First Car Accident

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tardtasticx

3075 posts

Uber Geek

#108044 23-Aug-2012 23:20

Had my very first car accident today, no fault of my own either. Silly girl not paying enough attention just pulled out of a side street, ignoring the give way sign, straight infront of my car. Didn't cause much damage thankfully as I saw her doing it and slowed down, but it was raining and lost control a bit and hit the side of her. Mostly paint damage, little bit of denting in my car.

She was very nice about it, obviously distraught, swapped details etc, asked if she had a licence because she didnt have an address, so I copied her info off that, and noticed she was on a learners licence, with no supervising driver. So then asked her about her insurance, she had none what so ever, not even third party. Called *555 as recommended by parents, reported it etc. and that was that, they said they weren't sending anyone since it was non-severe.

So what do I do from here? I've never been involved in an accident where I've been the driver. I have full insurance under my parents policy, but I don't exactly know what to do. Like, do I have to get my parents to claim it under their insurance provider (I think its Vero or State) and let the insurance company pay for it? Or do I need to call this lady and get her to pay for it herself?

-Sam

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20147 posts

Uber Geek

#676161 23-Aug-2012 23:29

Contact your insurance company. You have identified the driver etc, so you should be covered by them. Your insurance company should do everything else. One thing though is that you will probably have to pay the excess to the repair company when you have it repaired. I am with state, and if you identify the other driver, the excess should be refunded by them. But I had huge trouble getting them to refund it as they were trying to get it off the other driver, although they did after a year of waiting and a stern letter.

insane

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#676167 23-Aug-2012 23:52

Out of Interest where was this accident, work mates Mrs had one today in auckland....

tardtasticx

3075 posts

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#676168 23-Aug-2012 23:54

Mkay, Will do, she seemed pretty happy to pay for any repairs which is a good sign I guess.

And it was on Great south road in South Auckland, don't suppose it was in this area too?

kingjj

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#676172 24-Aug-2012 00:07

As above, but just to add: you would have been given an Event Number when you called the Police. Your insurance company may accept this or they may instead request a File Number. To get a File Number report to your local Police Station with the Event Number and they will generate one for you. Otherwise you did everything right. Pass all info on to your insurance company via the account holder and let them make contact with the other driver on your behalf.

tardtasticx

3075 posts

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#676173 24-Aug-2012 00:11

kingjj: As above, but just to add: you would have been given an Event Number when you called the Police. Your insurance company may accept this or they may instead request a File Number. To get a File Number report to your local Police Station with the Event Number and they will generate one for you. Otherwise you did everything right. Pass all info on to your insurance company via the account holder and let them make contact with the other driver on your behalf.

She was meant to give me one of these but she got side tracked or something and forgot about it and so did I. Should I still go get this number from the police station?

Asrafrate

276 posts

Ultimate Geek

#676174 24-Aug-2012 00:14

If it's any consolation, it happens to all of us whether it's our fault or not.

After seven years of solid driving with no problems... I had four in the space of a month; two my fault, two not my fault ~_~

Zeb A.
Twitter: @asgard

floydbloke

3522 posts

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#676237 24-Aug-2012 08:38

Plenty of good advice above, in short your insurance company deals with this sort of stuff all the time and will help you get sorted.

I don't quite undertand this bit

tardtasticx: ..., swapped details etc, asked if she had a licence because she didnt have an address, so I copied her info off that, ...

-Sam

Surely she must live somewhere.

Did Eric Clapton really think she looked wonderful...or was it after the 15th outfit she tried on and he just wanted to get to the party and get a drink?

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tardtasticx

3075 posts

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#676238 24-Aug-2012 08:41

floydbloke: Plenty of good advice above, in short your insurance company deals with this sort of stuff all the time and will help you get sorted.

I don't quite undertand this bit
tardtasticx: ..., swapped details etc, asked if she had a licence because she didnt have an address, so I copied her info off that, ...

-Sam

Surely she must live somewhere.

I don't quite understand that either. I asked for her address but she said she didn't have one, so I'm assuming shes staying with family temporarily. She was foreign and given she has only a learners licence, I'm guessing she hasn't been in the country long enough to find a permanent house. So at least if I got her drivers licence number and stuff they could use that to find out what address she registered when she applied for the licence.

rscole86

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#676247 24-Aug-2012 08:57

Police prioritise attendance to events based on a number of factors. If your collision was minor, ie no injuries, not blocking, minor road, and no dispute then they are not likely to attend.

You should have been advised to report to station is this situation, as your insurance company will want the police file/report number, not the police event number. The event number is created by the communications centre, and does not usually get made into a file number when police do not attend. The event number looks like P123456789. The file number is in the format of date reported / reference number ie 120824/5678.

