Dealing with motor insurers as a third-party

cookdn

Headhuunter wrote:

I haven't got the time to phone and chase insurance companies everyday so as far as I'm concerned it's the no win no fee route from now on as clearly insurers only responde properly to solicitors

No need to chase them (that could actually work against you). As soon as it became apparent that Directline were going to be uncooperative my strategy was to play them at their own game as suggested by one of the lawyers at CycleAid, more details in this earlier post.

bails87 wrote:

I would have thought that my quote has gone up because arsholes are crashing into people?

I also don't think anyone has said to commit fraud by submitting a false injury claim. The insurers told the OP to use a solicitor, so some of us said that he should, seeing as that's what he's been told to do. If it's use a solicitor or be ignored then it's not the OP who's at fault, it's the insurance companies.

Bails, is this the post you're referring to?

IIamnot Wiggins » Mon Nov 26, 2012 8:56 pm wrote:

I'm going to assume that most people on here are drivers as well as cyclists. You know when you get your renewal in the post and it's gone up, even though you haven't made a claim and you're at maximum NCB? It goes up because insurers have to pay out for false & over inflated injury claims, like is being suggested by a few of you on here. It's idiotic, stop it.

I haven't read any suggestion on here that anybody should make a "false" or "over inflated" injury claim. I think (hope) what IIamnot Wiggins was trying to say is that, as I discovered, the no-win- no-fee route is really only an option if your claim includes compensation for injury.

However whether the injury necessitates compensation is a judgement by the injured party in the first-instance. I was more concerned about the damage to my bike and clothing. In the meantime I have joined the British Cycling Ride scheme so legal assistance should be an option should this happen in the future.

Best regards
David

cookdn

Headhuunter wrote:

I think most insurance companies prefer to deal with solicitors anyway, a few people on this forum have mentioned that they have been told by insurers to appoint a solicitor to deal with them...

They don't prefer to deal with solicitors, they hope that telling you that you "need" a solicitor will "persuade" you to go away because of the perception/potential of costs.

Best regards
David

Headhuunter

cookdn wrote:

Headhuunter wrote:

I think most insurance companies prefer to deal with solicitors anyway, a few people on this forum have mentioned that they have been told by insurers to appoint a solicitor to deal with them...

They don't prefer to deal with solicitors, they hope that telling you that you "need" a solicitor will "persuade" you to go away because of the perception/potential of costs.

Best regards
David

Ridiculous really considering that they wouldn't do this in a motorist on motorist accident... Why should cyclists have to get a solicitor simply to be able to deal with an insurer effectively?!

cookdn

DrLex wrote:

Fingers crossed for a good result.

cookdn wrote:

[...] I'll post to this thread again when something happens.

Best regards
David

Please do; it's useful to know of people's experiences in these (alas increasingly common) situations.

Direct Line's Wednesday deadline for acknowledging my court claim has been and gone. I applied for a judgement in default yesterday morning and it was issued today by the Northampton County Court. Theoretically Direct Line could try to get the court to set the judgement aside but to do so they would have to persuade the court that they have a real prospect of successfully defending the claim. I can't see them either trying or the court granting such a request. Realistically they now have no option but to pay.

I'm going to contact Direct Line by telephone on Monday to find out what their procedure is now I have a court judgement against them. I assume they will just issue a cheque for £511.93 and that will be the end of the matter.

Making a court claim against Direct Line has been relatively straightforward using the Money Claim Online service. There is small amount of paperwork to complete but most of it is online and I only had to post one form to the court accompanying a copy of the documents for the court's file that I sent to Direct Line to support my claim. The main thing is to read the instructions fully before you start. The Gov.UK stuff is useful to a point but in hindsight incomplete. I found a much better guide (unfortunately after I started) at http://www.crippslaw.com.

I'll let you know what happens next. Hopefully this will come to a rather dull but satisfactory conclusion.

Best regards

Headhuunter

cookdn wrote:

DrLex wrote:

Fingers crossed for a good result.

cookdn wrote:

[...] I'll post to this thread again when something happens.

