John’s broker referred him to an Accident Management Company (AMC) to repair the damages on his family car. He wasn’t happy with the repairs and that he was referred to an AMC.
What happened
John’s family car (a 7-seater) was hit by a third-party while it was parked. It was undriveable, so he called his broker to help him make an insurance claim for the damage to his car.
His broker recorded the claim circumstances and decided the accident was likely non-fault. They said John was entitled to a small courtesy car under his comprehensive policy, but John said he didn’t have access to another car and needed a large like-for-like car to drive his five children to school each day.
His broker said he could refer John to credit hire/repair services, which would provide him with the larger car John needed. He explained all the main risks of using these services. This included an explanation that John would be stepping outside his insurance contract and dealing with an independent accident management company. If anything went wrong with the car or the repairs, he said John could complain directly to the accident management company, but if they couldn’t resolve his issues he’d unlikely have access to any alternative dispute resolution scheme to take things further. John said he still wanted to use credit hire/repair services.
John was happy with the hire car, but when he picked up his car he didn’t think the quality of repairs were satisfactory. He complained to the accident management company, who responded saying the repairs were adequate. He complained to his broker, claiming he shouldn’t have been referred for credit repair services. His broker disagreed. He contacted us for help as he didn’t think he should have been referred.
What we said
We checked to see if liability for the accident would likely be disputed. As the third-party admitted liability for hitting John’s parked car, we didn’t think it would be.
We also checked whether John had a real need for a hire car. We could see his car was undriveable and John didn’t have access to other suitable transport to get his children to school. John needed a hire car because a courtesy car would have been too small and he didn’t have any other options available to him.
We looked at the other information John was provided with, to see if he was able to make an informed decision on whether to use credit hire/repair services. We thought he was sufficiently made aware of the risks – in particular that he might not be able to complain about any poor repairs.
We thought John was treated fairly. And even if his repairs were of poor quality, this wasn’t something his broker was responsible for.