I am not totally sure of his insurance companies right to write off the car for less than it is worth to you. Or give you an inadaquate sum to replace it. The damaged caused is their liability.

Not their option for you to come up on the short end of the stick. Perhaps your wife should be developing a sore neck dependng on their initial response. You occassionaly have to use simular behaviour to what some insurance companies practise unfortunatly or you might indeed come up short.

I am not a crook but the insurance companies are far too used to defrauding people. All you wish is for the insurance company of the guilty individual to repair the issue their client created. If they do not want to go along is an obvious ploy to defraud you no matter how it is done.

My wife backed into an old car at the parking lot of a supermarket not that long ago. Very small inconsequential dent. She told them to get an estimate and she would pay out of pocket. It was an old clunker she hit.

Instead they claimed she hit and ran. We got a note from our insurance company that they paid a high estimate bill for the damage. This after explaining to them that there was no hit and run involved but rather an offer by her to pay for the damages out of pocket.

Plus it was reasonable to assume it was a 500-700 small dent with paintwork. The injured party claimed this did not occur but knowing my wife I am certain it did. I suspect the estimate was claimed for another previously damaged area of the car.

Probably best to get the police involved with every incident just so a record of it exists. A person with no insurance probably cannot afford to pay a claim anyways. Trying to be reasonable in these situations just not seem to work out well all the time.

I will always be a litle cynical after being intentially defrauded by my insurance company for five thousand less than the incident should have paid out to us. Even in court they were insistant that they were unaware of the total milage on the car. They intentially made every excuse for not taking it at the inspection of the wreck. They even challenged my statement of the actual milage. The car had about fourty thousand miles and they used comparison values for cars with over one hundred and fifty thousand miles that where either salvage vehicles or had major issues. The car was so new they really must have had difficulty finding some for comparison with that kind of high milage already on them. normally a two year old car has much less.