I got knocked off my bike by a car last summer. Got a broken vertebra and had 7 weeks off work. It was the woman's fault and she got done for driving without due care and attention. This December I have an MRI scan and a Doctor will make a final assessment of my back.
In the meantime, I've put in a claim for lost earnings and pension payments. I got paid while I was off but lost a load of overtime and payments into my AVC pension pot. I spent ages carefully working out fairly what I actually lost. I showed all my workings clearly. It came out at £1300. Then a forensic accountant at my solicitors worked it out totally independently of me and it came to £1400. That's pretty consistent. Churchill's, the woman's insurance company, have been sitting on this information for 5 months. My solicitor chased them up today for the umpteenth time and they said they can't see that I actually lost any earnings. But they are prepared to offer me £150. WTF?!!! I suppose they'll offer me a penny whistle and a Mars bar for my broken back. Is it just me, or are they ignorant f*ckwits?
Next time I see a bulldog, I'll feel like kicking its arse. Oh,YUS!
It's just part of the system. They'd rather spend thousands of dollars fighting a claim rather than pay out a much cheaper settlement. It's all about setting a precedent/bad example for future claims.
What they all said. They're just hoping you'll go away - just tell them you will fight this all the way but you will have to be prepared for various offers as they try to "negotiate" you down. I hate insurance companies (and banks, but that's nother rant).
For those of you not from the UK (Tor!), I ought to explain that I have nothing against Bulldogs, or any dogs for that matter, it's just that Churchill use a cartoon dog as part of their ad campaign.
Gary, no, the pain and suffering and future prognosis bit comes after my MRI scan this December. That's obviously an intangible and I am expecting some jousting with that part of the claim. This should be the easy bit!
I'm just wondering if they behave so badly that if it goes to the Insurance Ombudsman, he will make a punitive award to me? Teach the bloody buggers a lesson! Their other trick is to wait a couple of months after I have given them information they requested, then ask for exactly the same information. I really think they are just being thick, the clever people end up being solicitors, the idiots go into the lower echelons of the Insurance industry and just pee everyone off!
For those of you not from the UK (Tor!), I ought to explain that I have nothing against Bulldogs, or any dogs for that matter, it's just that Churchill use a cartoon dog as part of their ad campaign.
£150 Do they think you are in School or something and it's dinner money you've lost Get a good brief and screw them Oh, and from someone with a still dodgy - more importantly I hope it gets better - unlike mine
Good luck with it all. My Mum's insurance claim has been going on for nearly six years!
The one thing we've learnt from it is to always go for the option of legal expenses. I dread to think how much all the solicitors, barristers and forensic accountants have made out of this.
I presume you have told them that you will be claiming all costs resulting in this matter and that you will be claiming all Interest entitled to you from the date the claim was made....including any further loss of time to resolve the matter and possible stress related illnesses that may be incurred by the companys incensitivity in resolving this matter in a timely fashion.
That sounds a good idea Chris! :lol:
Luckily I'm a member of British Cycling, which gives me 3rd party cover of up to £10,000,000 if I cause a multiple pile-up or more likely, some silly person drives me off the road, in which case I can call upon the services of one of the country's top solicitors, Leigh Day & Co.!
If you ride a bike, join BC or the CTC (Cyclists' Touring Club), either way you get similar cover for as little as about £19 a year.
I was also knocked off in Spain in February (no, I'm not careless, just bloody unlucky! ) but my cover doesn't extend to there unfortunately, only on home soil. However, my travel insurance seems to be covering me and that is ongoing at the moment too! That was the guy's fault but I don't know if he's admitted liability. Even if he hasn't, I should be OK, because of an EU ruling that if a cyclist is in collision with a motor vehicle, the driver is deemed to be at fault unless he can prove otherwise! This is because 90% of such accidents are the driver's fault and most cyclists don't have insurance. I however DO, and I think anyone over 18 on a bike should!
.... an EU ruling that if a cyclist is in collision with a motor vehicle, the driver is deemed to be at fault unless he can prove otherwise! This is because 90% of such accidents are the driver's fault and most cyclists don't have insurance. I however DO, and I think anyone over 18 on a bike should!
That's grossly unfair IMO - considering the ridiculous behaviour of some of the cyclists in my area. Riding straight through red lights, weaving in and out of traffic etc etc...
