Cumbria County Council

by REwood

24 Nov 2011

To cut a very long story short, I hit a really bad pothole in January this year that damaged two alloys and tyres on my two year old x-type. I had just bought the car and was gutted. I had to replace both wheels and tyres at a cost of £550.
I initially claimed via my insurers, LVE Frizzell, who simply took the Cumbria County Council's insurer's, Zurich, word that despite it being a category 1 , 1 day repair pothole, that I hit over 24 hours of the them becoming aware of it, that the Council was not liable. They blamed the severe weather for the delays to the repairs of the pothole. The Council also said the road had been ok at a routine inspection on 8 December
I sought details of all potholes that had been reported between 8 December until mid January and details of all repair to them. These document simply showed that the Council had been aware of problems on the road long before they stated and had actually been repairing potholes on and around the relevant road the very day I hit the pothole. Their story was simply not true. I cited this to Zurich and they have today accepted liability and asked for details of my claim.
Despite my success, I am so annoyed at this whole process, not only at the Council, but also at both sets of insurers. I intend to claim full damages and repay my insurers the £250 it paid out for my claim (I lost out on £300 excess) and ask them to recalculate my last insurance policy which suffered due to the claim.
I took heart from some of the stories on this website and did everything myself, it wasn’t that challenging. The moral, as is so often quoted on this site, don’t give up.