I was on my way to a physiotherapy session, and a scooter bumped my rear bumper. I told him to pull over, got his phone number, took a pic of his licence plate and got his name. Told him to type his address into my phone but he didn’t type his full address in. The language barrier didn’t help either.
The damage is minimal, basically 3 scratches. A light bump. It still pissed me off A LOT, because my car was stationary at a red light and this idiot was going in between cars and bumped my car.
So, I didn’t call the police because I really needed to make my appointment because my back was in pain. Is there anyway to get this guy to pay me at all or do you need to have called the police?
Another annoying thing is people keep scratching my car when I park it, like it is a completely normal thing in Taiwan to get your car scratched in car parks or wherever. It drives me nuts.
This is the kind of thing I usually let go. It’s something that just happens when you’re in such a condensed city (no idea where you are, mind you, but I assume you’re in the city). I’ve also got quite a few scratches on the corner and back of my car from idiots who can’t parallel park. It’s going to look like a wreck in a few years but I’m never going to get anything for those, obviously.
You could go to the police and file a report. It would help with the insurance companies. You could ask him straight to pay but more than likely he’ll tell you to go pound sand unless you have something official behind you. People typically wait for the police at the scene so you’ve probably got an uphill battle doing it this way.
I probably let way too many things slide, mind you. I once had a cyclist fly through a red light and slam into the rear-side of my car. He was pretty shook up, I let it go. I have scratches and a cracked light because of that. He had a gash on his head and probably learned a valuable lesson.
Another: I was stopped at some lights and a BMW driver in front of me started rolling back. When he got half way to my car I started blaring my horn but he still didn’t wake up. Boom, right into the front bumper. He still didn’t know what he’d done. I had to explain to him that brake means stop. No brake, no stop. Luckily I had the whole thing on video and a cop was at the intersection watching us. But I let it go… what can you do? I feel like it’s more headache than it’s worth. The scratch was about the same size as any of the ones I get from parking in Taipei.
You can usually ask them for some token amount on the spot, but I’ve never liked that. It’s kind of shitty, I feel, because neither of you really know the extent of the damage. Never really seen it in practice either, now that I think about it.
If there’s a good chunk of paint off your rear-bumper, I’d go for it. Otherwise… I don’t know if it’d be worth it. If you’ve got insurance, it may be worth talking to them either way.
I was thinking this was the case really. It’s just, where I come from this doesn’t happen a lot at all. People park well, respect your car and respect their vehicle. I was in Taoyuan during peak traffic so yeah…
It just sucks man. My car is a 1997 model but was in perfect condition and now I am watching the value and aesthetics decrease on a weekly basis basically. Then I imagine if I bought a nice new car in a few years and this keeps happening.
I don’t have private insurance, just the insurance you pay when you transfer the car at the DMV. What does private insurance go for?
I felt bad for the guy at the time. However, I was recently driving down the #9 that cuts all the way through Hualien. They had a cycling event at the time and all the cyclists flew through red lights and never looked to see if there was any traffic. Every single one of them. I saw a cyclist taken out there too. Kind of changed my perspective on it. I thought my case was an accident, but I’m starting to feel many long distance cyclists just don’t pay attention to traffic lights.
On the original topic: I wonder if you can get a few thousand out of a moped rider for an accident like this. I wonder if they’d haggle it to a few hundred (depending on the rider).
You need to call the police and have a police report, without the report neither insurance companies or the police themselves will do anything for you. Neither vehicle should be moved until the police get there and do their thing. For a minor bump they won’t want to do anything as they hope you’ll sort it out yourselves, just tell them you want the report even if the guy is stating he will pay cash instead of using insurance. There’s probably nothing you can do at this point other than appeal to the guys nice side and hope he pays you.
Precisely. OP, take this as a lesson. Next time, prioritise calling the police above ANYTHING. You never know if the other side might want to play dirty in the absence of any evidence or police report. Don’t be a sucker next time. Also, never feel bad or pity for dumbasses who cannot ride/drive. They put their own convenience above your property, your life, the health and wellbeing of pedestrians and so on.
It’s stupid. I know. As a cyclist, we blame the race org for not closing the roads. The race org blames race participants for not reading the fine print of the rules. Who’s at fault? Clearly the cyclist running reds (which is actually illegal) and getting hurt. We cyclist complain and complain, but really, we’re the idiots not reading the rules of the race we signed up for.
+1 on this. I have been a victim of the guy who bumped into me asking for more money than the insurance company asked for. If their was no police report, I might be in trouble with the mob haha.
When I had a car on the rock. It got scratches from A-holes who liked scratching cars. I had so many scratches on the thing I finally had to have the whole thing repainted (only the roof was not scratched). Then first day out a row of motos fell on it and a few days later a bus bashed in the drivers door.
Oh well.
You got 3 little scratches from a moto? Life goes on bro, life goes on.
I got my car banged into by a scoot. I just didn’t want them turkeys to sue me or anything. So I told them that they should stay where they are and I will go and phone the police . Back in those days they still had public telephones ya’hear. And I actually had one of those then new fangled devices called a cell fone in my briefcase (yes them things were big).
And the little punks took off like a rocket when I purposely wasn’t looking.
Zapman. It’s still not too late. You can still file a police report at a station nearest to the location of the car accident. The statue of limitation is 2 weeks. Police can pull up surveillance
video from various angles to document this incident. You can also file law suit in the traffic court if that reckless cyclist refuses to pay for the damage. Asking anything from 3000 to 5000 is customary in fender bender accident. It comes down to if this is worth your time. Police report and Traffic court take hours to get your compensated. Its quicker to earn 3000 than to fight for it. 3000 may not be much to us expat but can be a lot of stress on a poor student motorcyclist.
I know tommy, but it’s like every week I have new scratches. Drivers door,
rear right panel and light, back bumper, passenger door. And I’ve only had
the car for about 9 weeks. Some of the scratches are through the paint and
I’m worried will start to rust. The cosmetic damage is meh, but if I have
to start treating rust and sh*t I’m gana be pissed
I’ve had scooters hit me when I’m sitting still on the front, back, both sides and even my rims on my car. Sometimes at a stoplight or sometimes just sitting on a small road with no traffic and no cars around anywhere.
They always drive off and I always have my car repaired and painted about once a year.
Always less than 10000NTD but only touch up and repairs of dents, not total car painting. And it’s a nice car original paint. Body work seems cheap in Taiwan.
tango42 could you please give me the contact details for the place you go to, I think I may use them in the future to do touch ups and repair dents etc.
