I am really throwing up my hands at this and I need some advice. Maybe someone here has dealt with this bullshit before and can give me some help.

Hubby was driving his 4 runner down a 4 lane street in early March. Traffic had stopped in 3 lanes to let a left hand turn driver across the street (stupid!). He did not see the car, he tried to stop but hit her square on her front wheel. She got a ticket for failure to yield and there is nothing on the ticket that would give him any liability whatsoever. No one was hurt and the truck bumper is just messed up on the inside, gives it a more macho look on the outside, IMO. There were no road conditions, nothing that would cause any fault on his part. The other driver stated on the ticket that he was speeding and not paying attention, how would she know?? Bitch. SHE got the freaking ticket.

Here's where it gets complicated. The other driver was visiting Houston for a business trip and driving a rental car for business, had taken out the rental insurance. Hubby figured it would be no problem to get the truck repaired. He was wrong. The National/Enterprise internal insurance is called Renal Insurance Services. They had an estimator come by his work and look at the car, but he got no paperwork from them. We heard nothing for 2 mos. until we started calling the other driver.

So it's been 4 mos since the accident, and we have heard from the insurance company about 3 times. The last time they offered me 80% (didn't say 80% of what) because they said hubby was 20% at fault. This is BS but hubby did talk to them over the phone which I told him he should not have done. They recorded him so that is probably what they are basing it on. I'm sure he didn't say directly that it was his fault but they may have trapped him in some way, he's a very direct person and will answer a question truthfully. I've been trying to work on that with him... ha ha.

We got an estimate for $1000 to replace the bumper, I called their estimator and the estimate they gave was $500. 80% of that is all they want to pay us! The bumper HAS to be replaced, the beam is broken, I'm sure they don't want to pay it.

The other driver has State Farm insurance as her personal insurance but they won't pay us because the rental insurance is primary, and I do not want to file a claim on our insurance b/c our payment may go up and we have $500 deductible anyway!

It seems like we are caught in a dead zone where no one is gong to pay and hubby is really hacked off, even threatened to find the other driver and smash her car to compensate! I told him it's not worth jail time and fines and bail money and that I would NOT bring him oranges if he's jailed.

If we take it to a lawyer it's gonna cost money up front, but that's what he wants to do, to sue to rental insurance company and the other driver. Since it's National/Enterprise, pretty sure they have lawyers...

What to do, has anyone ever gotten into one of these pickles with an accident before? The most annoying thing is that it's not even a huge amount - they could just pay it and get it over with.

Advice?

 

I had an accident once where the other party was at fault and the cop didn't issue a ticket because we moved the cars before he arrived.

The other driver was clearly at fault, but she seemed to think I was at fault. Her insurance company volunteered to spackle up my damage and paint over it, but all my estimates said that the fender would need to be replaced.

I documented the accident and why I thought it was her fault instead of mine. Her insurance company wasn't budging, so I had to file a claim against my insurance and pay the deductible. The case eventually went to arbitration and all my documentation must have made a difference as it was ruled in my favor and their insurance had to re-pay me for my deductible and re-imburse my insurance company for their payment. My insurance did not go up as the accident was not my fault.

It was a hassle, but I wanted my car fixed properly.

 

I retired after 25 years of handling automobile insurance claims. This won't be what you want to hear but I will try and bring you up to date. Your husband was on a thru street with the right of way. That is clear. However, if three lanes of traffic stopped to let a car turn and he didn't stop this is referred to as a "stop gap". In other words the point the other insurance company is making is that hubby should have been paying closer attention and wondered why the other three lanes had stopped and obviously he didn't/wasn't. The argument could be made: what if three lanes of traffic stopped to let a guy in a wheel chair cross the street and someone in the 4th lane didn't stop. Not a pretty picture. So yes, he has to buy some of the fault. Whether to go thru your insurance company or accept the settlement is your choice. It would be foolish to get an attorney as you would probably have to pay him more than the amount the other company is willing to pay.

PM me if I can answer any more questions for you.

 

You are right, that is NOT what I wanted to hear, and I am angry to hear that. How could my husband have seen anything when the other cars were blocking his view of the car which was being waved across AGAINST the right of way? I had a similar thing happen except I was the one crossing and ALL the lanes were stopped, including a bus in the far lane, but someone had enough of a gap to dart around the bus and shoot up the open lane and WHAM I hit her. It was my fault and my insurance paid although no ticket was issued.

I think insurance companies are a rip off - always taking your money and not wanting to pay. We've been with State Farm for over 20 years and have paid hundreds of thousands to them and now for $1000 they will stiff us? It sucks. I think if I were the agent I would write the check myself to keep good customers.

 

I am going to talk to our insurance agent today. I have not wanted to file a claim on our policy but it has come down to that, I am afraid. They can go after the other company for payment. Hubby wants vengeance at this point, says it's about principle now and when he gets angry, ...well... run!

