Whiplash Claim - Pulling a fast one!

[reorete]

ty steven you are right.thanks for pointing that out .things got a little heated but i was merely giving an opinion and never meant to cause anyone to be upset xxx

[steven4064]

Thankyou reorete

 

Now how to help "the Poison"?

 

(hopefully we haven't fogotton what the thread was actually about )

[Wulfyn]

I'm most of all interested in answering one of your first questions - why should the OP be concerned about this whiplash claim? The reason is one of those rare animals - a statistic about insurance that is actually true! The one I refer to is the estimation that fraud costs the average motorist £40 a year in premium increases. Insurance companies knows that it occurs, try to stop it, and we know that's it's not really fair for the average person to brunt the cost of these criminals, but these costs do get passed on.

 

What's very hard is the pervading attitude that people have a right to inflate a claim, that it's ok to try it on with a whiplash because everyone does it. People who do this are taking cash from your pocket. This is why we all, even you, should care.

[steven4064]

Yes, Wulfyn, absolutely agree withyou

[gyzmo]

Steven, I just want to point out that quite a few posts you highlighted before are factual. That's why I jumped in to Conniff's defence as it were.

 

For my own tuppence, how many of us who have worked in insurance roll their eyes up when taking details of items stolen from a car or house?

 

Sunglasses are ALWAYS Raybans or some other designer (not £3.99 from the market), the maximum amount of cash covered usually disappears (the £2 in change for emergency coffee at Maccy's drive thru or road toll), jeans and clothing are generally designer stuff - never Primark or anything like that, oh and the new stereo that was bought has also gone, but - darn it - didn't think I'd need the box or receipt so chucked it.

 

When my parents house was burgled, the PC actually said to make sure you claim for everything you can. My mother nearly booted him out.

 

But back to the point, the practice when I was insurance was usually for the claimant's solicitor to have their own panel of doctors sympathetic to their claims. The claimant would state their symptoms and the doctor would duly write up that they suggest whiplash. The defendant insurer is then in the position of either paying out or spending money fighting it at the risk of losing anyway.

 

And how easy is it to do this? When I worked on the coal miners claims for Vibration White Finger, a number of claimants would fake the symptoms by, for example, putting their fingers in a bag of frozen peas to simulate lack of blood flow to the fingers that is common with VWF. And the shaking and lack of dexterity with the condition results in difficulty in performing delicate tasks. It's amazing how many coalminers had matchstick modelling as their hobby that they could no longer do or window cleaning as a job that they had to give up.

[reorete]

maybe the people claiming pay year after year and never make a claim.so when they do need to make a claim they get what they can and who can blame them

[reorete]

ive had home insurance cover for over 20 years and touch wood never been burgled etc so i have never made a claim in over 20 years.sometimes i feel like im paying for nothing. i hope i never get burgled but if i ever did i wouldnt say my sunglasses were 3.99 market ones after all the insurance id payed you could bet on that

[LemonTwist]

Reoeite - it looks like you haven't understood a word I've said (or, for that matter, a word any of the other posters in this thread have said). I have been involved in insurance pricing and I have insurance qualifications, so I know for a fact that if people make false claims, it pushes up premiums for everyone. I don't know how I can explain it any more simply. If anything happened to me, I would only ever claim for what I'm entitled to claim.

[Mossycat]

ive had home insurance cover for over 20 years and touch wood never been burgled etc so i have never made a claim in over 20 years.sometimes i feel like im paying for nothing. i hope i never get burgled but if i ever did i wouldnt say my sunglasses were 3.99 market ones after all the insurance id payed you could bet on that

 

So you would inflate your claim and lie about the true value of things that were lost/damaged or stolen then?

 

Like I said earlier low moral standards.

 

Mossy

[Wulfyn]

maybe the people claiming pay year after year and never make a claim.so when they do need to make a claim they get what they can and who can blame them

 

 

Me for one. It's not the way insurance works, is intended to work, or is ever presented to the customer. Insurance is all about mitigating risk, and peace of mind. There is always a risk that something bad can happen, and the point of insurance is to make sure that you do not suffer a loss all in one go.

