G repaired

 One of our members works for a company that hires cars to insurance companies while yours is in for paint, high end cars be it BMW, mercs you name it. Scenario: this guy had a TVR and crashed it, but as TVR had gone cuput it was hard to get a body shell, so while the insurance company was letting there client drive around in a jag at a cost of £1500 a week his TVR was waiting for a body shell, this went on for months, the TVR was repaired, but the hire charge for the jag was over £60,000, plus the repair to the car which was worth £28,000. because the repairs didn't go over the cost of the car it was not written off, but the cost of hiring an equivalent car was, so why don't the insurance company just write it off, save on hire costs and buy him an equivalent car, or offer him the money ! Wonder why my insurance went up 60%

Not long after getting the Cayenne my brother in law reversed into the side of it making a large dent in the drivers door. His excuse was he did not see it because it was dark and the car is black !! Anyway shortly after contacting my insurers and passing on his insurance details I was contacted by a company called Accident Express who told me they would be handling the claim on behalf of my brother in laws insurance company and that they had admitted liability.

They arranged to have the Cayenne collected by an approved Porsche repair centre and told me that I was entitled to a like for like replacement whilst my vehicle was off the road. This would be an equivalent luxury 4x4.
I was a bit surprised when the following day a Bentley Flying Spur was delivered to my house with less than 700 miles on the clock. I had the Bentley for nearly two months until my repaired Cayenne was returned and the Bentley uplifted. The repair was to a good standard and all in all I thought the service I had recieved was excellent.

About three months later I recieved a letter from Claims Direct asking me to give a witness statement in relation to a court action they had raised against MY insurance company for non payment of the hire charges for the Bentley. These amounted to nearly £20,000, the actual repair to the Cayenne was shown as only  £3,800.

I contacted my insurance company who told me that there was a group of third party operators who were exploiting the insurance clause that gave an "equivalent " vehicle replacement when the clients vehicle was being repaired.  Equivalent used to mean  Mercedes S class = C class, Mondeo, Vectra etc. Now according to the third party operators like Accident Express the definition would be the equivalent VALUE of vehicle.They made their money because of the exorbitant rates they were able to charge for short term luxury vehicle hire. The insurance companys were attemting to fight back by refusing to pay these charges and several test cases were in the pipeline.
 
I don't know by what means these companys are able to act on behalf of the insurance provider but it would appear riddiculous and unsustainable that a four grand repair bill can become nearly twenty grand because of car hire charges.
The problem is how many of us would say no to the "free" Bentley when offered it. 

 That would seem the sensible approach, or possibly to negotiate the rate beforehand and have it on a sliding scale so that if the hire period increases, the rate drops accordingly.

Another alternative would be to offer the claimant a 'normal' car and financial compensation for having to look like a pleb for a few days/weeks/months. I know what I'd do, then again, they wouldn't be dropping off a Bentley if the Transit gets pranged would they!