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Now here is something really interesting that proves you can learn something new every day! And this piece of information could affect every single driver with his own insurance as well as companies running fleet cars. It all came about after I read a question regarding 3^rd party damage, following a car accident, when the damage is caused to local authority owned property.

For example if you were to hit a road sign or street light or maybe smash into a bollard or worse still damage barriers or even the road surface. I was shocked to read that a company running a fleet of vehicles was billed £46,000 for barrier repairs without realising the length of the replacement barriers.

The warning was raised by claims management company actually called Claims Management & Adjusting. They had found that in particular fleet operators were being targeted by local authorities for some obscene repair costs. As it turned out the claim mentioned was for a much shorter stretch of barrier as the authority had claimed in yards but the length was only a third as the measurement was actually in feet, not as stated in yards.

After pointing it out the claim was written off. The claims company also claimed a success when an invoice for £56,000 worth of re-surfacing work was challenged after obtaining information under the Freedom Of Information Act that showed a larger stretch of road had been repaired for £750.

It would seem that not only are there a few disproportionate claims for damage but Highways England has allowed certain contractors to decide upon charges and repairs without further reference as long as the claims were under a threshold, commonly £10,000. This caused me to look further into this situation and what a can of worms it turned out to be.

Most people are of the opinion that you only have to report an accident to the police and your insurance for the following reasons; if someone has been injured (report to police and insurance), there is a claim going to be made against you by another motorist (insurance only) or you are going to make a claim on your insurance for damage repairs to your own car or your contents/passengers (insurance only).

However, knock down a bollard and cause little or no damage to your car you may think that this is the responsibility of the local authority and simply drive off. In fact you have caused damage to a third party’s property so by driving off you could be committing a criminal offence. But then you may think that no-one saw you so where is the evidence but with CCTV cameras and people with mobile phones everywhere you may find that several weeks later you receive a bill for the damages.

But having not reported the accident to your insurance company within a certain period (see your policy) they may no longer be obliged to pay out. It seems  that it can take several months for a local authority to make a claim against a driver. Whilst I’m told that every car insurance policy will cover you for third party damage, that isn’t just someone else’s car or someone’s front wall, it also covers you for what is known as ‘street furniture’ which includes road signs, bollards, hoardings etc.

But if you fail to meet the terms and conditions of your insurance policy or they can prove contributory negligence you could be facing a hefty repair bill. In addition you are obliged to stop after an accident and pass your details to anyone involved or the owners of property that has been damaged. If there are no casualties you don’t have to involve the police.

However, if you have damaged privately or authority owned property you must report the accident to the police if the owner of the property is not available to take the details from you. So as you can see this is a bit of a minefield and what may have seemed like a minor accident could potentially leave you thousands of pounds out of pocket! By Graham Hill

You may not have heard the name Marina Usaceva but a court ruling, following an accident in which she was involved, could change your attitude to what you do whilst driving.      Marina was considered responsible for a fatal accident in which the other driver involved died. She had been using a mobile phone but not at the time of the accident.

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Her barrister explained that there was a 6 minute difference between the time it was shown she was using the phone and when she had the accident. Described as ‘clear water’ and provided as mitigating evidence the plea was still ignored by the judge when he sentenced Marina to 6 years imprisonment.

Evidence showed that she had sent and received texts on two phones during the 20 minutes before the accident. In summing up before sentencing Judge Sean Enright said, ‘If you were not sending texts at the time, then you were fiddling with your phone and that is what caused the collision. Mobile phone use whilst driving is a plague on our society,’

This is a clear warning that the courts will consider the use of a mobile phone whilst driving as a contributing factor to an accident, even if not being used at the time of the accident. Labour Peer Lord Ahmed was jailed for 12 weeks after admitting to texting at the time he was involved in a fatal accident on the M1 in 2009. Since then the law has tightened and sentences greatly increased.

At the time the case was ground breaking because the judge didn’t link the texting directly to the accident but described the texting as ‘prolonged, deliberate, repeated and highly dangerous.’ So the warning, as repeated by Lucy Whitaker of legal firm Rothera Dowson, is that courts are now increasingly willing to consider the use of a mobile phone, prior to an accident, as a contributing factor.

As the law stands at the moment if a driver is found to be using a mobile phone whilst driving he will usually receive a fine of £100 and 3 points on his licence. Using a mobile when involved in an accident causing a serious injury or fatality would be considered to be driving without due care and attention with a maximum penalty of 5 years imprisonment along with disqualification and potential fine.

Beyond that, death by dangerous driving carries a maximum jail sentence of 14 years and a minimum disqualification of 2 years, a discretionary re-test and possible fine. Whilst there is still no suggestion that telephones should be switched off whilst driving, if you have an accident, even whilst using a hands free phone, this could still be considered by a judge to be an ‘unnecessary distraction’ and be treated the same as if you had been using a mobile phone without hands free.

As pointed out by Lucy Whitaker, ‘There is no real ‘safe time’ to use a phone, hand held or otherwise, whilst driving.’ Be warned that it is standard practice for police to confiscate mobile phones from drivers at the scene of very serious accidents as part of the information and evidence gathering process. Casually using mobile phones without consideration of the consequences is irresponsible so stop it now.

Driver in a Mitsubishi Galant using a hand held mobile phone violating New York State law. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

In the first 3 months of this year 380 people lost their lives in accidents attributed to the use of a mobile phone, up 13% over the same period in 2013. Campaigners warn that mobile phone use could become a bigger killer in 2015 than drink driving – a sobering thought! By Graham Hill

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• Driver who used two phones at the wheel jailed for killing man (telegraph.co.uk)

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