Police won't reimburse for wrongly impounded car

[Atez]

We have motor trade insurance, with three named drivers on the policy to drive any vehicle.

 

The police pulled one of our vehicles over as it didn't show up on the MID. It was explained that it was covered under the policy and I even drove down to meet the officer and gave him the insurance papers. The police officer misunderstood the policy and said the driver was not allowed to drive the vehicle but I was allowed, but he still ordered a tow vehicle and impounded the car. We got our insurance company to speak directly to the police the very next morning to say the driver was covered to drive the car. It cost us £170 to get the car released from the pound and I have contacted the police legal team to claim reimbursement for this amount. Their legal team have come back with, 'The police officer was in belief that the driver was uninsured and therefore right in impounding the vehicle, therefore they deny liability whatsoever in respect of reimbursement of any fees'. They also lied in saying we did not provide evidence of the driver being insured at the time of being stopped, which we did and we have another witness to prove that.

 

I am so angry because we have not committed any crime, yet they are treating us like criminals and charging us for it.

[sgtbush]

See a solicitor. Start action.

I take it that your motor insurance policy allows all 3 drivers to drive any car even if that car has no insurance taken out .

I mean I can drive any car 3rd party as long as I have permission from the owner and there is insurance on that vehicle I want to drive. ( private policy) as apposed to yours being a trade ploicy

[renegadeimp]

Agreed. Seek legal advice. The police legal team are essentially saying they can impound any car without proof, and theres nothing you can do about it. It doesnt matter if the police had a belief. The evidence shows that belief was unfounded. Especially as it was shown BEFORE the impound happened.

[Atez]

Thank you for reassuring me to take this matter further.

 

Our policy allows us to drive any vehicle without the actual vehicle being insured itself.

[renegadeimp]

Speak to a specialist solicitor. Most will give first half hr free, and thats normally enough to see if you have a valid claim or not.

[randm]

Hi there, not sure if it is relevant or not but a few years ago a friend of mine was pulled over for no insurance. He's a class 1 straight guy and he told them that he did indeed have insurance. However the car got impounded because the insurance company had not tagged it as OK or something of that nature. Anyway long story short, the car got impounded, he called the insurance and sorte dthe issue out, went to get the car and had to pay fees. THe insurance company actually reimbursed him as it was their fault.

 

Let us know what happens.

[unclebulgaria67]

Hi there, not sure if it is relevant or not but a few years ago a friend of mine was pulled over for no insurance. He's a class 1 straight guy and he told them that he did indeed have insurance. However the car got impounded because the insurance company had not tagged it as OK or something of that nature. Anyway long story short, the car got impounded, he called the insurance and sorte dthe issue out, went to get the car and had to pay fees. THe insurance company actually reimbursed him as it was their fault.

 

Let us know what happens.

 

Agree that Insurers should be asked to refund the impound fee. It is a legal requirement for the Insurers to show the vehicle as being insured on the Motor Insurance Database (MID) the Police access.

 

If the vehicle was not on MID and Insurance document was not clear, it is not the fault of the Police.

 

Send the impound fee paid receipt to the Insurers/brokers that administer the policy with a complaint letter and ask for a refund of the fee. Advise in the letter that the underwriters of the policy failed to notify MID of the Insurance as required by law. The Police have refused to waive the impound fee. Etc.

[sgtbush]

How does the MID treat people with trade policies?

Do they put the names on the data base?

 

Surely if the vehicle was stopped and an insurance policy was produced and all other legal requirements were met then their is a case to answer.

I'm thinking there was other discrepancy's.

Trade plates required?

No mot

Drivers licence not right or not right for the class of vehicle, making the insurance invalid

Vehicle in a dangerous condition

Something like that.

 

I'm playing devils advocate

[Atez]

Okay I understand some of the points made. So here is the full story.....

 

When we took out the Trade insurance, we were told (and it's backed up in the policy documents) that we were covered to drive ANY car whether it's in our name or not. This is because if we purchase a vehicle at an auction and have to drive it back, obviously not enough time to put on the MID. But also, if we only have a vehicle for a short period of time because it has been sold on. The majority of vehicles that we only have on the MID are our own personal vehicles or vehicles that are taking longer to sell. The policy also allows us to drive for Social, Domestic & Pleasure.

 

The vehicle and driver stopped was fully legal (mot, tax, drivers licence etc) and the vehicle was originally on the MID list due to it being in our possession for some time. However, the insurance brokers arranged for us to swap over to another insurance company (Tradex) so we could also be insured for motorbikes. When the broker swapped the list of vehicles onto the new insurance MID list they somehow left out this vehicle and one other, but remember we were still covered to drive any vehicle on or off the MID list.

 

The insurance documents state who is allowed to drive and for what reasons, i.e for business purposes and personal SD&P. The only thing the driver was not insured for was HIS OWN personal vehicles, he was insured to drive OUR Personal vehicles, and this is where the police officer got it wrong. He kept saying that because the vehicle was registered in our name (could be classed as personal) then he was not insured to drive our personal vehicle. The insurance company even confirmed the very next day that the officer read it wrong. I even showed the documents to another police officer at the station and he read it correctly and said it read clearly to him, so didn't know how the other officer got it so wrong.

[sgtbush]

Its a mine field.

