Letter to Reader : Tips 101 on Making Claims

Hi Reader,

First and foremost, hope each of you are keeping safe from COVID out there! Wear a mask, sanitize your hands and keep a safe distance.

Anyway, I’m not here to give you some advice or tips on how to avoid COVID. Reason being :

1. Let’s be frank, there’s hundreds of articles out there telling you about COVID.
2. You’ve probably already read most of this and are now an expert.
3. We all get tired of hearing and talking about COVID for almost a year!!

I just thought of sharing other tips that you might find helpful in the event where YOU NEED TO MAKE A CLAIM FOR YOUR VEHICLE.

Well, you’re probably wondering why I would take the time to do this, right? I kid you not, being stuck at home has got me doing much more reading and finding out the most random things online.  Guess what I found? Malaysia has quite a high occurrence of road accidents (3^rd highest fatality rate from road accidents in Asia).

That also probably means that most of these drivers will start thinking of how to use their motor insurance in making an accident claim. So, I hope these bits of advice will help you (as they have helped me in my previous accident experience) 😊

Please take many clear photos of your vehicle, the other person’s vehicle and the accident area.

• I know the police will take photos as well, but it’s always better for you to have a set of your own photos just in case the insurance company asks for them to make processing and your car repair that much quicker!

Do always remember to note down the other driver’s vehicle plate, the time of the accident and how the accident happened. All these small details do matter!

• By sharing all these important details with the police, it will also help them to write a clearer description of the accident in the report, while avoiding mistakes which in turn leads to faster claims processing by the insurance company with lower chances of error.

You will not not lose your NCD if the accident is NOT YOUR FAULT, regardless of how you make a claim.

• If the police tells you that you’re not at fault, you are entitled to make a claim with your own insurance (as long as you have Own Damage cover in your policy) and keep your NCD. I strongly suggest that you do this as your car will be repaired in a much shorter time and is more convenient for you to manage this with your own insurer.

If you are not at fault and you make a claim with the other driver’s insurer, you should still inform your own insurer.

• There are actually a lot of internal processing and discussions that go in between insurers for claims processing. By letting your insurer know even if you are not claiming with them, it will help speed up internal processing for your claims on the other insurer’s side.

By making a claim with your own insurer for your vehicle repair, you can also make a claim for other UNINSURED LOSSES with the other driver’s insurer.

• By leaving your car in the repair workshop, you might not be able to use your car for a few days. You can even make a claim for these loss of time as an “uninsured losses” claim against the other insurer to make back some money.

Always remember what your current NCD is and how much your car insurance is, as these will help you decide whether you want to make a claim.

• Looking at your current insurance premium, you can roughly calculate the savings made with your NCD discounted value. For example, you are getting RM550 savings with an NCD rate of 55% for an insurance premium of RM1000. Having this knowledge will help you decide if making a claim on car repair is worth it as the car repair costs may be less than the savings you get from NCD.

Well, so there’s my six simple tips on what you should look out for if you ever think of making an accident claim for your vehicle. I hope these tips are of much help to you and do please share this information with your friends and family.

Till then, do stay safe!

Your friendly neighbourhood writer.