If your insurance company is happy with just the event number, call your local police station and ask to be put through to comms, and just let them know you are trying to get your event number. They will be able to locate it for you.

keewee01

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#676265 24-Aug-2012 09:31

As others have said, try and get the insurance company to do as much as possible.

But... I have heard of situations where the other party was uninsured that the insurance company play mean and try to get you to take a civil case against the other driver to recover costs involved before they'll do anything. Not sure if this is fact, of just urban myth, but I hope this does not happen to you.

Given she was on learners and likely driving outside the conditions of her license then I suspect the police will be paying her a visit, if they can find her.

xpd

Geek @ Coastguard NZ
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#676269 24-Aug-2012 09:37

Ive had 2 minor accidents.... one I rear ended someone and the other someone rear ended me.

First one I dont count as my fault as such because the guy was being a complete ass but in the eyes of the law I was in the wrong so yeah.... but no insurance involved, only damage was to my car somehow. But I made the mistake of signing up to State a while later from my prev supplier.... State asked if I had ever had ANY accidents, small or large, claims made or not. I said yes and explained what happened etc, and clearly stated "NO CLAIMS/INSURANCE COMPANIES involved" (I didnt even know the other guys name and he never asked mine). When the paperwork came through to be signed, it said I had made one claim!!! I contacted State and told them that no claims made and the girl said "sorry, but you admitted an accident and its on your record now as a claim so nothing we can do" - told them where they could go with their policy and went elsewhere.

Second accident was not that long ago, sitting at the lights waiting to turn right, the light turned to green arrow for me, so I went... as i moved I saw a little hatchback not slowing down for their red so i slammed on the anchors...lucky I did because the hatch didnt stop at all and screamed through the intersection...pity the guy behind me was following too close and didnt stop in time and put a nice dent in the rear of my wagon.

Was only a young guy driving and felt sorry for him, wasnt his fault as such but again in the eyes of the law... if that nana driving the hatch had stopped it wouldnt have happened...

Young driver was fully insured, and I spoke to his folks anyway and they just covered it themselves rather than go through insurance.

Gavin / xpd / FastRaccoon / Geek of Coastguard New Zealand

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oxnsox

1923 posts

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#676276 24-Aug-2012 09:44

If it's a non injury accident you have 48hrs(?) to report it to police I believe.

But more importantly for you. A good thing to do if you're involved with any accident is take some pictures (which you can do with your cellphone). A picture will show things like, weather/road condition, amount of light (sun) and road-markings (lanes and intersections) etc.

You may not be at fault, but the insurance company likes all the help it can get to build it's case if they're having to put the claim on somebody else (or their insurer).

A picture also gets the car type, colour, and number plate, if the other driver is not co-operative.

mckenndk

911 posts

Ultimate Geek

#676280 24-Aug-2012 09:50

I am currently waiting for my car to be repaired after someone backed into the drivers door with their 4wd, obviously don't know how to use side mirrors only the rear view in the middle.

The person did not know if he had insurance or not (either you do or you don't) but the main things I needed to provide to my insurance company to avoide paying the excesses were the persons Name , Number Plate of car involved, Address or the person involved and Phone number of the person involved.

Thankfully I got all of those even after the person had been down the road and back again.

Done a few claims over the years sor far only 2 have been my fault, hopefully she provided the correct details and let the insurance company sort it out, but stay on their backs as they can take a while or forget if you don't.

Dion

tardtasticx

3075 posts

Uber Geek

#752964 29-Jan-2013 22:38

Cant beleive it was so long ago, but eventually the car was repaired (My insurance company paid because she admitted over the phone to herself being at fault),
then a few months back she decided to go back on this claim, and said I was at fault. Now after getting no where, we're going to the disputes tribunal in March because she refuses to budge. Insurance company is chasing her for absolutely everything (nearly $1500 now). She wont be happy.

Whats the disputes tribunal like? I've never been before obviously.

johnr

19282 posts

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#752967 29-Jan-2013 22:54

tardtasticx: Cant beleive it was so long ago, but eventually the car was repaired (My insurance company paid because she admitted over the phone to herself being at fault),
then a few months back she decided to go back on this claim, and said I was at fault. Now after getting no where, we're going to the disputes tribunal in March because she refuses to budge. Insurance company is chasing her for absolutely everything (nearly $1500 now). She wont be happy.

Whats the disputes tribunal like? I've never been before obviously.

Easy sit down and talk about what happened, I took someone to disputes tribunal and it was over and done with in minutes

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