I hope I can talk him down...he's really pissed.

 

If your ins co paid out 100% on exactly the same type of accident in the past they'd have a lot of explaining to do for not paying you 100% when you're on the other side... especially when this time a ticket was issued.

Seems to me that if their client got a ticket, if you sued the other driver and her co they might be inclined to write a check rather than go to small claims court.

But I'm not a lawyer or ins guy.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure how to do that, the small claims thing, since she's in FL and I'm in TX. And what a hassle. I keep telling hubby it's just not worth it, we'll end up thousands in the hole just because of the time/effort/expense if we hire a lawyer. I thought about getting a lawyer to just write a threatening letter and I still might do that, that's probably only a few hundred bucks.

I'm sick of the whole thing, honestly.

 

You have to be aware that a ticket does not necessarily mean fault. Tickets are written under the code of Criminal Law. If you run a red light you get a ticket. Fault is under Civil Law which are laws of negligence. An example I use is an open, unmarked intersection. Criminal law (traffic law) says the car on the right has the right of way and if there's an accident the car on the left could get a ticket for "failure to yield". However, in Civil law (laws of negligence) it might be found that the two cars both had an obligation and an opportunity to see the other car and avoid a collision. Since both didn't use the opportunity they would both be found to be negligent and neither could get 100% recovery from the other driver. In this case it might be best for each to go thru their own insurance company and then let the insurance companies hash it out.

Having a lawyer write a letter from you won't accomplish a thing. That would be a toothless threat. All the other person would do is give the letter to their insurance company and after laughing at the letter there would be no reason for them to change their position.

If the car that your husband hit was being waved across by the other cars that means there was a gap (an opening) in traffic to allow the other car to pull out. Civil law (laws of negligence) says that when a person sees traffic stopped and leaving a gap in front of their car there must be a reason for that and a normal, prudent driver should wonder why and proceed with caution.

It's only people who are not familiar with negligence law that call insurance companies "rip offs".

Hey, I'm only the messenger. Don't shoot the messenger!

 

I have been told by law enforcement that even if someone waves you across an intersection you should NOT do it - that if something happens you WILL be at fault, period, end of story. That is why I am not getting this whole thing - it was not prudent for HER to start across a 4 lane street when she could not see the last lane. Where does HER negligence come into this? And doesn't criminal law trump civil law?

I know you have to defend your profession but insurance companies make a fortune and that is a fact. The rental car insurance company surely does this to other people too, which is why my husband wants to sue them. I'm sure we aren't the first people to have this happen and if the truck wasn't drivable we'd have had to get it fixed ourselves, I guess.

 

Juliane, I retired over 20 years ago from a job I hated. Believe me I have no loyalty to any insurance company. Also, you mention what a police officer told you! I was a cop for 7 years in Detroit. The average cop only knows traffic laws. He does not have any idea at all about civil law (laws of negligence) and yes, according to traffic law he's right but when he states that person would be at fault he's stating as far as a ticket goes not about whose "liable". Regarding liability he has no idea what he's talking about. Since I worked both jobs (police and insurance) I do know what I'm talking about.

Do what you have to do. Good luck.

p.s. As a follow up: you sue the person that you had the accident with. If you sue the insurance company all they have to do is appear in court and state they weren't involved in an accident = case dismissed. If you sue the person, he simply turns it over to the insurance company that already made their decision. It's sort-of like banging your head against the wall.

 

Never said you don't know what you are talking about, it's just that I have never heard any of what you say, maybe because I haven't had that many accidents! And when I have, the insurance company just took care of it. We've never been in this betwixt and between gray area where the other person's insurance does not want to pay. Hell, a lot of people in Houston don't even HAVE insurance so I guess I could just think of it that way - like she was an illegal alien and she just disappeared after the accident...No, wait, then SHE would sue US...



Wow, so you were a cop before or after you were in insurance? Which one did you like the most...oh, you said you hated insurance so did you like being a cop? Or neither?



This whole thing has just been so frustrating because the insurance company SHOULD just take care of it! It's only a thousand dollars, for goodness sake! We are decent honest people and it's really a head trip for stuff like this to catch us out.

 

I was a cop first and decided to get out of it. Insurance companies like hiring cops because they have a back ground in investigating accidents. When I started with the insurance company I was under the same opinion all cops are; cops determine fault. I quickly learned that getting tickets for traffic infractions doesn't have much to do with fault at all.

Keep in mind the insurance companies work with in the laws (civil) that "are on the books". They don't make up what they pay and don't pay. Their judgement is based on the law. You will run into discrepancies when a single insurance adjuster makes a mistake in judgement. After all they are only humans.

I did well in the insurance business and retired as a claims manager but I always regretted leaving the police department. There's a camaraderie there that I will always miss.

