Which repairer to use for your insurance claim?

You've had an accident, your not really sure what to do next! You want your vehicle repaired and back on the road as quickly as possible.

After phoning your insurance company, they appoint one of their approved repairers, where they achieve a commercial deal that helps to reduce the cost of the repairs, but what happens when you want to use your own repairer?

At this point a number of the benefits you thought your policy had start to be removed:-

Courtesy Car - Your insurer will remove the free of charge courtesy car they was previously offering.

I read an article recently that suggested this was because courtesy cars will inflate the cost of a claim, this is incorrect. A courtesy car is provided in the first instance by the approved repairer completely FOC, as your local repairer isn't contracted to provide a car, the insurers cannot make them.

Repair Guarantee - Quite rightly an insurer will withdraw the repair guarantee, after all how can one be expected to guarantee work for someone they don't know

Repair Costs - Your insurers may contest that they will only pay for the repairs up to the amount they could achieve under their own commercial arrangements via their approved repairer.

Your right is to be indemnified up to the retail cost of what you can achieve for the cost of the repairs on the open market, this can relatively easily be contested.

Most repairers will also be content to negotiate with the insurer engineers (as long as they can be reasonable)

Additional Excess - Some insurers will apply an increased excess to your claim by utilising a repairer of your own choice.

This is a grey area, one that I have a strong opinion on so will avoid going into to much detail, however always check your policy wording in your cooling off period. Most insurers I have stumbled across that apply this offer an alternative policy that doesn't include this clause.

If you don't agree with a clause check it immediately after purchase whilst in your cooling off period, don't just assume you will never have an accident, the famous last words our advisers hear all of the time.

At this point all seems lost and you have to admit defeat and not use your local repairer that you know & trust... but this isn't the case!

Speak with the repairer, you will often find all the obstacles can be removed by the repairer, most offer courtesy cars FOC, repair guarantees and will negotiate.

At Horizon Vehicle Management Ltd we offer

A nationwide network of BS10125 & Manufacturer Approved Repairers

Lifetime Repair Guarantee - from us not our repair network

FOC Courtesy Cars & Vans

Nationwide Recovery & A Taxi to get you home (that insurer that claims on TV to be the only one offering this... we think not)

And much, much more....

We work with insurers, brokers, accident management companies, credit hire organisations, fleet operators, independent accidents repair shops, motor trade, dealers and retail clients why not get in touch [email protected]