Claiming for bike\wheel damage caused by potholes - worth the hassle?

daniel_b

Morning all,

yesterday on the commute, in the dark I missed spotting a dropped manhole cover in time, and crashed through it on my commuter, seated, and with panniers on.

Latterly have realised it has marginally bent the front wheel, and majorly bent the rear wheel including a broken (sheared I think) rear spoke.
I think the frame got away with it.

I'm taking the wheels to my lbs today to see what they can do, and am hoping it just needs a new spoke and rebuilding, and hopefully the front one needs a minor truing, but if it's worse, and I need new wheels, I'd need to look to put a claim in I think.

I'll go back to take pictures in daylight with a tape measure etc, but wondered if anyone had previous experience of claiming from a local council - in this case it is Hampshire County council.
Looking on their website it seems to be all geared up for motorists making large claims for vehicle damage, and there appears to be a lot of hoops to jump through, so although I will definitely report the manhole cover as it's bl00dy dangerous, I hope to just take it on the chin and pay for the fix myself.

This is it in July 2019 via streetview, but I'm pretty sure it has dropped a fair amount more since then:



Any previous experiences, Hampshire or otherwise, appreciated.

Thankyou.

me-109

It needs to have been reported previously to stand any chance of success.

First.Aspect

Am trying to get insurance excess back for pothole damage to my car at the moment. Council just pass it on to their own insurers, who make every effort to ignore correspondence.

The bias is in favour of the council. They need to show that they have an adequate inspection and repair system in place and that they could not have known about that hole. You are on the right lines by showing the damage has been there since 2019.

I hit a hole on the edge of a patch. So I am arguing that if the patch was adequate there could not have been a pothole. I obtained records of reported defects on that stretch of road (there had been) and reports of any inspections and repairs (there had not). I also reported records of reports I had made of serious (around 12" deep) defects and showed that these had to be reported multiple times and still took months to repair.

All of this may not be enough.

Munsford0

Years ago I got the cost of a car tyre refunded by the council. Drove through what looked like an innocent puddle but turned out to be a pothole which damaged the tyre wall. 'Twas outside the school, and apparently reported numerous times already.

daniel_b

Ouch, that sounds heavy duty @First.Aspect and your car must have had some serious damage - I hope you get it sorted.

I suspect if my own bill is sub £150 I will write it off to experience, and if it's over I'll look to pursue.

Looking online, it would not appear that it has been reported before

That's good you managed to get the costs refunded @Munsford0

First.Aspect

Thing is, it wasn't serious damage. Just scrapes on the bumper from the suspension bottoming out and a new alloy and tyre. The legal costs the council or their insurers will incur for me to recover my insurance excess (which given the car is quite high) will exceed the costs of the damage. This is only dragging on because their insurers have not acknowledged receipt of or replied to any correspondence.

daniel_b

That's really shyt.

daniel_b

Was expecting the worst, but just took it to my local bike shop, and the gent in there who I know quite well, and serviced these very wheels only a few months back, was able to ascertain the spoke was fine, and just that the nipple had sheared off.

He took the tyre, and rim tape off, checked the rim was intact, and fitted a new nipple, re-tensioned it all, and did a minor adjustment on the front wheel, all for the princely sum of £25 - getting on for a good hour of his time.

Back and home within an hour, proper result

Charlie_Croker

Nice result. I would still (if you have the time to spare) put the claim into the council, don't forget to add your time lost onto the bill. It may help others with similar claims and help get the hazard removed which would benefit everybody

mully79

Good luck claiming. Here's Darren measuring potholes for those who missed the fun memes at the time.

https://www.google.co.uk/amp/s/metro.co.uk/2018/03/12/highway-inspector-darren-gets-mocked-after-pothole-picture-goes-viral-7381066/amp/

wolfsbane2k

Urgh, sorry to hear about that. Hampshire self insure, I've been through that rigmarole with them for £75 for spoke replace and true, and just gave up in the end, although it did mean they actually came out, inspected the road they'd not inspected for 4 years (which indicated they were negligent in their duty to inspect), but it just wasn't worth it.

In more recent years i have highlighted the car centric nature of the claims page to them; it's not in their priority scheme to fix, they need to fix their car centric design and build guidance first...