Scottish Elises

Was in touch with the assesors today. My baby is a cat B salvage write off. I'm gutted Linda is relieved, she said she wouldn't feel comfortable in a car that has been repaired, which is fair enough, but I have the feeling she may extend her objections to elises in general.

I'm just gutted

Sorry to hear that Stuart. Will you be venturing into Elise ownership again?

How you feeling now? Starting to feel any better? Hope your bones are well on the way to putting themselves back together again.

Hey Dezzy,
Elise ownership might take all my powers of persuasion as far as Linda is concerned. Will have to wait on the insurance settlement,then see what the premium will be hiked up too. I certainly don't want to give up lotus ownership as, apart from the accident it has been so good for me. We have been places we would have never have went, and met so many good people (getting gushy now, change of subject).

Bones are healing, even getting out for short walks, and the movement in the wrist is coming back slowly. Hopital check up tomorrow.

Stuart,

The Elise is a strong wee car. You are testament to that. Realise Linda will have misgivings, but do help her to understand the work that went into the Elise crash structures and chassis strength for just that sort of incident. People race them with little more than one extra rollbar brace installed. Now that's belief.

You may like to reel off the other prominent people with big offs to their credit (?!) who are around...and still got back in Elises...to tell the tale...Tut, Robin, MikeB and sorry if I missed anyone in that exclusive club!!

However you can't *persuade* her to feel better, you have to enable her to work it out for herself. Part of that may be driven by how she perceives you will feel by future Elise ownership...or importantly, LACK of it. Ask her open-ended questions to keep the dialogue going

Campbell

Neil, campbell. Thank you for the suport. I'm not sure it's because she a woman, a car is just car after all but you will all know that little grin that comes across your face every morning when you turn the corner and you see your car, and you think, that's mine! and isn't just the bizz!

I did catch her on the phone tonight saying that my baby was dead, so she my understand a bit more than I give her credit for. Although her next sentance was, I must be number one again. She always was

bad luck mate, remember not to accept their first offer as its usually pretty low! good luck cheers Ed

So how do you go about not accepting what they offer?
As I told the insurance company I'm new to all this. I have never made a insurance claim in my life, not even for a cig burn on a carpet. Do I need to start getting evidence of prices for similar cars in auto trader/pistonheads?
They said the offer would be based on Glass's Guide.

Bad luck mate
Get evidence from MMC off their website. Forget Autotrader, MMC's prices are higher so these are what you need to aim for. Get a figure in mind and be reasonable about it and you should get it. PhilA wrote his 111R off recently and got a very reasonable offer right away so you never know what's going to happen. Glass's Guide will probably give them a trade price but that's no use to you as you will need to buy from trade plus their markup.

Si, I have found only 2 03/04 S elises for sale at the moment, and both are over what I paid for mine from Wilsons back in Feb, and this is the "off season" this might be in my favour, but they also want to see proof of purchase from me to establish the price I paid.

Hmm, not sure it matters what you paid as you insure the car to cover the loss of it and what it would cost to replace. If you won a car, insured it and then crashed it would they not pay out as you never actually bought it? Sounds like a way of paying out less to me.

Maybe worth telling them you can't find the receipt and see what they say. What if you bought private with cash? You wouldn't have a receipt or any proof of purchase!

Not so sure that finding the receipt is such a bad thing.

It establishes the original market value of the car, if needs be a rough depreciation calculation can be applied, arriving at a fair value as at time of loss. That is what your insurance "commits" to pay out, as I understand it. At least it would establish a solid, agreed starting point.

And as for having no receipt if bought privately for cash, you should ALWAYS create a receipt when making a private sale/purchase...for just such a situation, as it happens! Even if you are buying and the seller doesn't create a receipt, you can prepare one just in case. A simple bit of paper with details of the deal in terms of date, object in question (car reg / VIN), declaration of it being received, the sum exchanged and signatures by both parties will do the trick at least in Scotland. Not so sure about English lawr of course.

Campbell

I don't agree with that. I insure my car for what it is worth and to cover me if I damage it, whether that means repair or to buy another. If I bought it off a mate for 50p and he gave me a receipt, are you saying that I should only expect 50p from the insurance?

The original market value should have nothing to do with it. Current market value is the ONLY thing that matters to Stuart and he should get as much as he can from them.

Simon, I think the point Campbell is making is that, if you have a reciept, especially if it a reasonably recent reciept, then it is a good starting of point, in conjunction with market values, for when/if you have to haggle with the insurance company.

E.g car bought 6 months ago for £15 grand, they offer £10 grand, try and get them to explain £5 grand depreciation in 6 months. Obviouslly backed up with local dealer prices for an equiveltant car will help.

hey
as Si said, i crashed my car in september and got a good settlement.

the guy was very reasonable - i didnt have to push hard.
He mentioned glasses guide - but then went onto autotrader and noticed the large variety of prices. He asked what I had found - and I agreed with his view that there was a variation in priced of 2 - 3 grand.
I luckily got the top limit of that.

Point was - it was how much i had to pay now to get a car of the same quality and spec. He had to submit a case for this to his boss - he was asking me to help with getting the best reasonable price

I was lucky in my crash in that the car destroyed itself on the outside to save me completely

strong wee cars and i fully intend to get another in the coming months

Cheers
Phil

The other thing to note is that the first offer is just that...an offer.

I crashed my MX5 (where is the gay smilie?) and they were only going to replace the one damaged alloy.........which meant it didnt match the other three. After a few days of persistance with the assessor they gave in and i got a whole new set of alloys.

Also my GF was originally deadset against me keeping the MX (she was in the car when we crashed) let alone getting a faster car but once she saw how excited i got when i went to get it back she seemed to give in.

Best of luck