Best regards
David

Please do; it's useful to know of people's experiences in these (alas increasingly common) situations.

Direct Line's Wednesday deadline for acknowledging my court claim has been and gone. I applied for a judgement in default yesterday morning and it was issued today by the Northampton County Court. Theoretically Direct Line could try to get the court to set the judgement aside but to do so they would have to persuade the court that they have a real prospect of successfully defending the claim. I can't see them either trying or the court granting such a request. Realistically they now have no option but to pay.

I'm going to contact Direct Line by telephone on Monday to find out what their procedure is now I have a court judgement against them. I assume they will just issue a cheque for £511.93 and that will be the end of the matter.

Making a court claim against Direct Line has been relatively straightforward using the Money Claim Online service. There is small amount of paperwork to complete but most of it is online and I only had to post one form to the court accompanying a copy of the documents for the court's file that I sent to Direct Line to support my claim. The main thing is to read the instructions fully before you start. The Gov.UK stuff is useful to a point but in hindsight incomplete. I found a much better guide (unfortunately after I started) at http://www.crippslaw.com.

I'll let you know what happens next. Hopefully this will come to a rather dull but satisfactory conclusion.

Best regards

Interesting, thanks...

DrLex

Thanks for the update; here's hoping for a result, but I wouldn't be surprised if DL apply to set aside the JiD on the grounds of not having received the papers. That's not saying that you didn't send them correctly, but just based on likely S.O.P. for the company concerned.

cookdn

DrLex wrote:

Thanks for the update; here's hoping for a result, but I wouldn't be surprised if DL apply to set aside the JiD on the grounds of not having received the papers. That's not saying that you didn't send them correctly, but just based on likely S.O.P. for the company concerned.

Based on the way they had me ringing round in circles today that maybe the case :roll: . But I'm not quite sure what it would achieve, surely the costs of attempting to defend the claim will quickly exceed the value of the claim itself (its only worth £475), that's before any question of liability. The other factor is that DL have made absolutely no attempt to prevent it getting a far as court in the first place.

However I'm not too worried about it getting to a hearing. Apart from completely denying that the collision occurred I'm not sure that their insured can put up much of a defence; DL have never suggested this being the case, they were suggesting today that they were still awaiting further info from their insured.

Best regards

DrLex

Is your claim including costs over £600? If so, might be worth your while reading this. Save any further time being wasted in getting the runaround from DL.
See also form N293a here about transferring up.

cookdn

DrLex wrote:

Is your claim including costs over £600? If so, might be worth your while reading this. Save any further time being wasted in getting the runaround from DL.
See also form N293a here about transferring up.

Thank you for the useful information. From reading it I don't think the use of a High Court Enforcement Officer is going to open to me because my claim falls under the threshold of £600, but this does seem to be the option with more teeth if you can use it.

I'll probably leave this now until the first week in January. If I (or the court) haven't had any response from DL at that point I'll apply for the Warrant of Execution on 4 Jan as this is 14 days taking into account the public holidays during the interim.

Best regards

cookdn

DrLex wrote:

[....] but I wouldn't be surprised if DL apply to set aside the JiD on the grounds of not having received the papers. That's not saying that you didn't send them correctly, but just based on likely S.O.P. for the company concerned.

Wow, DL have just telephoned me; the second time in four months that they have initiated any contact. To cut a long story short they were informing me that they have instructed their solicitors, Plexus Law, to handle the matter because they dispute liability. :roll:

This is where it gets a little bit wacky as DL first instructed Plexus Law on Thursday 13 Dec (they are re-sending the instructions today because Plexus Law claim not to be in receipt). This was the day immediately after their deadline to acknowledge the claim with Northampton County Court. The woman that phoned me confirmed that they had all the documents on file including my pre-action letter, the notice of service from the court and the detailed particulars I served separately.

Based on all the information available I'm not quite sure on what basis they can request to have the judgement 'set aside' ? Effectively they have ignored the matter until the day after their court deadline; it only got as far as court proceedings because they had completely ignored me for four months .