The only thing I can see Is a mix up changing company's and maybe coz the vehicle was missed off and you cant interchange personal vehicles.

The officer may of thought you may be trying to circumvent the terms somehow. If the officer is unsure they cannot let you continue. What if you they let you go, you pulled out and killed a child crossing the road and then, in court, your found to have no insurance on a technicality. That's the issue.

So in my eyes impounding is correct.

However I would of thought you could have a claim against the insurance provider as its not clear what thepolicy covers, even when read by a police officer at the road side.

I dont think the officer got it wrong, I think its the policy details and a technicality and the facts the car I missing off the policy. Your expecting an officer to be a walking talking instant law book. They are not. That's what the courts are for.

Take it to court

[Atez]

Forgot to say. Ideally the vehicle should have been on the MID but at the end of the day, the insurance covered us to drive it whether or not it was on the list.

[Atez]

It wasn't myself that was stopped, it was one of the other named drivers, and when I drove the documents down to where he pulled him over I even said to the officer that you can clearly see that I am insured to drive the car, so let me drive it home. He agreed that I was insured but still wouldn't let me drive the vehicle home.

[sgtbush]

That's the correct procedure.

 

Your claim, in my eyes, is against the insurance provider not the police

[Atez]

So the insurance documents account for nothing? What is the point of having them then if the police can read what they want into them?

[sgtbush]

That is your argument to put to the insurance provider, not the police.

If the policy is unclear then who's fault is that?

Not yours obviously, but its not the polices fault either.

The officer must of thought there maybe a technical infringement here. They have a duty of care to all.

 

You coming down with the actual docuents is a good thing. But if the officer is still unsure he cant let you drive the car off. That's not how it works.

If I got stopped with no insurance, what's to stop my mate with a trade policy to come down and collect the car, circumventing the impound fee?

 

Like I have said your argument is with the insurance provider not the police. You have a case, I think they, the provider are at fault, unless they see what the technicality is/was.

[Atez]

I hear what you are saying and agree to a certain extent.

 

The issue with the officer was with the driver at the end of it, as he could see I was insured to drive the car as the car was actually in my name so no crime was going to be committed. The offence now, where the officer was concerned was that he thought the original driver he stopped was not covered to drive the car, and yes you're right in saying he could not let the driver continue to drive the vehicle for safety reasons. The offence had still been committed by the driver in the eyes of the officer, so the summons could still be carried out without having to impound the car. It's not as if the car was at fault, do you see where I'm coming from?

[sgtbush]

Was the driver told that they were going to be reported for the offence of driving a motor vehicle with no insurance?

 

If yes then its a not guilty plea and have their day in court with the insurance documents proving they were insured.

But at the end of the day Te vehicle gets impounded. End of.

[randm]

Hi there

 

It is possible to be insured but not registered on the MIB database, so if you produce your documents or call the insurers up and confirm you have insurance the Police can still take the car until you sort it out. Is that what happened here?

 

Loads of people insure their car to get the documents and then cancel the insurance after 1 month, you see it on these Police programmes every episode, so they are not going to accept a paper document at the roadside any longer.

[sgtbush]

the police ring the insurers directly at the roadside to confirm insurance.

the data base supplies the data to ANPR

[Atez]

The case was dropped/cancelled the very next morning when they spoke directly to the insurance company.

 

Anyway, a nice phone call to the Brokers today revealed that they sent Tradex an email will ALL of the vehicles required to be put on the MID list, so it was Tradex who failed to put the vehicle on there. Tradex will now be refunding the pound fee. Happy Days!

 

Thank you to everyone who inputted on this subject, you've been extremely helpful.

[Aretnap]

The law is actually pretty clear in that if you show a valid insurance certificate which covers the driver's use of the vehicle, then the police have no right to seize the vehicle. End of. What the police believe is irrelevant at that point.

 

Of course the police might misunderstand the wording on the certificate, or believe reasonably but incorrectly that it's not a valid certificate, and decide to seize the vehicle. But if they do then they do so at their peril - if their suspicions turn out to be wrong then they will have acted unlawfully and they will be liable for the costs incurred by the vehicle owner/driver as a result of the unlawful seizure.

 

The relevant case Lay is Pryor v Chief Constable of Greater Manchester. In that case the police thought that the policy did not cover what the certificate said it covered, so they called up the insurance company to check and were told that the driver was not covered to drive the car. The call centre bloke was wrong, the policy did cover the driver, so the Court of Appeal held that the police were in the wrong and that they were liable for the return of the impound fee, along with associated costs. The same principles would seem to apply here; assuming that the OP is correct in that the insurance policy did cover the driver's use of teh vehicle.

[Atez]

Excellent link thank you. I will be forwarding this to the Police Legal team and see what they have to say about that, as it's almost the same principle that our car was impounded. The only difference being the officer couldn't telephone the insurance company at the time because it was Sunday afternoon.

[renegadeimp]

Double, triple and quadruple check EVERYTHING before you send it to their legal team. You need to ensure you havent made ANY mistakes or given them any leeway to ge tout of it or make excuses.

[sgtbush]

Told u it was the provider you needed to chase!

Glad to see your positive outcome

[Atez]

Told u it was the provider you needed to chase!

Glad to see your positive outcome

 

After reading the Pryor v Greater Manchester Police Case I don't believe it is all the fault of Tradex but equally the fault of the police.