just refuse to pay because she won't return their calls, but they can refuse if you don't have any proof even if she does call them.

If you have proof you don't have to depend on her insurance accepting her fault, can sue her in small claims court then it is up to her to get reimbursed by her insurance.


We have pics of our car's damage, and her car's damage and her car's license plate in a pic.


The damage isn't in question, it's if the other driver admits fault or not.

 

[Hall]

Who is your insurance company because they suck ! You pay them to deal with these situations and they tell you "call the other person's insurance" ??

Since it happened (from the sounds of it) on private property, no police report, no witnesses, this will be a case of "she said, she said". You and your insurance say it's the other person's fault, the other person will say it's your wife's fault. The truth, in this situation, doesn't really matter.

Tell your insurance company to do their job and handle your claim.

 

[dishdude]

Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Who is your insurance company because they suck ! You pay them to deal with these situations and they tell you "call the other person's insurance" ??

Since it happened (from the sounds of it) on private property, no police report, no witnesses, this will be a case of "she said, she said". You and your insurance say it's the other person's fault, the other person will say it's your wife's fault. The truth, in this situation, doesn't really matter.

Tell your insurance company to do their job and handle your claim.


He only has liability coverage. Since he doesn't carry collision, there is no job for his insurance company to do unless the other driver files a claim against him.

 

[csandste]

My wife got into a both parties backing up collision in a Walmart parking lot. Blame went into an internal litigation since both parties had Farmers Insurance. Two years later my wife died and I got rid of her car. I was told by the agent that it was still showing ongoing litigation for damages-- Farmers v. Farmers. I no longer have Farmers, but for all I know they're still going at it a decade later.

 

[Rand]

I had a terrible time with farmers when I was rear ended and the other party vanished due to police report not being filed for almost 45 days.

I had to claim on my insurance and they tried every dirty trick in the book to screw me.

Ended up dropping them after I got paid.

 

[John_K]

Originally Posted by hallstevenson
Who is your insurance company because they suck ! You pay them to deal with these situations and they tell you "call the other person's insurance" ??

Tell your insurance company to do their job and handle your claim.


Exactly. I have been hit several times in my 40 years of driving and I just call my insurance co and they take care of it. Never heard of calling the other person's, you are covered by your insurance it is their responsib8lity.

 

[ammolab]

Same thing happened to me. She is responsible for providing info to her company. In my case?..no contact to their company was "guilty by default" and her insurance fixed my car.

 

[DeafBrad]

My wife called the Safeway where the accident happened, and they have video cameras in the parking lot. We will find out more tmw!

 

[PimTac]

Originally Posted by Dave9
If there are no witnesses (nor video of it) and that lady doesn't admit fault, you are probably screwed and will have to eat the loss. It is always best if you can get the police to come and write a report while observing where both of you were and where the damage is, or at worst whip out your phone and make a video and pictures before the cars are moved.

No they can't just refuse to pay because she won't return their calls, but they can refuse if you don't have any proof even if she does call them.

If you have proof you don't have to depend on her insurance accepting her fault, can sue her in small claims court then it is up to her to get reimbursed by her insurance.





The police in our area do not respond to non injury accidents. You can fill the accident report out online or at the station.

 

[DeafBrad]

Originally Posted by ammolab
Same thing happened to me. She is responsible for providing info to her company. In my case?..no contact to their company was "guilty by default" and her insurance fixed my car.


This is what makes sense to me. No response = automatic guilt. To do it the other way rigs the system in the insurance's benefit and results in less pay outs.

 

[Rand]

Originally Posted by John_K
Exactly. I have been hit several times in my 40 years of driving and I just call my insurance co and they take care of it. Never heard of calling the other person's, you are covered by your insurance it is their responsib8lity.


Read closer he had liability only on it.