Danny B

Unfortunately my dog was hit by a car on Monday night and is recovering well, it was totally his fault and the driver did not stand a chance of stopping.

He has since rang me and given me a quote to get his car repaired, it's about £500. He has a company car and I have a protected NCB so I told him to tell his boss that I reversed into him while parking and my tow bar caused the damage. Unfortunately he is too honest and told his boss the truth before telling him this white lie. That way it would have only cost me £50 excess.

So now his boss wants to come after me for the £500, don't get me wrong I am quite prepared to pay for it (after a fight), but where do I stand legally? Suppose I was on the dole and skint, how could he get his money then?

Any ideas?

Cheers

KiwiGTI

If you were on the dole he could just get a CCJ and pursue the money that way, judge might order you to pay £1 a month.

Maz

iTrader: (34)

Pay the man.

DemonDave

iTrader: (13)

ClickPress | Dog owners liable for personal injury costs

Spoon

Owners should be made to insure their dogs by law, it would cut down on cases like this. My 2 are insured for 4 Million Public Liability, amongst other things, for 50%'ish of what you're going to have to pay out in this one case.

PaulC72

any self respecting dog owner would pay up if they were to blame i.e the dog managed to escape the house or was not on a lead outside or any other reason like that, but if the driver hit the dog because he didnt see it as he was reversing onto a driveway etc then he should pay for the vet bills for the dog.

just my opinion obviously.

Fuzz

I had a dog in mid stride that was heading to the other side of the road to see his grandparents.
I have this still image of a shaggy looking thing, both front feet in the air out in front of him... then he looks right and see's me.. eyes like dinner plates...

Next thing I remember is looking in the side mirror watching the dog do a spinning top impression down the pavement.

Cracked the bumper of my 306, bust the spotlight and ripped the inner plastic lining out of the wing.
Resultant quote was for £450 quid and although the owner who I vaguely knew as it was only 20 doors up on my road initially said he'd pay, he spat his dummy out when I dropped the bill round to him.
Said what he had to pay the vet had cleaned him, out and told me to F off.
GOt absolutely nowhere with it.

Andy

Danny B

Cheers, that sounds like a plan

Fuzz

Doesn't mean I couldn't have taken him to court over it all.
At the time they were bollocking the kids for leaving the back door open...

I'm too soft and just let it slide..

Depends what sort of **** he's going to be over it..

Andy

Dazza01

Deny it and say it was his fault and say you will counter claim his claim for damage done to your dog

J4CKO

iTrader: (1)

I insure my dog 'Furred Party'

stiscooby

Tell him to go chase himself (the boss/driver of the other car that is) and to go claim on his own insurance

hades

If the dog is in the road and not on a crossing/under control you're liable. You might get away with telling them to get lost, same as you might if you rode you push bike into their car or whatever. However, turn that around - if someone damaged your car (be it with a dog, a hammer or whatever) and told you "tough luck, I'm not paying", most people would be on here telling everyone what a **** they were.

DemonDave

iTrader: (13)

LOL @ J4CKO

would be interesting to see if all those saying sod him were to find themselves in the situation where their scoob or bike or pride of joy was damaged in this way.

So would all those, including Danny expect to pay it themselves or lose their no claims and pay the excess.

Fuzz

Wasn't worth claiming IMO

Scamming fraudulent ***** of insurance companies as it is, without trying to screw more money out of you at renewal!

Trout

iTrader: (1)

What a great idea - come on a public BBS and openly describe your plan to commit insurance fraud. You may not like insurers however you would not dream of walking into your bank and leaning over the counter to steal £450 so why do it to an insurer.

Your dog, you're reponsible, pay up.

I am glad your dog is recovering well.

douglasb

Check your home insurance. It will have public liability cover for you and may have PL cover for pets.

Stephb1986

But your quite happy to let the insurer rip us off for our hard earned cash i doubt it costs them as much as they charge us for being on the road it what they are their for to sort out claims.

personally i would tell the bloke to take a run and jump, the driver should of looked where he was going and not to be going as fast as he was then he would of missed your poor dog i bet he is in alot of pain he should claim for whiplash and his other injuries that would soon shut the ***** up drop him the vets bill see if he shuts his pie hole then!