 

I know I'm late to the party, but just to clarify (yes, I do work in insurance), companies don't always make tons of money. If you have ever seen YOUR rates go up but with nothing changing (i.e. same driving history, same vehicles, etc.), more than likely it is a rate adjustment due to them losing money. Otherwise, rates would stay the same or even go down (and they do go down).

I've read through your thread and I really do sympathize with you (though my opinion matches yours but whaap would be more the expert in this situation since he dealt with claims specifically whereas I am on the agent side), but insurance companies do pay out tons of money and some even lose a lot, but you just rarely read (or care) about it.

I know that it won't make you feel better about your situation, but look at it this way, just to understand that insurance companies don't necessarily rake in billions upon billions. Most people with full coverage pay somewhere between $1,000-2,000 annually, but if their car gets stolen, the insurance company will be paying out the ACV (actual cash value), less the comprehensive deductible, of the vehicle in most cases. So they already lost $20,000 on that client, and it takes 10-20 identical policies of claims-free households just to balance out that loss. And when you're dealing with accidents involving property damage of more expensive cars or even bodily injury, the money is lost very quickly. I have a client who, before being insured by me, had a car accident with a $250,000 bodily injury payout (which was probably even the maximum bodily injury limit). Her prior company will basically never recoup that money from her, and chances are, it wiped out the profits from 200-300 other clients, assuming that none of them ever have claims. And they still have to pay their employees who you talk to on the phone.

My boss had even mentioned after a meeting with our territory manager from Progressive that either 2009 or 2010 (I can't remember, though I'll try to find the newsletter that published that information) that they had paid out $103 million in claims, which was a bit more than what they brought in from insurance premiums alone, so they were a bit in the negative that year.

We all hate paying for insurance, but it is working for you. Perhaps you didn't get the end result you would have preferred, but whaap was kind enough to lend us his perspective as a seasoned claims manager to explain why the other company could decide that their client was only liable for a majority percentage of the incident. However, you could've tried to make a collision claim through State Farm. It's not necessarily a good thing, but you're paying for the insurance... why not use it? Especially when it's a NAF (not-at-fault) accident since the other party was found to be 80% at fault.

If you want, try some other carriers. I work with some preferred carriers like Progressive, Safeco, etc., they all seem to have very favorable reviews from my clients. I'm actually with Safeco myself, though I switched from Geico.

 

Thanks for the further information on insurance. Very informative.

I did decide to go ahead and file under our policy, although it still rankles me to do so. We will be out the deductible while State Farm subrogates for the entire repair amount. My hubby will not be happy about that, but I can't think about going to small claims court, or hiring a lawyer. We could drag this out forever and to what end? Maybe we'd get a few thousand back. Whoopee. It's not the hill I want to die on. And he's not even here to have to deal with it, so...executive decision says, "get 'er done." Hacks me off that the stupid rental car insurance company probably does this with everyone and most people probably don't bother or don't want the hassle of fighting them. Oh well.

 

A whole lot to be said for, "Get 'er done."!!!!

 

An additional little tid bit for those of you that think the insurance industry is ripping you off with their prices. Every insurance company in your state works under the guidance and control of your states Insurance Commissioner. For an insurance company to raise their rates they must first go to the Commissioner and show why they need a rate increase. Only with the approval of the Insurance Commissioner can they do that.

Also, something else many people don't know: If you ever feel your insurance company (Not the other guys but your insurance company) is being unfair to you in the settlement they offer you can contact your local Insurance Commissioner (located in phone book under state government) and his/her office will investigate on your behalf. They will contact your company to have them explain why your company is taking the position it is. If, after investigating, the Commissioners office thinks they are being fair and reasonable the Commisioners office will contact you and tell you so. If they think your insurance company is being unfair, your company will change their position. The insurance industry is more worried/concerned about Insurance Commission complaints than they are of shallow threats of being sued. The service of the Insurance Commisioner is free to you as they are already paid by the tax payers.

 

How would I complain about someone else's insurance company that is headquartered out of state?

 

There is no government agency that will represent you against someone else's insurance company. Their contract is with their policy holder and not you. Their obligation is to protect their policy holder and only pay you when their policyholder is found to be legally liable. That means a court has declared them liable. They will, however, investigate and pay claims they feel their insured would be found legally liable for as a short cut to having to go to court on every single incident. Keep in mind the other guys insurance company doesn't owe you a dime till a court has found their insured liable for that dime.

 

I am not asking any agency to represent me! Just to turn in a report of perhaps dubious business practices - I am sure we are not the first nor the last people this company will try to cheat out of payment. Never mind, you don't seem to understand my frustration with this whole situation.

 

What dubious business practices? They don't work for you, they work for their client.

You pay insurance, why not let your insurance company fight it out on your behalf?