 

 

I'll use a hypothetical and simple example to explain what I mean here. Say that you are in a risk category that means that your house will get flooded on average once every 50 years, and this flood will cost you £10,000. Now nobody knows just when this will occur. To simplify that math let's say this this means that every year there is a 2% chance of it happening.

 

Now 2% of £10,000 is £200, so the insurer will charge you a premium of around £300 (the £100 is mostly made up of commission to the broker, covering expenses, paying reinsurance, with around 2%-5% being actual profit to the insurance company). This will mean that over a 50 year period the insurer will break even. Now you could go 40 years without making a claim, or you could make 2 claims in 2 years - it's all about luck.

 

The point is what is better? Losing that £10,000 slowly at £200 a year, or losing all £10,000 at once in a big lump sum at some random point in that 50 year period.

 

 

What it is like is gambling in reverse. You are betting that you will have to make a claim. So (to simplify) you have a prize pot (which is the value of what you own), you have the odds (which are set by the insurance company) and that gives you a stake that you must pay.

 

What it is NOT like is a bank that you pay into to withdraw at some point in the future. Every year you take out insurance you are making a one year gamble. You wouldn't go down the bookies and say "hey I've been gambling here for 20 years and never won anything, it's about time you let me win so i can get my money back".

 

The problem is that this attitude of being owed costs everyone else a lot of cash. Because there is very little an insurance company can do to recognise who has this attitude and who does not (you're certinaly not going to admit to it when buying insurance!). So because, like anything else in insurance, we cannot identify where the risk lies we have no choice but to spread it out to everyone.

 

 

And that is why people who commit insurance fraud cost you money reorete.

[reorete]

Me for one. It's not the way insurance works, is intended to work, or is ever presented to the customer. Insurance is all about mitigating risk, and peace of mind. There is always a risk that something bad can happen, and the point of insurance is to make sure that you do not suffer a loss all in one go.

 

 

I'll use a hypothetical and simple example to explain what I mean here. Say that you are in a risk category that means that your house will get flooded on average once every 50 years, and this flood will cost you £10,000. Now nobody knows just when this will occur. To simplify that math let's say this this means that every year there is a 2% chance of it happening.

 

Now 2% of £10,000 is £200, so the insurer will charge you a premium of around £300 (the £100 is mostly made up of commission to the broker, covering expenses, paying reinsurance, with around 2%-5% being actual profit to the insurance company). This will mean that over a 50 year period the insurer will break even. Now you could go 40 years without making a claim, or you could make 2 claims in 2 years - it's all about luck.

 

The point is what is better? Losing that £10,000 slowly at £200 a year, or losing all £10,000 at once in a big lump sum at some random point in that 50 year period.

 

 

What it is like is gambling in reverse. You are betting that you will have to make a claim. So (to simplify) you have a prize pot (which is the value of what you own), you have the odds (which are set by the insurance company) and that gives you a stake that you must pay.

 

What it is NOT like is a bank that you pay into to withdraw at some point in the future. Every year you take out insurance you are making a one year gamble. You wouldn't go down the bookies and say "hey I've been gambling here for 20 years and never won anything, it's about time you let me win so i can get my money back".

 

The problem is that this attitude of being owed costs everyone else a lot of cash. Because there is very little an insurance company can do to recognise who has this attitude and who does not (you're certinaly not going to admit to it when buying insurance!). So because, like anything else in insurance, we cannot identify where the risk lies we have no choice but to spread it out to everyone.

 

 

And that is why people who commit insurance fraud cost you money reorete.

thanks for explaining things wulfyn .im not saying your wrong merely pointing out as a customer how it makes you feel. im sorry lemon but like i said ive never made a claim and i have not got low moral standards. whys everyone jump on my case just because i have i different opinion is beyond me.would it make people happier if i just agree with what everyone says?thanks anyway wulfyn i see where your coming from and i agree now you explained it that way

[reorete]

my mistake ss was mossycat said i had low moral standards

[Mossycat]

I said you had low moral standards because you stated that if you had to make a claim you would not be honest about the cost of things and you would increase their value on paper to get more money from your insurers.

 

That is dishonest, it is theft/fraud

 

That is something that someone with low moral standards would do.

 

End of

 

Now can we get back to helping out the OP?

 

Mossy

[callumsgran]

I think you've all scared him off!!

