149 replies to this topic

[ant_h]

glad your ok oli....
sorry about your little mini....
hope you get back on the road soon in another...and hopefully get her repaired..

allt he best mate

Ant

[blacktulip]

i cant believe it, such a nice mini! sorry to hear it matey.

[Haynes Emmanuelle]

Oh I'm really sorry about your mini it looked in great condition. All the very best in getting everything sorted. It looks so sad on the photos with its like lights down and grille all squashed. You have to bring a smile back to Baby.

[exuptoy]

As a biker, I know the dangers of diesel on the road. I was thinking when I first posted that diesel could have been a factor but forgot to mention it. If it was diesel then you would have rights to claim against the lorry company. That could mean a pay out over and above the minimum price for a 19xx mini and you may then be able to claim for actual value of the vehicle.
If this is the case and you have documented evidence of diesel on the road or a corroborating witness then get in touch with HELPHIRE as they are a non fault insurance recovery company and will only help you out in the event of a non fault accident. You pay an indemnitty fee of £10 to cover any uninsured losses and they put you in a vehicle UNTIL the claim is settled and they charge the other persons insurance company for DAILY rental on a hire car and they take up your case for damages AND losses incured by you.
I have used them before and they are superb. They will judge the case from the facts and will not take it on if they think they cannot win. They also DO NOT involve your insurance company as they act as your legal team.

Try them HERE.

They are brilliant and they deliver the car to you.

Edited by exuptoy, 04 September 2008 - 07:41 PM.

[oli8925]

annoyingly couldnt get through to the guy in the van so left him a message. my dad said try to settle it outside of insurance, but he reckons there might be around £2k damage to the van in which case ill be letting insurance deal with that. then let them evaluate the damage to mine etc and see what they offer me. if its a pathetic amount i can then say i dont want to claim on my car so that way it 'should' be more or less settled with me paying minimum amount. but i guess you never know until insurance gets involved.

as for diesel on the road its going to be hard to gather evidence now as last night and today there was heavy rain, and probably will be more tonight. but if i can get there i will. ill also check the tyres for any oil etc tomorrow moring when its light. they shouldnt get wet as its been under a cover. depending on my findings ill call them up and see what they say. but thanks anyway exuptoy. useful to know as i wouldn't have known about any company like that.

i suppose as a silver lining to every cloud, at least ive now got the excuse to do the rebuild i'd been planning and it will give me a nice meaty project to get stuck into. reminds me of last winter when i was new to the forum and couldnt get it to run for the life of me. i went and worked on her outside through sleet and snow. kind of looking forward to the challenge.

[5MITHY]

Aup matey, im actually genuinly sorry for you it was a beautiful car!

to be honest in their eyes shes just a 20 year old base model mini with a few bits of rust.

Does this mean that you dont have any modifications declared? if so this could be a problem if you get the insurance involved because they will just void your cover and you will have to pay for the van anyways!!!




Also, I had a look in the pictures you posted in the first post, to see if I could see any diesel or anything on the road (which I couldnt) but if you have any more pics which you havnt posted up then they would be worth looking at as like you say the rain etc. would probably have washed it away by now...

... Dan

[oli8925]

cheers mate.

mods were declared, so they shouldnt be able to escape there. although no doubt theyll try.

the pics probs wont show anything unfortunately and theyre the only ones. it slid a long way so any oil/diesel would be further up the road. i wasnt going particularly fast tho so why it slid a long way i dont know. more evidence to suggest there was something else involved.

[*Raz*]

omg

How have I only just seen this!!

Its heartbreaking isnt it.

So sorry to hear this, but Im glad you are ok

Raz xx

[Wozza]

Saw this at Smd, my mate pointed it out and rightly so

That was me and took pics as your baby was one fine looking mini, i'm so sorry to hear she's gone glad your ok though and remember if a pheonix can rise from the ashes then so can baby

[oli8925]

Raz, yeah its horrible now i kind of know what you must have felt like, although it muct have been even more soul destroying to have it happen again just months or weeks after the first repair. but i suppose all you can do is keep pushing on if getting rid is out of the question.

Wozza, thanks mate. and she will. that picture you took is my background pic for my pc, so thanks again for taking it



got through to the vehicle manager today, and he said just this morning he'd put all the details through to his insurance company. no chance of doing this without insurance.

so now ive got to start a claim on mine and see what they offer and decide to go with it and buy it back or cancel the claim on my mini. i think. all i want to do now is start taking the damage apart and evaluating myself...non financially

Edited by oli8925, 05 September 2008 - 10:07 AM.

[WiredbyWilson]

Oli, just because the guy has put it to his insurance doesn't mean you have to claim for your mini from your insurance.

I'm pretty confident from the damage that your ins co will write it off and class it as a cat B or worse - which means you won't be able to buy it back from them.

Try to get a book price on your mini, what was it a 1998 998? and then compare to what you ins excess is. If there is not much in it i personally wouldn't claim. Just tell your insurance you had the bumo but don't want to claim for your own losses.

I have doen this in the past when i was only TPFT covered.

Sorry if it sounds like im telling you what to do, im not honestly, just dont want you to lose baby

[oli8925]

Oli, just because the guy has put it to his insurance doesn't mean you have to claim for your mini from your insurance.

i know but i can always cancel my claim if they give me a stupid payout, and then it wont be anything to do with them again.

I'm pretty confident from the damage that your ins co will write it off and class it as a cat B or worse - which means you won't be able to buy it back from them.

oh no do you really think so if thats still the case cant i still cancel my claim. the car isnt theirs until the claims been settled so surely i could get her back.

Try to get a book price on your mini, what was it a 1998 998? and then compare to what you ins excess is. If there is not much in it i personally wouldn't claim. Just tell your insurance you had the bumo but don't want to claim for your own losses.

its a 1989 so is quite hard to find. but probably the same book price as yours, just slightly lower as mines a city. obviously im talking before mods but thats what the book price is isnt it? ive literally just come off the phone to my insurance company and they said theyd send someone round to pick it up and take it away for evaluation. carp! i need to find out asap so i can cancel my claim before they get their mits on it.

I have doen this in the past when i was only TPFT covered.

Sorry if it sounds like im telling you what to do, im not honestly, just dont want you to lose baby

no no, dont worry. as ive said i have no idea what im doing. i just dont want to lose baby either! thats all i want out of this, to keep her!

[WiredbyWilson]

just did this online, think they are well harsh as they offered me £150!!!! but even if you tripled it and i think you said your excesses were around £600, it looks bad.

sorry oli - maybe not claiming at all is still the most viable thing. plus don't let them take her because you'll never get her back

clicky

Edited by Wilson1275, 05 September 2008 - 11:56 AM.

[Gingerjoe]

reallly sorry man! like most people have said, your o.k & its material in the end of the day & your fine, good luck rebuilding x

[Ethel]

I haven't read all the thread but a few points...

If any other party makes an insurance claim then the fact your car has been in an accident will be recorded and is likely to be brought up by your insurers, I'd imagine at the very least you'd need to use an approved bodyshop or get any repairs assessed by an engineer to keep cover.

Opting not to use your insurance could invalidate your cover if you find you need to change your mind if things become too expensive.

If your insurers pay out only to a 3rd party that's still a claim so you won't keep any no claims bonus. You may as well get what money you can out of them; they'll try to recover as much as possible when you next take out a policy.

Fuel spillage could be an arguable factor, but you'd need to establish where it came from in order to claim against the spiller. There could be a difficulty in explaining why the van stopped and you didn't under the same conditions.

My suspicion is it's one you'll have to chalk up to experience and pray your Min gets away with being a Cat C write off.