Insurance or accept cash to repair it myself?

[seangee]

I've also heard a few times of people claiming on other peoples insurance for damage caused to their vehicle through no fault of their own, the same as this scenario, and their insurance went up because they had made a claim.
Maybe different companies have different rules. They're still all slippery buggers at the best of times though.

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money/cars/...claim.html

There is a central claims register they all tap into so you can't hide the claim. The online quoting engines always assume the worst. When I hit diesel on my 10 year old Fazer I had to claim because of the amount of damage I did to the car I slid into. My bike insurance went up to about 800 for 3rd party only. they tried to bump my car premiums (and my wife's) the following year and I had to phone around until I could find a company that would over-ride what the computer said. We both had 9yr + NCB and once I explained that it was a different class of vehicle and what actually happened they accepted it - did need a lot of phone calls though.


No problems with the SMIDSY though. I ended up not claiming as the driver's insurance contacted me and offered to pay. Still shows up on my history but has never affected a quote. Some companies hold it against you for 3 years and some for 5. I agree its best to keep insurance out of it altogether but you should never be penalised for someone else's mistake. SInce he wasn't on the bike it would be pretty hard for her to claim anything other than full responsibility unless the OP was illegally parked.