In France, they love the bike, here they loathe it! It will change, gradually. The Spanish like bikes too, they are just crap at obeying the rules of the road, especially on RAB's!
No-one gets more annoyed than me about twats shooting through red lights on bikes. I once spent 2 miles chasing one such idiot (I'd have caught him earlier if he hadn't been doing so) and when I caught up I gave him a bloody lecture about how he made pukka cyclists like myself look like gits. He eventually agreed with me and we shook on it.
But the simple fact remains that 9/10 bike/motor vehicle accidents are the driver's fault. Of the 1/10 which are the cyclist's fault, not all of them are down to crass stupidity, I should imagine most are due to inattention or carelessness. So the vast majority of these accidents are the driver's fault and the cyclist has no insurance protection. I think it's fair that the car insurance industry should pay for damages until the driver can prove the rider is at fault. There would be no shortage of other drivers willing to come forward to suggest any wrong-doing on the part of the cyclist!
But my ideal, is that anyone on a bike over 18 WOULD COMPULSORILY HAVE THEIR OWN INSURANCE as I've stated earlier. It's not expensive. Anyone under 18 could be covered by the present (new) legislation. I think that would be the fairest solution!
I do not agree. What happened to innocent until proven guilty?
Some drivers make stupid mistakes, are genuinely incapable of driving and concentrating but this suggestion is just another step towards blaming the driver for anything and everything.
It's the same with pedestrian casualties. People forget there's two parts to a car-hitting-person accident - one of which is there has to be a moving car, the other is there has to be a pedestrian on the road. If a pedestrian walks out into a road without looking, the driver is automatically blamed - which is ridiculous.
If that is the case, it's not a quantum leap to extending it to cyclists, is it? In actual fact, I should imagine most vehicle/pedestrian accidents are the pedestrian's fault? Certainly not 10:1 the vehicle's fault anyway, as it is when bikes are involved.
Mrs F got £1000 when she was T-boned on a rbout in her car. All she got was a bit of whiplash. A mate of mine also got a fair bit of compo when he was knocked of his bike and only slightly injured his knee. Good luck with your claim.
I don't agree with the 'blame the driver' for everything suggestion; but clearly if you and the forensic acountant have calculated the loss as £1,300 - 1,400 then that is approximately waht you should be getting. The £150 is just derisory
I gave up cycling, pretty much because of cars overtaking when it blatently isn't safe, and being nudged by a double decker, which sent me up the grass verge, and over the handlebars into a bush. I was bruised, but pretty much alright, bus driver didn't even notice, but none of the cars behind stopped. On a single carriageway, overtaking by a double decker when there is on coming traffic and no cycle lanes or paths is just not on.
Didn't cycle too much after that, but when I did, I was bang in the centre of the lane, and I held the cars at my steady 20mph for the whole 3.5 miles home, except for the few that managed to overtake when there was nothing coming the other way. Got lots of beeps, the finger from overtaking cars, and even a bottle chucked at me, eventually just gave up, and started borrowing me mam's Corsa
Oh, and good luck with you're claim VO2... If I'd have had any sense at the time I'd have got in contact with the bus company and sued them for all their worth too, put on some fake injuries and that
Good luck with your claim V02 Max....IMO get them for everything you can...PG it wont happen but seen a few peeps have recurrent injury issues later on in life, due to earlier accidents and you need the best medical opinion/treatment and rehab money can buy.
I was a serious Road/MTB racer in my youth and had a few close calls on the road. Knocked down some idiot who jumped off a moving bus in front of me on TCR...he was in a coma for 3mths and ive hit more than a few car doors and some woman in a Jag rammed me once while I stuck to her bonnet for 50yds, bike and nearly my legs got crushed underneath ! She was MD of a leather good factory and admitted culpability immediately as it was outside a Police Stn, I had witnesses etc and then later denied everything.. some legal heat did the trick...amazingly I never got hurt badly on the road and I only wore a helmet in races. Given it all up alas and waaay to scared to ride on todays roads, with all the uninsured nutters about now, who dont give a **** about human life but ive still got my Fat Chance Team Comp and Titanium ATB.. I could never sell them.
I really miss it though and found myself wistfully walking about Evans Cycles in Canary Wharf last week
Sorry for my rant, you just hit an old nerve
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