As before I am going to leave this until early January before requesting a warrant of execution. There is a possibility that something may happen in the interim but if Plexus Law are as slow as DL then probably not.

Best regards

Kieran_Burns

Surely they can dispute all they like. They are too late now and need to pay. It almost smacks of corporate blindness.

DrLex

David,
In your shoes, I'd draft a letter to the court to refute any attempt by Plexus to set aside judgment, pointing out the post-hoc events and listing succinctly the attempts you made to get DL to settle prior, thereby undermining any argument that your proceedings were "out of the blue" and that you are attempting to game an ignorant defendant with strict adherence to CC rules. You can then pick up the reins of enforcement in the New Year.

gezebo

I can't say I'm surprised. Although direct line have every right to defend a claim, solicitors are there to make money for themselves and no one else.

I'm sure what you've said is an accurate description of events however you don't know what other parties have said which will effect how any claim progresses.

My advice would be to be patient, keep a written record of all conversations and how much time you've spent dealing with the matter. Although you've given a figure for your claim, you can suggest to the DL an amount for your time or each letter sent out to them. They will tell you to get lost but ultimately only the court can decide on whether this is fair or reasonable.

However from experience I'd suggest that there will be some faffing, more faffing, dragging heals and then an offer to settle. In the unlikely event this goes to court this is where the written records come in handy!

cookdn

DrLex wrote:

David,
In your shoes, I'd draft a letter to the court to refute any attempt by Plexus to set aside judgment, pointing out the post-hoc events and listing succinctly the attempts you made to get DL to settle prior, thereby undermining any argument that your proceedings were "out of the blue" and that you are attempting to game an ignorant defendant with strict adherence to CC rules. You can then pick up the reins of enforcement in the New Year.

DrLex, this is superb advice. I have knocked up the following to send to the Northampton County Court tomorrow:

Wednesday 19 December 2012

Dear Sir/Madam

RE: Case Number: xxxxxxx - Mr David Cook v Directline Insurance

Yesterday morning the defendant, Directline Insurance, contacted me by telephone to inform me that they had now instructed Plexus Law to represent them in this matter. It is possible that Plexus Law may apply to have the default judgement set aside on the basis that the defendant was in some way ignorant to my claim and my pursuance of the claim through the County Court was ‘out of the blue’.

The defendant was first notified of my intention to claim by telephone on Friday 3 August 2012 when I contacted them to confirm that they insured the vehicle involved in the collision. I then wrote them three times enclosing my fully documented claim on each occasion:

• Tuesday 25 September
• Thursday 11 October
• Wednesday 24 October - in compliance with pre-action conduct giving 28 days notice

(Copies of this correspondence are included in the detailed particulars and should be found in the County Court case file.)

The single response that my correspondence provoked from the defendant was a telephone message on Thursday 18 October which I returned the following day. The defendant only wanted to confirm my intention not to pursue a claim for the personal injury sustained in the collision and refused to discuss the details of the claim or the question of liability.

On Tuesday 20 November I contacted the defendant by telephone and they confirmed that they were in receipt of my pre-action letter. On Thursday 22 November I submitted my claim via the Money Claim Online service and it was issued the following day.

During yesterday morning’s telephone conversation the defendant confirmed that they had all my correspondence on file including the County Court notice of claim and my detailed particulars. They also stated that they had instructed Plexus Law on Thursday 13 December, the day immediately after the claim acknowledgement deadline had passed. To date I have neither been contacted nor received any correspondence from Plexus Law on behalf of the defendant.

Yours faithfully

cc. Plexus Law

Edit: Updated letter wording to that actually sent.

cookdn

gezebo wrote:

[....]However from experience I'd suggest that there will be some faffing, more faffing, dragging heals and then an offer to settle. In the unlikely event this goes to court this is where the written records come in handy!