[reorete]

him????? reorete is a clue

[uddin]

Hello i was reading about what you wrote regarding this guys car accident Just want to know if you can advise me what can happen about this situation!

 

i was at roundabout back in September 2009 and their was a car in font of me. The car was about to go but didn't, but suddenly stop harshly. I stopped in time and the guy comes out saying that i hit him. I told the guy that i didn't hit him but wanted my details which i gave and took picture (We both took picture). Their was no major or minor scratched on his or my car. and said to him nothing is wrong with your car!

 

It has been 4 months now and just received a letter from a claims company stating that the guy wants to claim back whiplash from September 20009.

[uddin]

why dont you want her to get payment? whats it to you anyway its the insurance that pays not you? you swapped details with her because there was an accident.if she claims for whiplash its the big insurance company that pays not you...if i was her to be honest id claim too and if you were honest about it so would you

 

Hello i was reading about what you wrote regarding this guys car accident Just want to know if you can advise me what can happen about this situation!

 

i was at roundabout back in September 2009 and their was a car in font of me. The car was about to go but didn't, but suddenly stop harshly. I stopped in time and the guy comes out saying that i hit him. I told the guy that i didn't hit him but wanted my details which i gave and took picture (We both took picture). Their was no major or minor scratched on his or my car. and said to him nothing is wrong with your car!

 

It has been 4 months now and just received a letter from a claims company stating that the guy wants to claim back whiplash from September 20009.

[uddin]

She is only entitled to "damages" if there has been damage. If she DOESN'T have whiplash, she has no right to claim. To do otherwise would be at best misrepresentation and at worse fraud and extortion.

 

H

 

Hello i was reading about what you wrote regarding this guys car accident Just want to know if you can advise me what can happen about this situation!

 

i was at roundabout back in September 2009 and their was a car in font of me. The car was about to go but didn't, but suddenly stop harshly. I stopped in time and the guy comes out saying that i hit him. I told the guy that i didn't hit him but wanted my details which i gave and took picture (We both took picture). Their was no major or minor scratched on his or my car. and said to him nothing is wrong with your car!

 

It has been 4 months now and just received a letter from a claims company stating that the guy wants to claim back whiplash from September 20009.

[Conniff]

You should write to them saying you believe this to be a fraudulent claim and that you never touched his car. They can't just pay out on his sayso and he will need to prove you hit him and caused damage to him.

 

There are so many of these fraudulent claims now, mainly instigated by legal firms out to make big bucks.

 

Did you report this to your insurance company and do you have legal cover with them?

 

Don't pay a penny until you have seen the full medical report.

[uddin]

no i didn't report this to my insurance company when it happened.

[Mossycat]

OK well now you do need to report it to them and let them sort it out.

 

Pass any paperwork you have received onto them and when you fill in the accident report form make it clear that there was no actual impact between your car and any other. If they ask why you didn't report it earlier tell them there was nothing to report, there was no accident and therefore there cannot be a claim.

 

Mossy

[uddin]

what happens if the guy says their was an accident i do not have any evidence my car is fine.

[Mossycat]

what happens if the guy says their was an accident i do not have any evidence my car is fine.

 

Well of course the other guy is going to say there was an accident, he is already saying that otherwise you wouldn't have heard from the claims company.

 

It is your word against his, he says there was an accident you say that there wasn't. Insurers will investigate, he has to prove his claim. Questions will be asked as to why it has taken so long for this claim to materialise, reports will be taken on any damage to his car and also to yours, possible inspections will also takd place to look for signs of repair. If neither vehicle shows any sign of any impact damage then more questions will be asked (of him) about how he can claim an injury when there was no impact.

 

Just let your insurers deal with it, that's what you pay them for.

 

Mossy

[uddin]

thanks for that!

 

Uddin

[Conniff]

Yep, as Mossycat. You don't have to prove there wasn't an accident, he has to prove there was.

 

Also be certain of the date this happened as he could have done something at a later date and decided you were an easy target.

 

Perhaps our government shouldn't be worrying about terrorist coming into the country but slimey American con tricks from even slimier solicitors. The advent of these type of claims, whether it happened or not have spread faster than myxomatosis did and the slimey solicitors who act them out don't care one little bit if they happened or not, they see a fast easy way to make a buck.

Edited February 1, 2010 by Conniff