Trout

iTrader: (1)

Steph,

for the most efficient of insurers (not that many are that efficient) the cost of claims is around 80% of premiums. The cost of operations, overheads and sales is around 12-15% which leaves a nominal profit of 5-8%, subject to tax and all sorts of other things.

About 10-20% of claims will be due to fraudulent or overstated claims - money that you and I are paying for dodgy claims.

So I am not sure what the rip off is. The level of profitability is around the same as Tesco and Sainsbury and I don't see many posts on here talking about how they rip us off every time we go to the supermarkets.

I presume you wear clothes where the margins are significantly higher - it costs between £1-10 to make a pair of jeans which can resell for as much as £345.

I don't hear you crying out about that.

Just because you may not like something does not validate open fraud.

I don't like petrol prices but I don't try and drive off after filling up because the attendant has not seen me!

Stephb1986

I've felt like doing that a few times, I wouldnt blame you if you did

Dazza01

Slightly of topic, but i believe the rip off comes when you ring up for a quote, my son has his driving test next week, and weve already got him a Pug 106 for when he passes (hopefully), now on phoning round loads of different compaines i got quotes from £1500 to £3400, which is a blatant rip off, but on talking to Direct line £928

Stephb1986

my first car cost me £1000 to insure TPFT my second car with a bigger engine and 3 more months of experience cost me £800 TPFT and my third car with a even bigger engine costs me £700 to insure Fully Comp! now tell me that they just dont make prices up in their heads!

OzzyWRX

What was your dog doing on/near the road and not on a lead?
Pay up and take more responsibility for your dog.

bioforger

iTrader: (1)

His fault? No, it was your fault! Pay the man.

Trout

iTrader: (1)

Can you explain to me specificallly why it is a rip off?

The higher quotes will reflect what is called the 'experience' of that insurer. It means that according to their historic experience they have of young, new drivers of Pug 106s have an accident rate of around 50%. Which is probably quite reasonable. Young, new drivers have an incredibly high accident rate.

With Direct Line who use real time pricing you can sometimes call and get a good price like the one you have and yet only a few hours later you call with exactly the same details and get a wildly different quote that may be much more expensive.

What this is based on is a model that says to have a 'balanced' book of risks I will accept so many drivers of a car type per period. If you are early in that period you can get a good price. If you are late in that period then the price will start to rise until no-one is paying. This reflects the increasing level of risk to Direct Line in being over-exposed to new young drivers. By raising the price you will either buy at the higher risk or more likely phone somewhere else and get a better quote.

This model is very much driven by the phoning around for a price behaviour that most people do.


Steph,

your price is the same - most new drivers have an accident in the first three months. Once you are past that your premiums will rapidly fall.

Rannoch

wrx-kris

your dog caused £500 worth of damage to a car and its still alive!?

i would pay him TBH mate..... and count your lucky stars the dog is on the mend and he hasnt put in for whiplash.

MattN

If the dog had escaped then it's not your fault. If you hit an escaped prisoner (and there's a few) would you be able to claim off the prison? I doubt it.

Danny B

Sorry my fault, when I said "His" I was referring to the dog and not the driver.

I have been thinking about this overnight and taking everything into account I am going to tell him to tell his Company to get lost.

If it was his personal car, then yes I would quite happily pay for the repair out of my own pocket, but due to the fact that my dog took a turn for the worst last night (brain has swelled and now he's blind) he will have to be put down tonight and I will have another large vets bill to pay.

Plus he didn't have the heart to wait a week before shoving repair estimates in my face, I am now going to reverse the claim and hound his company for payment of my vets bill and say that he was speeding.

What would his company of done if it was a deer he hit and not my dog?

Case closed, he had a chance to get it repaired via my car insurance, now he's not getting a penny from me.

Thanks for all the replies.

Flatcapdriver

Why don't you just take responsibility for your own actions? Its your dog who was supposed to be in your control, therefore its your responsibility to pay for any damages.

A shame about the dog but its about time people realised they are a responsibility and the fact that he's going to be put down doesn't mitigate that.

OllyK

Pay special note to line 2 of the above

This is why you should have pet insurance, it covers the costs of damage caused by your pet and the vet fees. Expect the company to persue you!