Tell me about it. :roll: I suppose there is a reasonable chance that once I copy the letter above to Plexus Law that they then politely suggest to DL that they just settle. Unless it is relatively easy to get a default judgement set aside, I would have thought that any action available to Plexus Law has been rather compromised by the way DL have handled things so far.

It's not like DL have to open themselves to a further claim, they can just settle this claim on a 'no admission of liability' basis. What they do with the driver's NCD is not my concern.

Anyway we'll see what happens next .

vitesse169

cookdn wrote:

gezebo wrote:

[....]However from experience I'd suggest that there will be some faffing, more faffing, dragging heals and then an offer to settle. In the unlikely event this goes to court this is where the written records come in handy!

Tell me about it. :roll: I suppose there is a reasonable chance that once I copy the letter above to Plexus Law that they then politely suggest to DL that they just settle. Unless it is relatively easy to get a default judgement set aside, I would have thought that any action available to Plexus Law has been rather compromised by the way DL have handled things so far.

It's not like DL have to open themselves to a further claim, they can just settle this claim on a 'no admission of liability' basis. What they do with the driver's NCD is not my concern.

Anyway we'll see what happens next .

Of course, it could be that the claims handler is a right duffer.... they exist in all walks of life and work. He/she may just be useless and now trying to cover his/her tracks before being found out...

cookdn

vitesse169 wrote:

Of course, it could be that the claims handler is a right duffer.... they exist in all walks of life and work. He/she may just be useless and now trying to cover his/her tracks before being found out...

Hmm, that did cross my mind.

I think what has happened is that the claim was first allocated to DL's third-party personal injury team because it was a collision with a cyclist. Once the PI team had established that I was not claiming for injury (the one single time DL contacted me) they then dumped the claim back onto the general third-party team where it has festered ever since.

After that I guess the claim never made it to their litigation team because the inbound correspondence was coming from me (a member of the great-unwashed public) rather than a solicitor acting on my behalf. How the court documents didn't provoke a more immediate reaction is anyone's guess. :?

Best regards

JamesPritchard

Sorry to hear about your accident. I have been reading this thread and wondered if I can offer any particular assistance.

I am a cyclist but also a personal injury/litigation solicitor specialising in cycling claims.

I am glad to see that you are not seriously injured and understand that you are not claiming for personal injury but are simply seeking to recover the cost of repairing your bicycle and damage to your property.

I can see that you have commenced small claims proceedings against Direct Line and that, as is usually the case, Direct Line failed to acknowledge service of those proceedings within the initial period thus allowing you to obtain a judgement in default. As I understand it however, Direct Line have now instructed their usual solicitors, Plexus Law, to seek to defend the claim.

Plexus Law are able to apply to set aside the judgement in default which you have obtained. They would make their application to the Court in writing and this would be considered by a Judge. In order for their application to succeed they would need to prove that they have "a real prospect of successfully defending the claim" or that there is some other good reason why they should be allowed to defend the claim. They will also need to show that they have made their application to set aside judgement promptly.

Therefore, the advice which DrLex has given you regarding writing a letter to the Court is very sensible. You have listed your various attemtps to contact Direct Line/letters written and have sensibly included copies with your letter to the Court.

You will need to await the Court's response which will probably not be received until the New Year. Unfortunately however, in my experience, default judgement is often set aside quite easily. If this happens it is likely that the Judge would also make an order that Plexus file their defence within a set period of time. The Judge would also either at that stage, or after the defendants have filed their defence, make a list of "directions" which all parties must comply with up to the final hearing. Usually the claim would be transferred to your local County Court for this hearing.

It is likely that the directions would include an order that the parties exchange statements. This really just needs to be your written version of events setting out what happened in the accident. It would then be a case of the parties attending the small claims hearing. Unfortunately, as you are claiming against Direct Line it is likley that the driver of the car would be present with her solicitor as the solicitor would be paid for by her insurance company. However, I would expect that they would be very junior and further, in my experience of small claims matters, the Judge will often be particularily helpful to an unrepresented party such as yourself and will guide you through the process (it is not expected that individuals will have legal representation in the small claims court).

