Hi, just wanted some advice. My husband and I were on our way to a hospital appointment and our car was hit by a bus (local company). At the time my husband was stationary and did not cause the accident. The bus driver (although my husband beeped him and waved to get his attention) drove off, refusing to stop, which of course is an offence. The bus company are denying liability and are claiming their driver did not stop as he didn't know the accident had happened, in the next breath, he appears to be giving a detailed account of what occurred! Anyway, we reported the incident to our insurers (for info only) and have been trying to handle the actual claim against the third party insurers ourselves. The third party insurers, however, are refusing to disclose anything to me and refusing to co-operate., basically being very obstructive. They will only deal with our insurers they say, but our insurers are not actually handling the claim. Can the third party insurers behave in this way? We have since had a second accident (a foreign lorry driver tried to switch lanes suddenly into our lane and hit the side of our car, causing extensive damage, and it will probably be written off). Again, reported to our insurers in case we had problems down the line, although the police were called to the incident (by us) as the driver otherwise could quite easily have left the scene and simply returned to his country. He admitted to the traffic police that he was to blame and the police manged to get all his details, although he did not speak English. I have been handling this myself and liasing with the agents in Austria by email. Anyway, have now discovered that our insurers have doubled my husband's premiums (which we are not going to pay by the way) and it has also affected his no claims. Again, can they do this, when we have not actually asked them to carry out any repairs or anything else, as we are waiting for liability to be admitted before we do that. We are fully comp by the way, any help much appreciated, Magda

Why aren't your insurers dealing with the claims?

Hi, because we don't have protected no claims and if they deal with them and we aren't successful, then my husband will lose his no claims, which appears to have happened anyway and the premiums will more than double, which again they have done already. My husband is the innocent party in both accidents and the third parties for both had no damage to their vehicles (probably a bit of paint missing on the bus), so I am just handling them myself, which I have done on a previous occasion. It's a bit complicated as the second claim will probably result in the car being written off anyway, but we want the first driver's insurance to compensate us obviously for any shortfall from the second claim. Have been on to the insurers again anyway and it seems they will now back down and reinstate my husbands full no claims and we are taking out insurance elsewhere. Still need to know though if the third party insurer can refuse to deal direct with the insured. Haven't had a problem with this in the past. Our insurers are prettty useless anyway we have discovered. Many thanks, magda

Our car is still driveable, by the way, and the second claim should be pretty straightforward as we had the police as witnesses. The third party insurers for the second claim are dealing direct with us without problem, but the first lot of insurers are really awkward and obstructive.

The bus insurers have no lawful basis for refusing to deal with you.

You need to write to them formally and advise them that you are acting on behalf of your husband in this matter.

A couple of points to note.

First incident - Many bus operators now have cameras fitted to their vehicles, mainly inside but may have some facing outside. Providing you have time and route number, thay should be able to access the video data.

Generally though, the whole point of comprehensive insurance is to get your car repaired and for your own insurance company to persue the third party for costs, credit hire etc and an Uninsured loss policy will persue other costs such as excess etc. Especially with the 2nd incident your insurers will arrange repair/write off etc and persue against the foreign insurers.

Unless you have an insurance/legal background it is pretty difficult to persue third party insurers yourself. I would put this back into the hands of your insurers.

As you've notified the insurers of these incidents though, they will probably have left these open in case of counterclaim. If you want to continue yourself, you could write to them to them stating that notification was for information purposes only and that should any counterclaim be received then you would fully deal with this. They should then reinstate your NCD. I would not however recommend this route unless you do have a good legal/insurance grounding.

As for the reduction of your NCD now, I'm afraid you will either have to pay the increased premium or disclose to a potential new insurer the reduced amount and the 2 incidents which are currently "outstanding" which will reflect in the premium quoted.

Try and discuss with someone senior at your insurers, depending upon who you are with they may come up with a solution.

Sorry, one more thing, if you can confirm who the bus company is, I may be able to provide further information on who handles their claims.

Sorry, one more thing, if you can confirm who the bus company is, I may be able to provide further information on who handles their claims.

