What have you done to your MK 7 today ?

[AndyG]

Very sorry Rebecca to read of your accident.I wouldn't mind betting he was on his phone,the utter pillac.
We must consider rear dash cams I think.

[kalimon]

Someone else did this to it....

Out and about in the car on work business this afternoon and hit in the rear coming off a roundabout by a transit type van.  Hit my passenger side rear wing and bumper.  Fair bit of damage to rear off side wing, bumper, rear light and the wheel and damage under wheel arch.   F**king hell!
 
I was indicating left and had all but exited the roundabout onto the dual carriageway when heard and felt a bang which rocked the back of the car.  I immediately pulled off the dual carriageway into a nearby side road and parked up. I didn't see the vehicle that hit me, but a few moments later a blue Peugeot pulled up into the side road and came alongside me and wound down his window.  Assumed he must be the driver that hit me but it was someone who witnessed the incident. Incredibly, I knew the witness guy (someone used to work with) - he said a transit type van had hit me in the rear.  He was travelling behind the van and he’d seen what happened and transit driver was at fault. 
 
The transit was indicating right, to go right round the roundabout but was driving in the left hand lane and hit the back of me, just as I was leaving the roundabout and still clearly indicating left.  He said the transit had then pulled off into a different side road but by the time I got back in the car and round the one way system to that location it was gone.  I phoned him later to get a description of the van, he unfortunately hadn't been able to get the reg number but said it was very distinctive large brown transit of some sort, with a hotchpotch of panels painted different colours.  I suddenly realised that I had seen it on my way back round the roundabout on way to police station but didn't know it was the offending van at the time!!!  I have reported it to the police and will be checking to see if there’s any cctv covering the roundabout and adjacent area that may have captured the incident and hopefully identify the van. Also reported to my insurer and I' arranging to get the car assessed and a quote from my preferred repairer later this week.
   
P!ssed off doesn't even begin to describe it.
 
The damage
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Holy sh!t Rebecca, only just spotted your post
I feel sick just looking at the pictures.
Why does it always happen to people who take the utmost care of their own cars?
Hopefully your insurance claim will be painless and the black beauty will be repaired to perfection and beyond
Van drivers are arseholes ( apart from me of course )

[Booth11]

Thanks for all your lovely words of support, much appreciated. 

Went to the Police again today to give them a better description of the van and full details of the witness.  Pretty lacklustre response from them about the whole thing.  Told me because it happened on a roundabout very hard to prove.  Having found out at work, I told them that there is a CCTV camera on the roundabout (Sod’s Law it’s located on the opposite site to where the crash took place) and also a CCTV camera in the road that the van turned into.  They said the CCTV would need to have picked up the actual collision and understandably the CCTV in the side road would not count as that’s not proof that the vehicle was involved.  The Police have to request the CCTV from the council.   Despite the vehicle leaving the scene of the accident it is not classified as a crime so just a normal CAD ref number.  Frustrating!  What else can you do!!!

I took the car down to my trusted repairer (VW Approved) this afternoon to be assessed.  The assessor, knowing my passion for cars, couldn't believe what had happened.  Even though they won’t know the full extent of the damage until the bumper is removed, he advised me wasn’t happy with me driving it at all due to the wheel taking a hit, and he said the way the bumper and wing panels are bent in under the tyre there’s a high risk of the misaligned sharp edges of the panel hitting the tyre on uneven roads and speed bumps.  Plus he thinks it is quite likely there is damage behind the bumper.  So I drove back in this…….     



Had to go and get petrol for it, got out and couldn’t get the petrol flap open, not push-in style and no key, took me 5 minutes to find the lever under the dash, lol.  Plus I’ve already left the manual handbrake off once (fortunately flat ground)!     Plus it’s a manual so had to dust off my left foot. 

Anyway my R is now in good hands, just need the formal full damage report and then Direct Line to be satisfied with it as their own engineer will want to have the final say, but the bodyshop guys are very familiar with DL engineers and are on the case so to speak. So fingers crossed. 

In the meantime, I'm loving the 1.2 Nissan Micra..............not!   

[KyleB]

Sorry to hear of your misfortune Booth, you've not had the best of luck with the R have you?

My car had its MOT today, it's 3 years old next month but wanted to get it done early as I'm off work. Sailed through happily.

