Top tip - driving a 17 year old car worth £400.00 - do not waste money on fully comp insurance and protected no claims bonuses!
How much do you all think it will affect insurance my premiums?
That's fine but I have had the car for nearly 10 years and a lasts been fully comp with it.
Should I not bother trying to get it repaired on my insurance?
Will that at least cost me less when I try and renew insurance, be less punished so to speak??
Actually choosing fully comprehensive can work out cheaper than TPFT, or even only negligibly more. Premiums being based on risk, and a driver choosing TPFT considered a greater risk.
And why not protect the no-claims bonus? If the driver were to replace their '17 year old car' with a newer or higher group one, that protected no-claims might considerably reduce the insurance price.
100% its a write off, there's no getting your insurance to repair it. Without knowing your insurance costs no one can tell you how it will affect future premiums. Try doing an insurance quote with a fault claim added.
Check your policy document.I had a low speed bump in my partners car - they took 2 years off her no claims discount which wasn't protected.
Bear in mind that the NCD is a % of the risk they calculated.With 17 accident free years your risk was lower than it is now with 0 accident free years so the base premium will rise next year then they'll apply the NCD to that higher value.
If you keep the car then your risk also goes up, it's a proven fact in motor insurance that once an owner has bumped their car they are statistically more likely to have another accident in the same car.
What will it actually cost?Hard to say, my own insurance went from £200 to £250 fully comp on a Golf GTi, I'm 45 with a similar accident free record until last December but then everyone's insurance has been going up year on year so some of that might have been coming anyway.
Try not to panic about it.If they suggest writing off your car then ask them for the salvage value.It might be worth doing the work any way but bear in mind that once your car has been written off it will also affect it's (negligible) value and probably it's insurance risk too.
What is an insurance write-off? Your Guide to Cat A, B, S (C) & N (D) | RAC Drive
Whether you claim for your damage or not will make no difference as the Third Party will be claiming.
Assuming they value your car at £400 then they will give you £150. You could ask for the salvage value of the car and then pay that to the insurance to buy it back from them. You would then need to pay for the repairs to your car which sound like they could well add up to well over £1k and if you get it all done properly I suspect you would be looking at a cost closer to £2k or maybe more. That would be money that would be better spent buying a new car IMHO.
You need to figure out how much money you have to spend on a car and start looking around locally for something that looks good. There will be plenty of cheap cars around, some will be wrecks but there will also be some that will be well looked after and in a similar condition to your car before the crash. So your car is certainly not irreplaceable but it is going to cost you around £250 (your excess) to get a replacement (assuming you get £150 from the insurance company).
You only pay the excess when you claim on your insurance policy.You do not pay any excess if a third party claims from your insurance.Therefore you pay no excess if your insurance is paying for the repairs to another vehicle not covered by your policy.
Hi again all
Thank you very much for the help and advise.
I have spoken to the company that will be costing the repair for the insurance company on my car.
They are called Artis accident care. (anyone had dealings with them ?)
They want me to send some pictures to evaluate the damage and the actually resale cost value of the car.
They said not to worry to mush as they will do the best so that i have a few options on the table.
Not sure what will happen , but i am trying to remain optimistic.
In the mean time, might have to try and look at prices of cars i can realistically afford.