Declaring cosmetic mods to Insurance company

[NeilP]

anyone with admiral or their sister companies, make sure you escalate who you talk to regarding the charges.

when I had my plate transferred over to the car they wanted £25 as the admin fee...after 5 minutes of complaining and asking to speak to the manager the charge was waved.

This isn't the first time either they've done this, they wanted an additional £37 when i lowered my old smart (again, complaining and asking for the manager brought it down to £15.

As for any mods, worth declaring. An invalid insurance is not something anyone wants (yet plenty have)

 

[StevenH72]

Just state it is a non-flimper spec. Sorted

 

[Cibbers]

Bit of a funny subject this, up until 6 months ago I spent 6yrs working as an insurance engineer in the motorcycle sector and met a lot of Assessors from insurance companies who would come to authorise repairs/write off damaged bikes. Now nothing on the road gets modified more than bikes, and you would be AMAZED how lenient they are.
Obviously it is at your own risk to not notify your insurers about anything, but you will generally find that if you have any mods that look 'OEM' it won't be too much hassle to get them repaired/replaced. We only found that the ins' co kicked up a fuss when the client was basically an a55hole - ie abusive on the phone to everbody etc, that the Assessors have the power to say "right, your exhaust is non standard and you have not declared it, therefore we are rejecting your claim an voiding your insurance" - 99.9% o the time, even race exhausts (illegal on UK roads) would get replaced. As a repairer we would go to the ends of the earth sometimes to obtain aftermarket equipment on bikes which had been damaged, an there was never any talk of whether it had been declared.
In addition to this, the same goes for things such as tyres being worn to/past the limit etc, depending on the accident - eg if a fatality has occurred then an engineer would have to determine if the fact that the tyres where bald would be an attributing factor to the accident then you would most likely get busted, however if its a simple bump between 2 cars, they won't be bothered, as it's too much paperwork, the repairer will just make you buy new tyres from them.

Personally, I pick and choose between mods, wheels for example I would, because they can be faulty and cause serious accidents, but things like black grilles etc I wouldn't bother because the Assessors wouldn't even know if it was not OEM and neither would they care to be brutally honest.

Bottom line is, as long as your car is economically viable to be repaired, and the modifications don't cause it to be Total Lossed unnecessarily then there most likely won't be a problem, as long as you dont cause a scene like something out of Die Hard 4 and cause a harrier jet to crash on the M5. The Assessors just work with numbers, ie is it repairable? Yes repair it, is it repairable? No write it off. Simples.

 

[slick]

Bit of a funny subject this, up until 6 months ago I spent 6yrs working as an insurance engineer in the motorcycle sector and met a lot of Assessors from insurance companies who would come to authorise repairs/write off damaged bikes. Now nothing on the road gets modified more than bikes, and you would be AMAZED how lenient they are.
Obviously it is at your own risk to not notify your insurers about anything, but you will generally find that if you have any mods that look 'OEM' it won't be too much hassle to get them repaired/replaced. We only found that the ins' co kicked up a fuss when the client was basically an a55hole - ie abusive on the phone to everbody etc, that the Assessors have the power to say "right, your exhaust is non standard and you have not declared it, therefore we are rejecting your claim an voiding your insurance" - 99.9% o the time, even race exhausts (illegal on UK roads) would get replaced. As a repairer we would go to the ends of the earth sometimes to obtain aftermarket equipment on bikes which had been damaged, an there was never any talk of whether it had been declared.
In addition to this, the same goes for things such as tyres being worn to/past the limit etc, depending on the accident - eg if a fatality has occurred then an engineer would have to determine if the fact that the tyres where bald would be an attributing factor to the accident then you would most likely get busted, however if its a simple bump between 2 cars, they won't be bothered, as it's too much paperwork, the repairer will just make you buy new tyres from them.

Personally, I pick and choose between mods, wheels for example I would, because they can be faulty and cause serious accidents, but things like black grilles etc I wouldn't bother because the Assessors wouldn't even know if it was not OEM and neither would they care to be brutally honest.

Bottom line is, as long as your car is economically viable to be repaired, and the modifications don't cause it to be Total Lossed unnecessarily then there most likely won't be a problem, as long as you dont cause a scene like something out of Die Hard 4 and cause a harrier jet to crash on the M5. The Assessors just work with numbers, ie is it repairable? Yes repair it, is it repairable? No write it off. Simples.

You may well be correct but I wouldnt chance it ....finding my P&J insurance was void isnt something I'm prepared to chance especially as it costs a few hundred too .And something I wonder about when I see a thread like this .......just how much info can the Police pull up on their system as regards individual policies? When I bought my wheels and declared them , I was sent a new cert of insurance though no mention of the wheels or anything obvious was on it ?? :?

