Motorcycle hit while parked. Who's at fault? | GTAMotorcycle.com

Motorcycle hit while parked. Who's at fault?

D

Dioso

Member
I apologize in advance for the amount of text, or if this is posted in the wrong section. I'm still quite shocked. New rider/ first post.

Just purchased a New 2014 Ninja EX300 SE in August, got the first service done last week. Couldn't wait to get in a bit of riding before the first snow fall.

Rode to work today in what seemed to be perfectly fine weather.

Parked in front of my work place, came back out an hour later and realize that the bike had been moved. Upon closer inspection the horror set in. It had been hit, picked up and moved.

Chunk of the front fender had broken off, what remained was touching the tire
The right handle bar bent
Possible damage to forks based on tire position
Break fluid was leaking from right break near throttle
Most of the fairings on the right side had been scratched/cracked
Right mirror broken completely
The rear break pedal and foot peg housing(?) had cracked as well
Yoshimura carbon fiber exhaust was scratched up real bad/dented

I run back in to store I work at in utter disbelief, a woman seen what had happened and told me what had happened and gave me the. A man and woman in a Mercedes E320 were seen picking up the bike.
Left near the left handle was a note with a phone number. Called the number, girl/woman apologizes for hitting the bike. Claims she didn't see the lime green bike. Proceeds to give the phone to the father who says she will email me their insurance info.
I call up my insurance, tell them what happened. Give my insurance the other parties information. Get the bike towed to nearest collision center.

Bike currently sits in the collision center. Plan on calling insurance tomorrow to update them on what has happened. Then tow the bike to Snow City to get a quote and see what the actual damage is.

Is there anything else I should know before proceeding? I feel like I've done everything correctly so far. This shouldn't affect my insurance one bit right? 100% the car drivers fault?
 
The fact the other person owned up to it should make it a fairly painless affair for you...and look on the bright side, it happened in basically November instead of May or June. ;)

Since you're basically 100% not at fault, and the other person has admitted that they were the ones 100% at fault, it won't effect your rates or record at all. Your insurance company will liason with the other persons insurance company and do all the hard stuff - just wait for your insurance companies advice or directions before proceeding on towing it places, etc - it is ultimately YOUR choice where you take it for the repairs, but the insurance company will need to assess things first and decide if it's even repairable. Frame damage, for example, will make it a write off.

In the meantime, I would thank the other person for being honest enough to own up to it and leaving their info. That's probably the last time you'll actually talk to them, and of course you're not even obligated to do that really, but it's not uncommon in those sorts of situations for people to just drive away and hope nobody seen them, so they really did do you a solid and honest people deserve at least a thanks IMHO.

If it was a hit and run and there was no witnesses, at that point you have to claim under the hit-and-run guidelines which will still get your vehicle fixed in the end (only IF you have collision coverage, however - no coverage, and you're screwed) but you are stuck paying your deductible. For your situation however you shouldn't end up paying anything aside from your time.
 
Yes, the original poster is astoundingly lucky that the driver who hit the bike admitted it. Hit-and-run is the most common outcome. Do thank them for doing so.

Don't be surprised if your bike is a write-off because of the amount of damage. That sucks.

The lesson ... select your parking spots carefully if at all possible. If there is a designated motorcycle parking area, use it. If there's a way to park it away from the most commonly used parking spots, do that. If it can be parked within sight of someone who is there all the time (yourself, if possible!) do that. If you are stuck parking in a random spot - park it towards the back of the spot so that other drivers can see it well before they decide to pull into that spot. It's not unlike what you do with cars to avoid door dings.

Never letting the bike out of your sight unless it's in your own locked garage ... is a fairly good plan. If that means taking the car to do the shopping trips, so be it.
 
Thanks for the input, it's very helpful. I will try and thank them, I was thinking precisely the same thing. But I'll wait till everything is finished processing.

I normally don't park where I did, had no other choice since where I normally park was taken. And I only came out to move it to where I normally do. I will be more strict in future. Thank you.
 
Sorry this happened to you. It's every motorcyclists nightmare (one of many). One thing I do now if I have to park among cars for any period of time is snap a quick phone pic of the car in front and behind. It won't do any good if they have moved and it was someone else that did the damage but at least you have been proactive and may have a record of the offending vehicle if no note is left.
 
I was told as a kid... always take pictures....... now, as everyone has a camera ... TAKE PICTURES!
and,, I have seen some pictures that tell the "truth" in the way you want to convey it... wink
even if you have to recreate the accident for the pictures ,,like putting your bike back to where it was when hit.. then call police...

If the person who hit your bike decides to say.. it was your fault as you parked illegally,,,, or some such nonsense.. you can pull out your "pictures" and prove your point!

I was able to show a judge pictures.. I was charged with following too close.. the drunk driver who hit me said I was .... he hit me with his passenger door when he changed lanes..
legally, there was only 1 lane... it was federal property.. that was always driven as 2 lanes... so the cop said I was at fault.. I watched the drunk walk into the bar to call 911.. he claimed he had a couple beers in the bar after calling 911.... sigh.....
the judge said I was not at fault... because my pictures proved it... and she even helped me take the drunk to civil court to recoup my damages.. because I had pictures.
 
I have pictures after the incident. Also I have security footage of the parking which I should be able to get a copy of, if anything doesn't go as planned. But that's very useful advice. I'll start doing that from now on. Thank you.

Bike has been dropped off at the dealer, informed insurance of its current location. Echelon said to call and inform the insurance adjuster on Monday, so hopefully I can get this resolved properly. Also forgot to mention that upon unlocking the bike steering, I was no longer able to lock it after.

