Well that’s my five month holiday gone for a burton,

[denisejoe]

When our van was repatriated we bought some bags to take a few clothes iPads we were given a hire car to take us to ferry, taxi from ferry in uk to hire car and drove home when we went to the van in uk everything was inside untouched even the bag of washing, what have you in van that you can’t carry in a car or in a bag.

 

[Emmit]

Your reason for LV not writing your van off is right there - repairs cost £13k, replacement would have been £40k...

It doesn't change the situation, but I think it does help if the offending party is genuinely apologetic, rather than not.

Even if dash cam footage is restricted for posting online etc, it is still useful to have to pass on to the insurance company as it gives them weight to their argument.

It's surprisingly easy for vehicles to get hooked up on bodywork/chassis components, especially if you have a tow bar. I had a Range Rover hit my van while I was parked(!), and it got hooked up on my towbar even despite the slow speed impact. I have to admit to rather hoping that it would pull off his front splitter/bumper when he backed away, (partly due to his total indifference to the fact he'd driven into my van - no apologetic words at all from either him or his wife, see my comment above!), but he did manage to 'de-couple' without damage and the only injury to my van was some smudges and small scuff. I think my towbar saved the van from worse damage. But my accident wasn't at 90kph++ closing speed...

Totally understand this. And it may influence your decisions. I understand that too. I've had my van for 10 years too, and would be gutted if I was in the same situation.

Duct tape is in EVERY van, isn't it?

That may be true, but I think many people are completely unaware of the fact that it's shockingly easy to fall asleep at the wheel. It happened to me on the M4 about 25 years ago. I was driving home in very bad weather from an event I'd been at in Windsor and I was aware of being a bit tired, but I didn't feel 'exhausted'. One minute I was awake, driving in lane one, the next I woke up in the outside lane when my wheels hit the rumble strip. I was exceptionally lucky to cross three lanes of a busy motorway without hitting anything or being hit by anything. The rumble strip certainly saved me from injury or worse. I came off the motorway at the next junction and stopped. Ever since, I've been very aware of the risks of driving tired, and I frequently tell others that contrary to what most people think (including me, before), you often get no warning at all, and if you ARE aware that you're beginning to struggle, you should definitely pull over rather than trying to push on through to reach your destination. You (or someone else) might never get there otherwise.


Meanwhile ivorantony I hope that whatever you decide to do in terms of getting yourselves and your van home, that things work out for the best result in the circumstances and that it doesn't take too long for you to be back out enjoying your motorhome once again. All the best, and take care.

Your reason for LV not writing your van off is right there - repairs cost £13k, replacement would have been £40k...

It doesn't change the situation, but I think it does help if the offending party is genuinely apologetic, rather than not.

Even if dash cam footage is restricted for posting online etc, it is still useful to have to pass on to the insurance company as it gives them weight to their argument.

It's surprisingly easy for vehicles to get hooked up on bodywork/chassis components, especially if you have a tow bar. I had a Range Rover hit my van while I was parked(!), and it got hooked up on my towbar even despite the slow speed impact. I have to admit to rather hoping that it would pull off his front splitter/bumper when he backed away, (partly due to his total indifference to the fact he'd driven into my van - no apologetic words at all from either him or his wife, see my comment above!), but he did manage to 'de-couple' without damage and the only injury to my van was some smudges and small scuff. I think my towbar saved the van from worse damage. But my accident wasn't at 90kph++ closing speed...

Totally understand this. And it may influence your decisions. I understand that too. I've had my van for 10 years too, and would be gutted if I was in the same situation.

Duct tape is in EVERY van, isn't it?