Thanks Trojan, I have managed to get the no claims reinstated now, so I can now take out insurance elsewhere, as the current insurance renews on the 21st Feb, so at least that worked out well! The third parties are not counter claiming for either claim as the vehicles involved were a bus and a 40 foot lorry, so they really didn't suffer any damage. Our insurance co. could have found this out via a simple phone call, but instead they doubled the premiums for no good reason. Also, I do have the bus company's insurance details, but the person I have spoken to is really obstructive and seems to be under the impression that he can only deal with an insurance company. We had an accident a couple of years ago (we have a lot of luck) when our car was rear ended and it was written off. I did deal with the claim from start to finish without problem so hopefully will be ok this time. Our insurers actually said, with regard to the foreign claim not to hold our breath and it could take a very long time to resolve. I have found that the foreign insurers(Slovenia) have been quite helpful and their agents in Austria are ok also. I find with a lot of insurance companies that they like to take your money, but they don't like to pay any out unfortunately. I have now emailed the insurance co. for the bus co. and told them I will officially be dealing with the claim and that I require details of the statement provided by their driver, as they have previously refused to provided any information at all, so will wait and see if I get any response. Thanks also to Bernie for the reply and thanks again Trojan, Magda

The bus insurers have no lawful basis for refusing to deal with you.

You need to write to them formally and advise them that you are acting on behalf of your husband in this matter.

thanks Bernie, have emailed the insurers now telling them this, and will put a copy in the post also. The person concerned is extremely unpleasant and has basically said that we have no right to any information under the data protection Act. Magda

Well the insurance company has now been forced to deal directly with us, but they are still being extremely obstructive, rude and they bahave pretty much like thugs. From what I have been told by a local solictor, this is typical of a bus company's insurers. He said they are always a nightmare to deal with. They recently sent cctv stills from the bus which they claim proved the driver's version of events (which they most certainly do not) and said they trust we will now retract our claim. mmm... don't think so. My husband looked at the stills and he said if we have all of them (they have cherry picked a few they think suit their own ends) it will show that my husband's position did not change and we did not as they are claiming, collide with the bus. We have requested sight of all of the stills, but they are refusing to send them and said we can get a solicitor to ask for them. I have also asked why their insured refused to stop at the scene of an accident and that I require a statement from their client, but again they don't want to know. I rang the company who underwrite their policies (they are actually a broker) and the chap I spoke to suggested sending a SAR as they will then have to provide the info we want. Seems like a good idea, so think I will give that a try. If we do find the stills prove our version (the true version) of events, not sure how we are going to get them to agree though, without actually taking it to court. Has anyone had any similar experience or maybe just has some advice? It's really a matter of principle now, as we are disgusted at the way this company is behaving. The foreign claim seems to be progessing slowy, so hopefully that one will be a bit more straightforward to resolve, although I'm not holding my breath at the moment. many thanks, magda

Hi, not sure what my next move should be. I've spoken to the IC's office and they were quite vague, so not that much help. Spoken to the Insurance Ombudsman and they say they can only deal with complaints about the person's own insurance company, not the third party insurers. So if the other insurance company are behaving unethically, apparently that is ok and there is nothing they can do. I spoke to a solicitor last week on the phone, he was kind enough to call me back, but he said as it would be small claims, he wouldn't recommend it because of the costs issue. So the only option I have really is to do a SAR, but not sure if this will force them to provide the CCTV footage or not?? The insurers acting for the bus company are One liability services ltd, and they told my husband last week, or shouted at him down the phone more like, that they can't let us see the images as we would see the passengers' faces. My husband replied that they had already sent an image showing passengers and has simply blacked out their faces. They are just unbelievably unpleasant to deal with, so I would really appreciate some help on whether the SAR is a good option or not. Thanks Magda

There is specific guidance on the Data protection act and CCTV footage.

I did a stickie with info about this have a read here.

Thanks Martin, will have a look, Magda

Well, not much luck with the claim against the bus company. They eventually provided footage, with quite a few images blacked out, as they now claim one of the interior cameras on the bus wasn't working, and we have no proof either way, they will just deny any allegations we make. The images have also been cropped it seems so it doesn't show what we want. It also doesn't actually show my husband hitting the bus, which they are claiming, and is pretty much useless. So, don't think there is much point in carrying on with this one as it is our word against their's and it will just drag on and on and they will continue to lie through their teeth.

The foreign claim (the cause of most of the damage to the car) is going better though and they have accepted witness statements from my parents who were in the car, apparently abroad, they are considered to be independent witnesses, so that's good. Especially as the lorry driver has decided to change his story and now is claiming that we hit him!! even though the police were there and he admitted to them what he had done. Will be glad when it is all sorted now as it has seemed to drag on for far too long.

Good news on the foreign claim. The driver initially lied about the way the accident happened, but they have now admitted liability and insurers agents in the uk are going to do a valuation on our car, so hopefully it should all be settled very soon now. One thing I have found is that insurance companies do very little to earn their money as this is the second time I have handled a claim directly. All they are interested in is increasing the premiums even if you are the innocent party and do little else. Magda