Insurance Claim Situation Help

[steeltown23]

Got an interesting situation. I was at my boss’s house May 2017. We were both inside and his daughter came in saying she just backed their Hummer into my Rage Rover which was parked in their driveway behind where the Hummer was pulling out. When we walked out the bumper was on the ground with some broken pieces laying on the ground. While my boss was apologetic he immediately began looking at my car and claiming there was some pre-existing damage. He was saying that some small parts were previous broke and were missing. He told me he did not want to make a claim to insurance and that he knew a lot about how to fix cars and wanted to by the parts and fix it himself. Since he was my boss at the time it did put me in a predicament, so I did not file any claims nor take any pictures (yes, I know I screwed up big time). He was able to reattach the bumper using gorilla tape, but since has yet to fix the bumper (yes, it is still attached with gorilla tape). I have now lost patience and want to file a claim with his insurance. I have done much digging and run several VIN reports both free and pay and have not found any damage to the car. The car only had one previous owner and I bought it from a certified preowned dealer for what that is worth. My questions are 1) How much will time have an effect on me filing a claim and 2) While there might have been some preexisting damage, the brunt of the damage came from the daughter hitting my car with the Hummer. How will the supposed preexisting damage effect my claim?

 

[djs]

You need to file the claim immediately, like right now. Don't delay, you'll run into issues if it gets any older.

Only the claims adjuster can really answer your questions, its going to depend on a lot of things.

Did you know of existing damage before this? How did your boss know it was there? Or did he just say there was?

If the damage was there previously, and I would assume it wasn't since you had to search to try to find something, but if it was, a new claim would pay the difference in damage from the pre-existing damage to the new damage, usually not much. You would be amazed to know how many times 2 claims happen for the same spot in a car before the repair is done.

Now, backing into a car doesn't usually knock a bumper off so I wouldn't be surprised to learn that there really was pre-existing damage. The bumper had an epic fail if it fell off from a bit of a tap, unless she backed in a lot faster (or caught a corner) than is normal in this situation.

Also, did the bumper fall off? Or did the cover fall off? Bumpers falling off in modern cars is usually a big deal, covers, not so much. You see a lot of bumper covers on the side of the highway. The bumper itself nowadays has a gazillion sensors in it and isn't really something a backyard mechanic should be doing.

Dan

 

[steeltown23]

Thank you Dan. To answer some of you questions, I did not know of any previous damage. I had just bought the car used 6 months prior to the accident. I did my research and none of the reports had any damage claims or previous accidents and the car only had 1 previous owner (it is a 2007 Range Rover)

It is a 2007 Range Rover and to be honest I know very little about cars so I am not sure if it was just the cover or the bumper. It was a teenage girl driving and it was a Hummer which is a pretty powerful car. Neither of us actually saw the hit so I can not speak to that

My Boss said there was preexisting damage once hw saw the bumper on the ground with a bunch of pieces laying around.

 

[VolAgent]

It was almost certainly the cover, when most people say bumper they are really referring to the cover. The bumper is a solid piece of metal that is covered by the cover.

As to damage backing up, it can be substantial. I had a very similar claim many years ago. My boss's wife backed over my Honda Prelude with a Dodge Durango. Obviously some differences as the bumpers really didn't hit, so she started to go over the hood until she realized. Fortunately there was no issues and we filed with her insurance. She did try to say it was illegally parked, which it was. However that really doesn't matter in Tennessee and it is a space we all would park in on occasion.

So going back to what Dan said, file now. There is really no way to know if she and his company will accept responsibility, so you may have to file on your own or pay out of pocket to repair the damage.

 

[Allen Trent]

sounds like a property damage claim if your car was parked. Your own insurance likely would not pay because you are way, way outside the window of reporting a claim.

His carrier may or may not pay depending on Minnesota law on how soon you have to take action against an at fault party in property damage auto claim. Also, they may not pay because it was reported 15 months later, not permitting them time to investigate the claim. That leaves you with small claims court if under the max limit to sue for or you will have to sue him in civil court if you haven't exceeded the window of time to file suit.

Definitely best to start with his insurance company, assuming you can get that information from him to contact the carrier.