[mini66]

Hello all, im a bit new round here so bear with me! unfortunately had a scrape last week, 3 days after buying the car (previously driven by myself but actually a company car) sods law i guess.wasnt good in any case, but looks like its going on the other guys insurance, which is good! i have a 2001 pre face lift cooper. basically this bloke pulled out in front of me from between parked cars. there is damage running from the drivers side front panel, all the way across the door, and damage to the rear pannel also. there is also what looks like minor damage to the pillar in the middle of the car (to the right of the drivers head) I have a friend who is an engineer, and he thinks that there is a possibility the car may be written off due to any damage to the chassis. it looks to me like the midle pillar and the rear quarter panel are all one pice. what does everyone think? just hoping that it can be fixed, dont want my dooper going to the scrappy!

cheers

lewis

[I love MINI, Laura]

Ouch! Good luck with the insurance fight I mean claim.

Welcome to MINI2! Shame your first couple of posts are about this sad incident. Hope it gets fixed soon.

PS.... Just to update you with the MINI jargon: The Dooper is the phrase used for the new Cooper Diesel (2006/7 onwards). I see you have a 2001 Cooper. Sorry compulsive habit!

[mini66]

Yeh, it is turning into a bit of a figh. oh well eh, could have been worse. "dooper" was a typo sorry guys, but didnt actually know that so thanks for the heads up anyway!

[118]

oh no, sorry to hear that what is it with accidents lately! main thing is you're ok, but hope you get it sorted soon

[Randall Raines]

Quote: Originally Posted by mini66 (original)

basically this bloke pulled out in front of me from between parked cars. there is damage running from the drivers side front panel, all the way across the door, and damage to the rear pannel also. there is also what looks like minor damage to the pillar in the middle of the car (to the right of the drivers head) I have a friend who is an engineer, and he thinks that there is a possibility the car may be written off due to any damage to the chassis. it looks to me like the midle pillar and the rear quarter panel are all one pice. what does everyone think? just hoping that it can be fixed, dont want my dooper going to the scrappy!

The rear quarter panel & pillar is actually made up of quite a few different parts, all replaceable, if it's just quarter damage it would be quite easy to replace, if any other parts are damaged behind this then they are classed as part of the chassis, they are still replaceable but the cost mounts up making it more likely to be written off .

If you do have damage near the drivers head then it does sound like the post may have moved, however this could still be repaired without replacing (rushing or pulling it with repair equipment) once the rear quarter is removed, but as I haven't seen the damage I couldn't say as what seems very bad to one person can be very light to someone in the body-repair business.

The age of the your MINI is going against you a little in this case as a 2001 will be classed as quite old and maybe not worth repairing in the eyes of the insurance company (hope not & hope you get it sorted), however saying that these written off vehicles do get sold on by the insurance companies for other people (garages / body-shops) to repair as they can keep costs down using used parts and cheaper labour costs (so don't be surprised if it does get written off if you see it driving around again).

['wiz']

Hope you get it sorted

[mini66]

thanks for the advice randall, yeh the damage to the pillar is actually very light, so fingers crossed they wont want to write it off too soon. Also, just found out im getting a bmw 1 series as a replacement car for a while so thats a bit of a result! Does anyone know how insurance companies pay out for write-offs? do they give you the full value of the car minus the excess or what?

[mab01uk]

You can sometimes buy your car /salvage back off the insurance company for a cheaper repair with secondhand parts, etc, provided it's not a Category A or B write off (which from your description doesn't sound likely)

Category A - eg. Burnt out or water damage (total), cant even be split for parts, must be scrapped.

Cat B - never safe for going back on the road, but can be stripped for parts.

Category C - uneconomic repair with structural damage but if repaired may need to be re-tested to go back on the road. Maybe economical to repair diy or with cheaper used parts.

Category D - uneconomic repair though probably not structural eg. stolen recovered, vandalised, there is no requirement for a retest. Often economical to repair diy or with used parts.

For categories C and D, the write off is recorded and can be found out via HPI or other vehicle checks. If you sell it on you should declare to the buyer that the car was declared a write off and of course expect a lower price as a result.

"Category unrecorded" - where they write it off, but you can just fix it and drive it like nothing happened. This also doesn't appear on an HPI check.

[Randall Raines]

As "mab01uk" has stated you can buy vehicles back off insurance companies and have them repaired (depending on the category) and you can end up with a cheap car (in some cases) but any repairs should be done by someone who knows what they are doing.

Quote: Originally Posted by mini66 (original)

Does anyone know how insurance companies pay out for write-offs? do they give you the full value of the car minus the excess or what?

If a vehicle has had a previous right-off marker the insurance companies can argue over the final payout of that vehicle and you may not get the full market / retail value, however I have known this happen to a couple of people who wrote-off cars and then the insurance companies pointed out the previous write-off status one got paid out the full amount what they paid for the vehicle (full retail price) as the didn't know the car was previously damaged as the never had any HPI checks done, The other person got paid out a percentage of the retail price as they knew it was damaged as they had done the HPI checks (knew it had been damaged), got the car inspected properly (everything OK), and got the car cheap initially (the final pay-out was more than what they had initially paid).

You can't deny knowledge off cat C damage anymore these days as they need an inspection to go back on the road and this is stated on the bottom of the new documents (log book).

However if you have a vehicle repaired properly to a high standard you can have an "Autolign Inspection" and once passed the car is classed as back to normal (up-to a standard of an equivalent undamaged vehicle on the road of the same year etc... etc...), this can cost you quite a bit but the car is classed as inspected and Insurance companies etc... etc... pay out the full retail value of a vehicle even though it's been previously damaged.

Another point to remember is, it's hard to get finance (not impossible) on a recorded (write-off) vehicle unless it's been "Autolign Inspected", so they can be a lot harder to sell / trade in as dealers etc... don't want them.