That may be true, but I think many people are completely unaware of the fact that it's shockingly easy to fall asleep at the wheel. It happened to me on the M4 about 25 years ago. I was driving home in very bad weather from an event I'd been at in Windsor and I was aware of being a bit tired, but I didn't feel 'exhausted'. One minute I was awake, driving in lane one, the next I woke up in the outside lane when my wheels hit the rumble strip. I was exceptionally lucky to cross three lanes of a busy motorway without hitting anything or being hit by anything. The rumble strip certainly saved me from injury or worse. I came off the motorway at the next junction and stopped. Ever since, I've been very aware of the risks of driving tired, and I frequently tell others that contrary to what most people think (including me, before), you often get no warning at all, and if you ARE aware that you're beginning to struggle, you should definitely pull over rather than trying to push on through to reach your destination. You (or someone else) might never get there otherwise.


Meanwhile ivorantony I hope that whatever you decide to do in terms of getting yourselves and your van home, that things work out for the best result in the circumstances and that it doesn't take too long for you to be back out enjoying your motorhome once again. All the best, and take care.

Whilst I totally understand your frustration when the Chelsea tractor smacked your pride and joy with occupants of said tractor not apologising, however (and there is a very valid HOWEVER)

Many Funsters on this thread have said, "don't do that", "don't do this" in order to mitigate, as far as possible, the Insurance Co. wriggling somehow out of making a substantial payout.

Every Insurance I've had for a vehicle warned against making an admission after an accident. Saying anything like 'sorry' could be construed as an admission.
See all, hear all, say nowt is good advice

 

[KiltedCamper]

SORRY - THIS IS LONG BUT MIGHT BE WORTH READING: We had a similar experience around Christmas 2023. Our Autocruise Starseeker was hit side on by a Mini doing around 40mph on a sharp blind right hand bend (driver and passengers were high on Nitrous Oxide and ran off). We weren't badly hurt but the MoHo was written off because the chassis was bent by the impact.

We had paid £24,000 for the vehicle less than 12 months before. Our insurer (that I won't name because in the end they came up trumps) initially offered us about £15,000. I queried this, as the agreed value less than a year before was £24,000. It became clear their Desktop Assessor was valuing the vehicle on the basis that it was a Peugeot van, not a motorhome! I sent the insurance company a set of pictures of adverts for comparable vehicles for sale. Their Desktop Assessor responded with two Autocruise adverts for what he said were comparables, with prices around £15,000. I followed up the adverts. One of them was for a company that didn't exist (i.e. it was a scam ad). The other company was real so I phoned them and spoke to their MD. He was quite clear that he had never had an Autocruise for sale and that they had not placed that advert - It was a fake Autotrader ad that this company had known nothing about.

I referred this back the the Desktop Assessor and he, somewhat reluctantly, referred it to higher authority. The result was that they paid us the £23,000 (i.e. the cost of the claim minus the excess). As it was an uninsured loss (the owner of the Mini reported it stolen about 2 hours after the crash, and I believe her home address was not too far from the crash, which makes me very suspicious) and so we had to wait quite a few months to get about £400 back towards the excess from the Insurance pool for uininsured losses.

The moral of the tale is to be very firm with your insurer, especially if it isn't a specialist, about the true value of your loss. It was a hard slog, but as our insurer was one of the top rated motor insurers they accepted that I knew more about motorhome valuations than their Desktop Assessor. That's not his fault as he had no experience of motorhomes.

PS: Anyone sitting in the second row of seats would probably have been killed by flying debris even though we were doing less than 20 MPH at the time of the crash. The result is that our replacement vehicle is a Campscout PVC. Still not up the the standards of a modern car for safety, but better than a traditional motorhome.

 

[Barclaybasher]

ivorantony thought about returning via Bilbao or Santander but no cabins....

lt might help phoning the local BF offices at -

• Santander
• Port Address - Brittany Ferries Terminal. Estacion Maritime S/N, 39002, Spain. Tel: 9 02 10 81 47
• Bilbao Port Address - Terminal de Brittany Ferries, Puerto de Bilbao, Muelle A3, Zierbena, 48508, Spain. Tel: 9 02 10 81 47
  
  ...sent from a very rock and rolly Salamanca to Bibao