 

[Liam-O]

Bit of a funny subject this, up until 6 months ago I spent 6yrs working as an insurance engineer in the motorcycle sector and met a lot of Assessors from insurance companies who would come to authorise repairs/write off damaged bikes. Now nothing on the road gets modified more than bikes, and you would be AMAZED how lenient they are.
Obviously it is at your own risk to not notify your insurers about anything, but you will generally find that if you have any mods that look 'OEM' it won't be too much hassle to get them repaired/replaced. We only found that the ins' co kicked up a fuss when the client was basically an a55hole - ie abusive on the phone to everbody etc, that the Assessors have the power to say "right, your exhaust is non standard and you have not declared it, therefore we are rejecting your claim an voiding your insurance" - 99.9% o the time, even race exhausts (illegal on UK roads) would get replaced. As a repairer we would go to the ends of the earth sometimes to obtain aftermarket equipment on bikes which had been damaged, an there was never any talk of whether it had been declared.
In addition to this, the same goes for things such as tyres being worn to/past the limit etc, depending on the accident - eg if a fatality has occurred then an engineer would have to determine if the fact that the tyres where bald would be an attributing factor to the accident then you would most likely get busted, however if its a simple bump between 2 cars, they won't be bothered, as it's too much paperwork, the repairer will just make you buy new tyres from them.

Personally, I pick and choose between mods, wheels for example I would, because they can be faulty and cause serious accidents, but things like black grilles etc I wouldn't bother because the Assessors wouldn't even know if it was not OEM and neither would they care to be brutally honest.

Bottom line is, as long as your car is economically viable to be repaired, and the modifications don't cause it to be Total Lossed unnecessarily then there most likely won't be a problem, as long as you dont cause a scene like something out of Die Hard 4 and cause a harrier jet to crash on the M5. The Assessors just work with numbers, ie is it repairable? Yes repair it, is it repairable? No write it off. Simples.

You may well be correct but I wouldnt chance it ....finding my P&J insurance was void isnt something I'm prepared to chance especially as it costs a few hundred too .And something I wonder about when I see a thread like this .......just how much info can the Police pull up on their system as regards individual policies? When I bought my wheels and declared them , I was sent a new cert of insurance though no mention of the wheels or anything obvious was on it ?? :?

The police can only check if there is a policy and who it's with. They would then need to call the company and check what had been declared.

Obviously they would need to know what is and isn't standard on your car, so as said, if it looks OEM, you would probably be okay.

 

[LukeMace]

Happy with that... Extra £53 to add :
Wheels
Suspension
Front and rear bumpers
Quad exhaust mod (fun explaining that one!)
Planned spoiler.

Can't fault that!

 

[-Tom-]

Bit of a funny subject this, up until 6 months ago I spent 6yrs working as an insurance engineer in the motorcycle sector and met a lot of Assessors from insurance companies who would come to authorise repairs/write off damaged bikes. Now nothing on the road gets modified more than bikes, and you would be AMAZED how lenient they are.
Obviously it is at your own risk to not notify your insurers about anything, but you will generally find that if you have any mods that look 'OEM' it won't be too much hassle to get them repaired/replaced. We only found that the ins' co kicked up a fuss when the client was basically an a55hole - ie abusive on the phone to everbody etc, that the Assessors have the power to say "right, your exhaust is non standard and you have not declared it, therefore we are rejecting your claim an voiding your insurance" - 99.9% o the time, even race exhausts (illegal on UK roads) would get replaced. As a repairer we would go to the ends of the earth sometimes to obtain aftermarket equipment on bikes which had been damaged, an there was never any talk of whether it had been declared.
In addition to this, the same goes for things such as tyres being worn to/past the limit etc, depending on the accident - eg if a fatality has occurred then an engineer would have to determine if the fact that the tyres where bald would be an attributing factor to the accident then you would most likely get busted, however if its a simple bump between 2 cars, they won't be bothered, as it's too much paperwork, the repairer will just make you buy new tyres from them.

Personally, I pick and choose between mods, wheels for example I would, because they can be faulty and cause serious accidents, but things like black grilles etc I wouldn't bother because the Assessors wouldn't even know if it was not OEM and neither would they care to be brutally honest.

Bottom line is, as long as your car is economically viable to be repaired, and the modifications don't cause it to be Total Lossed unnecessarily then there most likely won't be a problem, as long as you dont cause a scene like something out of Die Hard 4 and cause a harrier jet to crash on the M5. The Assessors just work with numbers, ie is it repairable? Yes repair it, is it repairable? No write it off. Simples.

You may well be correct but I wouldnt chance it ....finding my P&J insurance was void isnt something I'm prepared to chance especially as it costs a few hundred too .And something I wonder about when I see a thread like this .......just how much info can the Police pull up on their system as regards individual policies? When I bought my wheels and declared them , I was sent a new cert of insurance though no mention of the wheels or anything obvious was on it ?? :?

The police can only check if there is a policy and who it's with. They would then need to call the company and check what had been declared.

Obviously they would need to know what is and isn't standard on your car, so as said, if it looks OEM, you would probably be okay.

I think the problem comes IF you end up claiming. Churchill took my brother to the cleaners ... Thankfully paid out but screwed him over.

So others can learn ... He had an mx-5 when he was 18 (one of many nice cars he's had between 17 and 22). He'd just put an OEM hardtop on it. He hit some diesel or something round a corner, and only doing around 15 mph went head on up a kerb which severed the front brake lines and he did a slow-mo through a council owned fence. Deviating from the point an off duty plod saw it all happen and when the rest of the plod came backed my brother up before they started wagging any fingers about dangerous driving.

Cutting to the chase ... Ended up with a huge case against paying out because it had a hard top on which he hadn't declared and the alloys although standard apparently were an upgrade from factory spec, albeit put on at the factory. Stung him left right and centre for adding the "mods" before paying out, way over the odds but there was nothing he could do and they knew that. The payout then didn't account for resale value he could have had from the hard top etc. Just be very careful.

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