Fezza

I purchased a nice-looking Fiesta RS Turbo about a month ago and insured it as being a standard vehicle. Got a reasonable price with 2 years NCB.

Now, I have been shunted by an articulated lorry, and when the garage have come to collect my vehicle, the mechanic has said that the wheels are not standard (he believes tham to be from a mondeo), nor he believes are the lights and spoiler. He also says that it has been lowered, although I do not believe it has as I recently replaced the clutch and saw no aftermarket markings / stickers on the struts when the vehicle was up on stands.

Now, I am not asking 'how to get around' this issue, but I do want to ask the following...

How reasonable is it for an insurance company to expect a layperson to know whether a 20 year old car is factory specification, particularly if the said vehicle was purchased 'as a standard RST' in good faith? For example, would your mother know a fiesta with different wheels to standard if she was insuring the vehicle?

I am sure many people would not be able to identify whether, for example, a Cortina had the correct wheels for the model and year, nor do I think many people would know whether the RS1800i came with a tape player as standard and as such I consider it to be unreasonable to expect a layperson to know the specifications of every vehicle they may purchase incase they have an option that might not be factory. The wheels on my fiesta had the ford logo on them (embossed into the metal?), as does the spoiler, hence my believing that they were standard.

Based upon the above statement, would it be worth challenging the insurance company if they take issue with the allegedly non-standard parts?

Tony @ Greenlight

Hi Fezza,

Some modifications are obvious to see and an Insurer would take exception if they consider these to have been deliberately non-disclosed. If they are in any doubt they would have an independent motor engineer assess the vehicle to ascertain the extent of the aftermarket modifications.

Insurers are red-hot when it comes to fraud and one way of reinforcing your position would be to find the advert that the prior owner used to sell the vehicle, which presumably would have any modifications listed upon their (autotrader/ebay/pistonheads) advert and if none are listed this would be helpful to you.

If the Insurer concerned is someone who does not cover modified cars, they could refuse to pay a claim on the basis that had they known the facts they would not have offered terms for your car in the first place.

Alternatively, they could simply retrospectively apply terms for any modifications that were present but not declared.

At this stage, your best starting point would be to find the sale advert and then sit tight and wait for the claim to progress.

Kind regards

Tony

Ps. If you can PM me if you're with Greenlight as I can help in a 'hands on' way.

155lee

iTrader: (10)

if you got hit from another vehicle then their insurance will be paying,i dont think that would be a problem,fiesta rs turbos had spoilers,alloys and lowered suspension anyway.

ben_frst

the frst was 25mm lower than a standard fiesta it had alloys standard, and a spoiler standard, even though the spoiler and alloys my not be factory there still listed on the factory spec i think this is wrong who cares if it looks a little different its not like your hiding a full blown zetec turbo

the wheels even say ford just kick up a fuss and they'll pay you out i worked for multipul insurance companies and there all spineless wankers (no offence tony i mean the companies not the individuals)