[Watts]

Got mine back already (only dropped off at 10) and the rattle and creaks from the driver's door are no more Must say, despite some initial issues with them not having ordered parts in advance (as it turned out none were required) the dealer was very good calling me with an update then promptly when it was ready. Plus, they didn't wash it as asked! They made it clear:

[p3asa]

Sorry to hear that Bec.
Do you think the driver even noticed he had hit you especially if its a big van?
Hopefully if he's got a conscience he's hoping you chap on his door or is actively looking for you. 

You can hope   

Hopefully you have better luck with DirectLine than we have had.
Police car hit my sons car at the beginning of February this year and we are no further forward.
They promised to do XY&Z every time I called (and I called every week) and they never bothered to do it.
I've been doing all the running about.

On the bright side though, you at least have a repairer that you are happy with so you have no need to have reservations about the quality of their work.

[JoeGTI]

Do you think the driver even noticed he had hit you especially if its a big van?

I think it would need to be a van of Boeing 747 proportions for the driver not to have noticed hitting her! A smack that caused that kind of damage was not akin to driving over a packet of crisps...

Reminds me of this classic scene in "Snatch"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRJxNpPj6Zc

[monkeyhanger]

Thanks for all your lovely words of support, much appreciated. 

Went to the Police again today to give them a better description of the van and full details of the witness.  Pretty lacklustre response from them about the whole thing.  Told me because it happened on a roundabout very hard to prove.  Having found out at work, I told them that there is a CCTV camera on the roundabout (Sod’s Law it’s located on the opposite site to where the crash took place) and also a CCTV camera in the road that the van turned into.  They said the CCTV would need to have picked up the actual collision and understandably the CCTV in the side road would not count as that’s not proof that the vehicle was involved.  The Police have to request the CCTV from the council.   Despite the vehicle leaving the scene of the accident it is not classified as a crime so just a normal CAD ref number.  Frustrating!  What else can you do!!!

Surely they should be able to request the CCTV footage of the side road in an effort to identify the van so that they may contact the driver and ask their side of the story, possibly giving the van a going over for telltale damage and paint transfer from your car? You have an independent witness that has described the incident, involving a van with a unique paint job - were they able to identify the make/model of van even though they didn't get the reg number?

Perhaps you'd have had more luck at the scene if you'd said you had been injured? They bobbies are supposed to be obliged to respond, but then you'd be wasting an ambulance's time. There's no easy way to get the bobbies to do their jobs rather than just hand out crime references for insurance purposes.

Does your insurer have a hit and run clause for which you would not lose any no claims?

[monkeyhanger]

Do you think the driver even noticed he had hit you especially if its a big van?

I think it would need to be a van of Boeing 747 proportions for the driver not to have noticed hitting her! A smack that caused that kind of damage was not akin to driving over a packet of crisps...

Reminds me of this classic scene in "Snatch"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRJxNpPj6Zc

I had a huge lump of something smack the windscreen while driving the wife's A1 home from work today. It was a huge clatter - I saw the windscreen flex, but not a mark on it. If whatever it was had hit the bodywork i'd have had a dent for sure. Can't believe my luck!

[Booth11]

Sorry to hear that Bec.
Do you think the driver even noticed he had hit you especially if its a big van?
Hopefully if he's got a conscience he's hoping you chap on his door or is actively looking for you. 

You can hope   

Hopefully you have better luck with DirectLine than we have had.
Police car hit my sons car at the beginning of February this year and we are no further forward.
They promised to do XY&Z every time I called (and I called every week) and they never bothered to do it.
I've been doing all the running about.

On the bright side though, you at least have a repairer that you are happy with so you have no need to have reservations about the quality of their work.

There's no way the van couldn't have been aware it had hit me Stevie. It was a really big thump.  And then his behaviour of turning into that side road but having been indicating to going right round but in wrong lane), is odd.  The more I think about it the more I think he wanted to get out of sight for a while.  And then having seen it later (only becoming aware of that after the witnesses description) well it looked like it panels from a variety of other vehicles patching it up and looked for all the world like it wasn't the first collision it had been involved in.

Time will tell with Direct Line. It's the Police that seem apathetic as they don't like pursuing incidents on roundabouts, and they seemed not to care less about a vehicle fleeing the scene of an accident which I always thought was against the law!