Rolfe
Moderator
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2023
- Messages
- 10,601
- Reaction score
- 12,213
- Points
- 3,638
- Location
- West Linton, Scotland
- Driving
- MG4 SE SR
Until 31st March (eleven days ago) I knew next to nothing about electric cars except that my next car would be one. I'm collecting my new MG4 SV on Thursday.
My existing car is a 2009 Golf GTi Mk6 with 135,000 miles on the clock and bodywork issues. In December an idiot BMW driver pulled out of a side street and hit me, damaging the front wing and driver's door, also scratching the alloy wheel. First he said he'd pay for the repair and I was OK about that because I didn't want to risk the car being written off by the insurance company (it goes like a bat out of hell), but when he heard the cost - £1,600 - he backtracked, so the insurance became involved.
Insurance said that's fine, it's repairable, but we can't do it till 22nd March. So I just drove around in this bashed car till then. On 22nd March they carted it off and said, soon have that back to you all fixed. The courtesy car arrived, all fine. Then on 31st March an email arrived out of the blue saying they'd decided to write the car off. They'd give me £4,000 (so a fair bit more than it would have cost to repair!) and please fill in a transfer of ownership and hand back the courtesy car.
I panicked. That was going to leave me stranded with nothing. I told them I wanted the car back. The insurance said they'd give me £2,674 if I wanted to keep the car, and I said OK then, having little option at that point or so I thought, and went to collect it.
However the seed had been planted. About 20 minutes of googling that evening convinced me that the MG4 was the stand-out candidate to replace the Golf. I was mindful that the Golf needed four new summer tyres about now, and was it worth it given that I'd been thinking about changing the car next year anyway? Also, how much would it take to get it through its MOT in November this time? I spent the rest of the evening watching reviews of the MG4 on YouTube.
After the weekend I went to talk to my own garage man and he said, well, if you're going to change the car, don't get it repaired because that wouldn't increase its trade-in value by as much as it cost. I was still thinking it would take weeks - probably months - to get hold of an MG4, but I could run the car on its winter tyres till then (this is Scotland after all), and its road tax was good till August. So I thought I'd get the process started and booked a test drive on 8th April, expecting that even if I wanted one I'd still be in the Golf until about July.
I loved the car and decided on that course of action. Order placed for MG4 SE basic model in Holborn Blue. I was gobsmacked when the dealer said, would Monday 17th April be OK for you? No waiting list. Apparently they're selling like hot cakes so the dealership has been ordering them on spec, knowing that they'll sell, and he had one sitting waiting to be prepped for sale. Wow. Sadness for the Golf was rapidly being replaced by new-car excitement.
Then the dealer said he could only offer £500 on the Golf as trade-in, but that he thought I could get maybe £1,300 for it on Auto Trader. I said well I could do that, but both of us realised that the original insurance offer was even better. The dealer said to me, get back on to your insurance and tell them you've changed your mind. You want to take their original offer. Cry a bit if you have to. Tell them you're a poor confused old lady (who drives boy racers, right...)
It worked. (I didn't even have to cry.) There was a bit of confusion about what to do with the Golf, which actually resulted in the dealer speeding up the prepping of the new car so I could have it on Thursday (13th), because I thought I had to return the Golf to the repair shop today. But that fell through, and now I'm just waiting for the salvage company to collect it directly from my house at a time to be arranged. Which will probably not be before Thursday. So I'm not even going to be without a car for a day.
Of course the insurance people could have handled it better, but on the whole it's all worked out to my advantage in the end. The only downside? If I'd realised I'd be getting rid of the Golf Tuesday/Wednesday I wouldn't have filled it with petrol last Thursday!
Long thread, bit of a stream of consciousness, but I thought some of you might find the story amusing. Zero to new MG4 in eleven days. Which included the Easter weekend holiday.
My existing car is a 2009 Golf GTi Mk6 with 135,000 miles on the clock and bodywork issues. In December an idiot BMW driver pulled out of a side street and hit me, damaging the front wing and driver's door, also scratching the alloy wheel. First he said he'd pay for the repair and I was OK about that because I didn't want to risk the car being written off by the insurance company (it goes like a bat out of hell), but when he heard the cost - £1,600 - he backtracked, so the insurance became involved.
Insurance said that's fine, it's repairable, but we can't do it till 22nd March. So I just drove around in this bashed car till then. On 22nd March they carted it off and said, soon have that back to you all fixed. The courtesy car arrived, all fine. Then on 31st March an email arrived out of the blue saying they'd decided to write the car off. They'd give me £4,000 (so a fair bit more than it would have cost to repair!) and please fill in a transfer of ownership and hand back the courtesy car.
I panicked. That was going to leave me stranded with nothing. I told them I wanted the car back. The insurance said they'd give me £2,674 if I wanted to keep the car, and I said OK then, having little option at that point or so I thought, and went to collect it.
However the seed had been planted. About 20 minutes of googling that evening convinced me that the MG4 was the stand-out candidate to replace the Golf. I was mindful that the Golf needed four new summer tyres about now, and was it worth it given that I'd been thinking about changing the car next year anyway? Also, how much would it take to get it through its MOT in November this time? I spent the rest of the evening watching reviews of the MG4 on YouTube.
After the weekend I went to talk to my own garage man and he said, well, if you're going to change the car, don't get it repaired because that wouldn't increase its trade-in value by as much as it cost. I was still thinking it would take weeks - probably months - to get hold of an MG4, but I could run the car on its winter tyres till then (this is Scotland after all), and its road tax was good till August. So I thought I'd get the process started and booked a test drive on 8th April, expecting that even if I wanted one I'd still be in the Golf until about July.
I loved the car and decided on that course of action. Order placed for MG4 SE basic model in Holborn Blue. I was gobsmacked when the dealer said, would Monday 17th April be OK for you? No waiting list. Apparently they're selling like hot cakes so the dealership has been ordering them on spec, knowing that they'll sell, and he had one sitting waiting to be prepped for sale. Wow. Sadness for the Golf was rapidly being replaced by new-car excitement.
Then the dealer said he could only offer £500 on the Golf as trade-in, but that he thought I could get maybe £1,300 for it on Auto Trader. I said well I could do that, but both of us realised that the original insurance offer was even better. The dealer said to me, get back on to your insurance and tell them you've changed your mind. You want to take their original offer. Cry a bit if you have to. Tell them you're a poor confused old lady (who drives boy racers, right...)
It worked. (I didn't even have to cry.) There was a bit of confusion about what to do with the Golf, which actually resulted in the dealer speeding up the prepping of the new car so I could have it on Thursday (13th), because I thought I had to return the Golf to the repair shop today. But that fell through, and now I'm just waiting for the salvage company to collect it directly from my house at a time to be arranged. Which will probably not be before Thursday. So I'm not even going to be without a car for a day.
Of course the insurance people could have handled it better, but on the whole it's all worked out to my advantage in the end. The only downside? If I'd realised I'd be getting rid of the Golf Tuesday/Wednesday I wouldn't have filled it with petrol last Thursday!
Long thread, bit of a stream of consciousness, but I thought some of you might find the story amusing. Zero to new MG4 in eleven days. Which included the Easter weekend holiday.
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