In theory it is possible that, if the default judgement is set aside, when Direct Line file their defence it may include a counter claim. If this is the case then you should speak with your own household insurer urgently, however, in my experience, it is unlikely for a counter claim to be made in circumstances such as these.

Also, if this claim does go to a small claims hearing, as Benno68 has mentioned previously, there is a possibility that fault could be apportioned between yourself and the driver. Accidents which occur on roundabouts are notoriously difficult but you need to be clear in your descritption of the accident and hopefully a Judge would find in your favour. Unfortunately however, if the Judge is simply unable to decide that one party was more at fault than the other then it is quite possible that the claim may be settled on a "50/50" basis which would effectively see you recover 50% of the full value of your claim.

I hope that this advice is of some assistance and wish you the greatest of luck with your claim. I will try to keep an eye on the forum and if I can be of any more help in the future will certainly respond.

DrLex

James,
Welcome to the fora and thank you for taking the time to write an informative and comprehensive first post; we need a +1 or "like" button! Hopefully you will stick around and offer further advice.

(From your comment about the likelihood of the Court setting aside judgment, it would appear that little has changed in the two decades since I was last there in a professional capacity, although good to know that the Tribunal still assists the litigant in person.)

cookdn

JamesPritchard wrote:

Sorry to hear about your accident. I have been reading this thread and wondered if I can offer any particular assistance. [...]

James, thanks for taking the time to make your lengthy post. Getting perspective from people such as yourself, DrLex and others is very useful. While I have tried to knowledge myself as fully as possible on how to best handle this, the theory and reality can be somewhat different.

I suppose what I find most annoying is that DL are making a bit of a mockery of the court pre-action protocol and have effectively forced this into the hands of the County Court by ignoring all my prior attempts to resolve the matter. Is it that they feel that this is to their advantage as there is no financial obstacle to them using legal professionals? However I can't imagine that defending a fixed cost £500 claim using a law firm can be justified on purely economic grounds, what is likely to be motivating them to take this route?

As I have said before I am quite relaxed about this getting as far as a court hearing as I think my evidence is relatively strong. DL have had my statement and all the supporting info since the end of September, unfortunately I know absolutely nothing about their insured's version of events. I don't think there will be a counter claim as there was no damage to the car; the paint work was protected by hitting me side-on :roll: giving me nasty bruising from the nearside wing mirror in the process. In some respects a counter claim could work to my advantage as I would then get the support of my third-party liability insurer.

Best regards

cookdn

We came home after being away over Christmas to find a letter from Plexus Law simply notifying me that they had been instructed to deal with this matter by Direct Line and a N251 Notice of Funding. No denial of liability or anything else.

A bit of research reveals that warrants of execution can be set aside (probably as easily as judgements). As I haven't had any further contact from Plexus Law I am planning to send this back on Monday to try and move things along.

Monday 7 January 2013

Your Ref: xxx-xxx.xxx-xxxx


Dear Sirs

RE: Case Number: xxxxxxxx - Mr David Cook v Direct Line Insurance

Thank you for your letter dated 21 December 2012, your interest in this matter is noted.

It is now 21 days since the Northampton County Court issued a judgement against your client in respect to my claim. The judgement remains unsatisfied. If the judgement remains unsatisfied after 14 days from the date of this letter then I will have no option but return to the Northampton County Court and request a warrant of execution.

If the warrant of execution is issued and you subsequently apply to the County Court to have the warrant and judgement set aside I will contest on the following grounds:

• CPR 13.2 - Your client failed to acknowledge service of the claim or enter a defence despite being in timely possession of the County Court claim documents.
• CPR 13.3(1)(a) - To date your client has neither denied liability nor provided any evidence that could be used as grounds to deny liability and mount a successful defence.
• CPR 13.3(2) - Judgement was entered on 14 December 2012. On the basis that my request for a warrant will not be made until after 21 January 2013 it will be questionable that any subsequent application to have the warrant and judgement set aside has been made promptly.

Please acknowledge receipt of this letter and your proposals for settling this matter at your earliest convenience.

