Ambulance chasing after car accident

[BilboWaggins]

Heads-up and warning for anyone with elderly relatives who still drive.

Last week a friend of mine had a small prang. Only bodywork damage for both his car and the van involved, and no dispute about reponsibility/liability etc. Fully insured and assessor from insurer-appointed garage came promptly to look at the damage.

Should be "job done" but the phone calls from legal firms have started - heavens knows how but they know my friend is with Sainsbury's insurance and had his phone number, but not policy number.

Some of the calls have been quite threatening. He was not injured but one man said to him "you MUST have been injured, but if you are lying to your insurance company then we have the power to cancel your insurance". This has just made him mad and he's making a formal complaint to Sainsbury's but if he was one of the many elderly widows who live in our valley they might believe what they were being told and be very scared.

If someone less on the ball than you ever has an accident, do keep an eye on them to make sure they are not getting conned by calls like this.

[Hazel at the Hill]

Yes, this could be intimidating to anyone - and is obviously very poor form as a selling technique.

I'd make sure that I noted down the legal companies who had called and send a letter of complaint the practice manager of each company touting for business - copied to trading standards, the local paper and MP.

Also a letter of letter of complaint to Sainsbury insurance - although unless you've ticked the privacy box, they can pass your details onto 'specially selected third party companies who you may be interested in hearing from', I suspect.

[pjh75]

This annoys me soooo much

On two occasions in the past two years my reg number has been taken down / given out incorrectly as being involved in accidents. I have then got a call from my insurer accusing me of not reporting an accident, and spend weeks trying to convince them that it was not me or my car... the last time they were demanding that I tell them where my car was so that they could send someone round to inspect it for damage - I felt like I was a criminal. Anyway, I digress a bit... the point is that once I get all that sorted out and they admit that someone quoted an incorrect reg number (don't get an apology by the way), the phone calls from the ambulance chasers start - when I ask them where they got my details from they don't want to admit that my insurance company passed them on - but who else could it be? And I tick the box for not sharing my details, and we are ex-directory and on the phone preference thingy that means you're not supposed to get cold calls.

I even changed insurers after the first time but the exact same thing happened again.

[Incy]

This all sounds very familiar. I think it must sadly be common practise. We had the same thing and are still occasionally getting the calls almost 3 years after our very minor prang.

[Two_Sheds]

I had my bike crash in June.
Since then, we've been plagued by calls from the Phillippines, variously claiming to be working for Barclays or So-and-So. "have you had an accident in the last 3 years?"

The funny thing is, they didn't ask for my name, they asked for Mrs (OH's surname). Seems like they had a phone number but not a name for that number. I never give out my landline number, because I don't use it, I use my mobile.

We are with the TPS, so we aren't supposed to get cold calls. I've registered several complaints with them about these calls, but they are unable to help with foreign callers.

My normal practise of leaving the phone on the side while they witter to themselves, wasn't working, so the last lady to call me got a tirade I'm sorry to say. They seem to have stopped (for now)

[dogsbody]

Data Protection Act anyone?

[seasprout]

I had my bike crash in June.
Since then, we've been plagued by calls from the Phillippines, variously claiming to be working for Barclays or So-and-So. "have you had an accident in the last 3 years?"

The funny thing is, they didn't ask for my name, they asked for Mrs (OH's surname). Seems like they had a phone number but not a name for that number. I never give out my landline number, because I don't use it, I use my mobile.

We are with the TPS, so we aren't supposed to get cold calls. I've registered several complaints with them about these calls, but they are unable to help with foreign callers.

My normal practise of leaving the phone on the side while they witter to themselves, wasn't working, so the last lady to call me got a tirade I'm sorry to say. They seem to have stopped (for now)

I'm glad I read this... I recently had a lady call me with a foreign accent, and she was insisting I had had an accident within the last 3 years, I told her she was wrong, but she was adamant, so I just hung up. Thought she was a weirdo, and we are on the TPS.

[Peter]

Being a cynic I suspect the traditional brown envelope and not a word to the taxman.

i.e. employees passing details to ambulance chasers in return for a commission.

[blue411]

And the good news is that these flippen calls can come for up to 5 years now, the length of claiming has been extended from 3 years to 5 years

[HotStuff]

It's a mystery how some of these people get hold of their info. Last year I had to have an operation on my left foot, not because of an accident but due to a medical condition. After the op I was on crutches for about a week before I was allowed to put weight on that foot again. During that week I got a phone call asking for me by name and then the guy said "I hear you've been in an accident recently...". The only thing I could think of was that I mentioned to a couple of people in e-mails that everything was taking a bit longer as I was on crutches. Spooky

[Sprocket*]

I keep getting calls for the OH who had an accident when he and he only drove through a large puddle at 60 and drowned the cars engine. They called and called so being a devil I let the come round with the paper work, you should have seen his face when I told him it was a single vehicle RTC with no injuries. Suprisingly enough we have had no more calls......giggle giggle