Now I just have to play the waiting game and see what unfolds :(
 
+1.. if the ins. they gave you is legit, no worries. Your ins. will either pay to repair it(up to you who does it) or write it off(probable from the damage described). If they do that, you could take the $ or "buy" the bike back from them and take less $ and fix it yourself. You don't necessarily have to take their first offer. But if it's good, save yourself the hassle of fixing and buy another. Start looking around and find similar bikes as yours for sale and save the pages(screen shots) to build a "value amount" file....or look for your next purchase.
 
I'm no legal expert, but I would suspect taking pictures of the cars around you before leaving your bike wouldn't really help you in anyway. I mean, without witness, how do you prove anything other than they were in the vicinity? Anyway Brian P's advice is spot on, and he's right, do thank them for being decent enough to fess up.
 
Neil_V said:
I'm no legal expert, but I would suspect taking pictures of the cars around you before leaving your bike wouldn't really help you in anyway. I mean, without witness, how do you prove anything other than they were in the vicinity? Anyway Brian P's advice is spot on, and he's right, do thank them for being decent enough to fess up.
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it doesn't help if no one has seen anything...but if you have a witness that says "green car hit bike and drove away" and you have a pic of the plates of the green car that parked in front of you and may have reversed into your bike. Then you have at least something to ask police to follow up with.
 
jc100 said:
it doesn't help if no one has seen anything...but if you have a witness that says "green car hit bike and drove away" and you have a pic of the plates of the green car that parked in front of you and may have reversed into your bike. Then you have at least something to ask police to follow up with.
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I get the idea, but honestly, you can hardly get the police to come out of the build AT a collision reporting center, never mind going out and doing follow up on a hit and run mall parking lot situation. Maybe I'm just cynical, but I feel unless you catch them in the act or have darn strong video evidence you'll end up paying pics or not... I dunno, maybe the perp admits to it, if you can track them down, but for me, it's not worth the effort given the low percentage of positive outcome.
 
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I have confirmed security footage of the mentioned car hitting my bike. This is a last resort just in case the aforementioned driver gave me false insurance information. Which I doubt is the case, based on the fact that the information given to me matches that which they provided.

The wait seems forever though. Trying to remain positive through this, but its rough. Thanks to everyone for their input.
 
Yes insurance is notoriously slow. If your bike is going to be repaired, (which will primarily be decided on the quote by snow city, unless as stated there is frame damage). Insurance no longer send adjuster to dealerships, snow city will prepare the quote take pics of the damage and send it all to your insurer. Your insurer, will contact driver's insurer and they will figure out the details.

As someone else said go to kijiji, ebay, buy and sell, autotrader, (bike edition), get pricing for same model with similar mileage and farkles. print off ad copies. This is what adjuster will do to determine the value of your bike. As stated if their initial offer is low you need not accept it, tell them why it is low, and get them to move up. Within reason, (if there are 10 bikes on the sites and the average ask is say $5,000, they offer $4,500, your unlikely to get them to move much but if they offer $3,000 then you can get them to move). Also ask Snow City what they would retail your bike in based upon its pre crash condition. Get that in writing if you need it to deal with adjuster. Depending upon the company, (Allstate is known for given proper valuations, others low ball), but you will also likely be dealing with a different adjuster, (they have adjusters who deal ONLY with write offs, they don't do accident benefits etc).
 
BTW, the aforementioned "buy back" option (if they write off the bike) should only be exercised IF the bike is just cosmetically damaged to the point of writeoff, NOT if there is frame damage. Once there is frame damage the ownership will be branded and you'll never be able to get insurance on it again no matter what you do for repairs - there is no option for going from "salave" branding to "rebuilt" branding for motorcycles as the "rebuilt" brand doesn't apply, only "salvage", and once it's branded that way the bike is basically a part source.

If it's just cosmetics that they write it off for and the dealership clearly states there is NO frame damage, you can entertain the buyback option if you're willing to fix it up on your own dime and time. It won't likely make financial sense to pay the dealership to do the repairs however, so that's really only a financially savvy option IF you can do the repairs yourself, in which case you may actually end up making a few dimes on the deal in the end.

All that said, if you're not really handy or don't want to be bothered trying to fix things yourself...just take the writeoff dollars (pay heed to Hedo's advice above) and buy yourself a new ride. From your list of damage it doesn't sound like you'd be able to fix it anyways for the $$$'s you'd pocket in a buyback deal, and it'd be a lot of work....
 
is this what happened to your bike?

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FLSTC said:
is this what happened to your bike?

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Heh, visited a friend's place up north, big property that gets rented out to ranchers. Only cows through. Each morning, the Burg's folding mirrors were pushed in and it was covered in nose/smooch prints. Never knocked it over though. They even came to see the scooter off when I left.
 
Counterintuitively, cows show much more panache than horses. Back on topic. As far as getting your bike creamed by an affluent couple this is about as smooth as it gets. They obviously missed a memo or had a spiritual awakening. As mentioned ad nauseum thanks and a round of high fives are the go.
 
your insurance will low ball you and likely say the bike is a write off for the amount of damage on it.
It's not so much the amount in parts, but the labour involved in putting it all on.

Be prepared to fight if they low ball you and don't budge. Have print outs of similar bikes and mileage.

I case was in limbo for a few months and I had to get the insurance ombudsperson involved as Primmum wouldn't even return my calls at that point.
 
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