Yours faithfully

David Cook

cc. Northampton County Court

The letter make reference to the Court Procedure Rules for setting aside or varying default judgements.

DrLex, James, anyone, does this seem reasonable?

Best regards

JamesPritchard

Hope you had a great Christmas. Sorry for the delay, I was away as well.

Firstly you have asked how it can be in Direct Line’s interest to be justified in using a law firm on a fixed cost £500 claim. Unfortunately this happens quite often and insurance companies will outsource any and all small claims work to those solicitors who will employ very junior staff working on very low fees with a large number of cases supervised by one solicitor. I can only assume that they are seeking to dispute liability as this is what they have been instructed to do by their insured. As you have said you have received very little information and nothing at all to allow you to assess the strength of any defence that they may have and thus it is very difficult to explain why Direct Line are taking this course of action.

Thereafter, I am sorry to hear you have received a letter from Plexus Law. It sounds as though the letter you have received from them is simply a standard letter providing little other information. It may be the case that behind the scenes they are making an application to set aside your default judgement. As Plexus Law will be doing this work for a very low fee I wouldn’t expect to receive much contact from them and, unfortunately, you will probably only receive standard letters like this plus the odd phone call.

As it stands, until such time as your default judgement is actually set aside by the Court, you have a County Court Judgement against Direct Line and you are perfectly within your rights to enforce it.

Your letter therefore seems very sensible. You provide Plexus Law fourteen days to meet the County Court Judgement. This is a reasonable period and it is unlikely you will be criticised by the Court. I agree that you should send this letter and see what response is received. If you do not hear back I would then move to request a Warrant of Execution as threatened. Even if an application to set aside judgement is made and is successful you should still be able to recover the cost of requesting the warrant.

You have also countered any argument which Plexus may raise in support of an application to set aside judgement and it is sensible to send a copy of this letter to the Court so that if an application to set aside judgement is made and is considered by a Judge “on paper” they can refer to your letter which provides your arguments against such an application.

I hope this helps a little.

Regards,
James.

The Rookie

(2) In considering whether to set aside(GL) or vary a judgment entered under Part 12, the matters to which the court must have regard include whether the person seeking to set aside the judgment made an application to do so promptly.

Promptly, they are "'avin' a giraffe'.....

I'd go straight to a WoE if I were you....

cookdn

James, thanks for your further advice.

I didn't send get letter out and yesterday Mrs Cookdn called me at work to tell me that Plexus Law had left a telephone message at our home number.

Spoke to them today and they are seeking my consent to have the judgement set aside :shock:. To be fair the chap from Plexus Law was quite reasonable and a bit surprised (and apologetic) that Direct Line had let things get this far. We tried to have a discussion about liability but Plexus Law have almost no information about the claim other than the location and the scantiest of details from Direct Line's insured. All the stuff that I sent to Direct Line (four times) has yet to reach them :roll:.

All Plexus Law could say was (paraphrased) "it's a roundabout, there is no independent witness, it will go 50/50". So after confirming there was no counter-claim I said "ok lets talk about an out-of-court 50/50 settlement". To cut a long story short we have agreed in principle that they will settle 50% of my claim and reimburse my court fees, Plexus Law are going back to Direct Line for further instructions. Plexus Law started to talk about applying wear-and-tear to the settlement, so I pointed out that Direct Line weren't in the strongest of positions to start nit-picking at this late stage. He agreed.

On my way home from work I got chance to think this over and it struck me that Direct Line are rather taking the pee. I guess if they are looking for my consent they are either trying to save the court fee to have the judgement set aside or think they are on a bit of loser with the court and wouldn't get it set aside without my approval. As far as the collision circumstances go, the brief description of the driver's version doesn't make any sense in relation to the roundabout layout and their claimed direction of travel.

To be honest I'm relatively happy to get this settled as above quickly and just move on. However just in case I am going to send this to the court:

Dear Sir/Madam

RE: Case Number: xxxxxxx - Mr David Cook v Direct Line Insurance

Today I received a letter from Plexus Law. They now explicitly dispute liability and seek my consent to have the judgement set aside. I contacted them by telephone to discuss the matter.

