what to do?

[puntodan]

A few weeks back my s40 t4 was damaged in a no fault accident, damaged the bumper and indicator, bent the edge of the wing and bonnet slighlty.

It has been deemed uneconomical to repair as it came to 1700 in total to fix. It is now a cat c write off. The car is a 97 r reg with 88k on the clock full heated leather, winter pack, cambelt changed by me, suspension and drop links all replaced etc. All the usual bits that need doing had been done.

They have offered me £1400 for it or £900 If I buy it back but it needs a Vic check and can't be driven until its had that and an mot. What do I do?

I can't find another one for that money with same spec and similar millage or year, even newer ones don't have the spec or appear to have all the bits replaced like mine has.

Dan

[andy_d]

dont accept the 1st offer is the general rule of thumb with these thieves.
price up via 2-4 other repair centers and see if there 1700 is accurate (bet you it will be high ,,quite high)

VIC check will take not long at a local VOSA center. all they are doing is checking to see if that car is that car. they wont be checking the repairs, just that the car is the reg/vin numbers it should be on the V5C




if you cant find a similar t4 for the £ they are offering, tell them to up the offer as that spec car goes for £x ,

wings are bolt on for us , all the bits are bolt on/bolt off from what you have said, so challange there "£1700 to fix" price , they Will be screwing that price too high.

indicators, £30? bumper prob £80? bonnet/wing say £100 each ? and a spray job ,,poss £500ish for a wing/bumper/bonnet (and thats on the high end i bet).

[Clan]

The best option is take the £900 and source the bits you need , can you straighten the bonnet or wing? You could well come out with a profit .
You should be able to find a Nice T4 for £1400 or a little more though ...

It is about time insurance companies went "Eco" and started saving panels and parts from cars they have written off to repair cars such as yours .

[jon1985]

dan it sounds like you have enough knowledge to possibly repair the car yourself. When i had an accident in my bmw 318 coupe i managed to get a whole new front end for £300 that was 2 wings, a bonnet, a bumber, the slam panel and two new fogs, that price also included delivery. I had to get them sprayed which only cost £600.

Very recently i paid £55 for a wing for my 97 plate car incl delivery and it is the same colour as my car.

So if you look around i am sure you will find the parts fairly cheaply.

[gatos]

£1400 is not bad at all. Last year we were in the same situation with our old Volvo S40. It was a 1999 1.8 with 80K on the clock. The bumber came off and had the tiniest crack, the plastic wheelarch was the only thing broken and the front wheel was very slightly bent. First offer we got was £1050 and second offer was £1200. which i thought was not bad at all. Bach then I didn't have a clue about working on a car so I we decided to accept their offer and move on. If the same thing happened today, I think I would have bought the car back and fixed it myself as it was doable. One think you have to realise is that the price they are quoting for repairs is at an approved garage and they will quote stupid ammounts for repairs. Everything is OEM and brand new and they are probably charging a rate of £10,000,000,000,000 per hour, hence the repair costs. The car is already 14 years old so it really depends on you and how you feel about that car. If you really like it and can't part with it, then you can easily repair it for a lot less. If however you dont care that much what happens to it, then you can let it go and move on.

If you choose to do the work yourself, you can source many things from ebay. If the colour of your car is not an unusual one, then you can get a cheap side panel, and possibly a bonnet too. Indicator should not be more than a tenner. And the good news is that they are fairly easy to change. I have posted Vadis instructions somewhere of how to replace the side wing.

Keep in mind that since the car has been declared Cat C, the value of it will be a lot lower than before. So (touch wood) if you claim again from insurance for whatever reason, the value of the car will be lower. That was one other reason why i let the old S40 go.

Hope this helps

[-chris-]

I had a similar run-in with my previous v40... it also was low mileage and i couldn't find any exactly the same... if you decide to take the money and run find a selection which are close and say yours is worth slightly less or more than each you should be able to justify a good price... just don't take no for an answer and keep going! also obviously find equivilent cars which are steeply priced to aid your cause..

as others have said it sounds like its probably worth buying yours back and doing the work yourself... but you could also try and barter the £900 buy-back down aswel... good luck which ever way you go!

[gatos]

True. More Than offered us to by the car at about £280-£320 depending on the money they would offer. He told me that the price of the car was a perentage of the final compensatio. £500 is a bit too much