Plexus Law could only give me a very brief summary of the defendant’s account of the collision so it is still not clear what is the basis of their defence. However we discussed the possible outcomes of a court hearing.

On a pragmatic basis we agreed that in the absence of independent testimony a court hearing could result in a shared liability. As there is no counter claim I agreed that Plexus Law could seek approval from the defendant to settle the matter on a 50/50 basis to bring the matter to an expedient conclusion. If the defendant refuses to agree to this shared liability settlement then I fear that the matter will need the further attention of the County Court.

This brings me to the matter of the having the judgement set aside to which I strongly contest. While everybody should have a fair opportunity to defend themselves, it appears to me that abuse of court procedure rules is the modus operandi of the defendant when dealing with a litigant in person claimant. Plexus Law are still not in possession of the details of the matter, including the detailed particulars of my claim submitted to both the defendant and the court, yet seek to make a request to the County Court that the judgement is set aside.

On that basis it would seem improbable that Plexus Law could demonstrate to the court that the defendant has a real prospect of successfully defending the claim to satisfy CPR 13.3(1)(a). My letter to the court dated 19 December 2012 addresses any suggestion by the defendant that I have not followed pre-action protocols and they were in some way unaware of my claim before it was passed to the County Court.

Yours faithfully

Any thoughts?

gezebo

Sounds like you are as happy as can be with 50/50 and accept it.

I've scanned your letter but Tbh if you are accepting their offer then just do the minimum you need to do. They are getting paid, you are not and the court probably don't care either way!

Apologies if I've misunderstood.

The Rookie

I'd have still gone straight to a WoE, once that is executed DL would probably figure the cost of reversing it would exceed what they were already liable for.

gezebo

The Beginner wrote:

I'd have still gone straight to a WoE, once that is executed DL would probably figure the cost of reversing it would exceed what they were already liable for.

That isn't how it works or how they think. DL will be employing someone regardless and if they are not working on his case it would another. It's not surprising they are disputing liability due to the circumstances. That's just how the world of insurance is.

cookdn

What a difference a day makes. There is now a 50/50 offer, including the court fee, on the table and at last I have the driver's version of events including a diagram. This is a complete fabrication and should be easily refuted with my GPS data. I'm now going for a 100% settlement.

There are two other interesting aspects. Firstly the driver answered a multi-choice question on the form asking whether they would accept a split liability settlement to which they answered unambiguously yes. Secondly the two pages I have are part of a larger document, I guess the claim form, but I don't have the date it was completed. I have requested this information as I am hoping that these facts will support my case that Direct Line have been acting in bad faith from the start should I have to contest an application to have the judgement set aside.

On a more positive note Plexus Law are being reasonable to deal with. I guess as officers of the court they cannot play the same games as Direct Line.

I'll keep you updated.

cookdn

All finished. Direct Line have settled my claim on a 100% liability basis.

In the end it was sorted out very simply by comparing my GPS track to the drivers account of the collision. Draw your own conclusions from the pictures below based on an impact from my rear offside. The car driver was attempting to exit the roundabout to the west, I was going North.





YouTube Vid of the above.



Personally, I very much doubt the mini entered the roundabout from the south and certainly wasn't directly behind me at the lights as the driver claimed. This is why I was entertaining the 50/50 offer, I assumed the drivers account would have them coming from the east and it would turn into a argument about who had gone through the red light.

For anyone interested, I plotted the GPS track onto the satellite imagery using a combination of Google Earth and the free ActiveGPX plugin.

Thanks for the supportive comments and advice.

DrLex

Missed the recent developments; well done for a v. good result. Had wondered, on reading your last posts, whether you'd lost the advantage by agreement to a 50:50 split; I'd have tied it in with reception of a cheque the next day for a stipulated amount. I'd go along with your suspicion that Plexus were only instructed after SJ was granted.