help please!!!!

[naflharrison]

im in a bit of a pickle! on monday night sone very young kids were caught by my neighbour throwing stones at the front of my 8mth old car. we spoke to the two sets of parents involved and one lot were fairly ok about it the other refuse to believe that their little angel would do that, we live in a nice semi-rural area where this type of thing doesnt happen. our paint is very badly chiped and after getting a quote from an approved body shop we are shocked by just how much work is needed to rectify the problem, nearly �2,000. what i want to know is if anyone has had this kind of thing happen and how long they spent getting the money from those responsible to repair, im certainly not paying for it as we have a witness who saw and heard what happened and police are involved, im just afraid that when the parents see the quotes they will go nuts and refuse to pay. i will add that if we dont get the damage repaired our car will rust as the damage is down to the metal and therefore our paint warranty void. anyone help!!??

[~max~]

I know in France we had insurance for kids, and that involved damage caused to others....Now I'm not sure it would work if the damage was intentional?
Can you ask your car insurance? I'm sure they'll have come across this before and will offer you advice, without needing to make a claim that might affect your bonus.
I guess I'd talk to the parents first, see if they have some kind of home insurance that would cover this. Good luck!
At least you're lucky to know who actually did it!

[Ethel]

You are not going to get the parents to pay if they don't volunteer, realistically.

The police are involved but if the children are under the age of criminal responsibility there is nothing they can do. If they are over, they will simply get an informal caution, unless they have records of previous similar behaviour.

You could I suppose go through the County Court to get compensation, but without proof that those children caused that damage, you'll be wasting your time and money if the witness is not prepared to 'go all the way' and specify that he saw those children cause all the damage and the damage definitely wasn't there before.

Even if you won at County Court, you will still have to enforce the judgement - the hard part.

The best you can hope is the police will either persuade the parents to pay or issue summons to get them into court and compensation be awarded.

Was your car on your own property at the time of the incident?

[ChuckFickens]

can't help with your actual question, but �2000 seems somewhat on the expensive side to me for sorting out a few paint chips. I'd suggest that you get a couple more quotes from other places.

Oh and that just typical of parents these days isn't... "oh my little angel wouldn't do that!!!"

If I had done anything like that as a kid (I wouldn't BTW) and an adult came to see my parents about it my parents would have believed them and I dread to think what would have happened to me! and my parents would have offered to pay before being asked, they did when I accidentally rode my bike into somebodys car!

[naflharrison]

turns out because the kids are under the age of 10 the parents dont have to be held responsible therefore will only pay out of goodwill. fat chance ypu havnt seen them!! also although the cost is nearly 2000 this is because the entire front of the car needs to be resprayed and windscreen replaced!! bonnet, both wings and pilars to doors etc all need re-sprayed and this must be done by manufacture approved as if we dont use manu approved this will void our anti corrosion warranty. basically if we use a back street cheap body shop we have no comeback if the paint goes bad in a yr r so down the line. so cant take that risk!! also just been told by police we will prob have to pay via our own car insurance. we have protected no claims but will this make any major difference to nxt yrs policy as im the holder and only 28 car is 2.0 sport so expensive enough to insure as we are in n. ireland! total nightmare. basically your kids can cause all kinds of damage to someones house car etc as long as they are under 10 and you can get of scott free and arent responsible for them till they are 10. funny but thought we were responsible for our kids actions from the day they are born untill they are at least 16!!

[randyraven]

Find some local kids under the age of 10. Give them a bag of sweets and stones and point them towards thier car.

Always remember revenge is the answer :-)

[Twenty20]

Looking at it from another point of view, if someone came knocking on my door saying 'your kid damaged my car, I want �2000', I dont think I'd be immediately reaching into my pocket. I'd certainly tell the kid off in no uncertain terms if I knew it was them for certain, but I would assume that the car owner would claim on their insurance, after all thats what its for.

Sounds like an awful lot of damage. What were they throwing, bricks? Do you know why they were throwing things at your car?

[naflharrison]

just being silly kids unfortunately, was only stones that were thrown but paintwork is badly damaged and windscreen needs replaced. its all the respray work that is needed as the marks are down to metal so will rust if left like that. car is only 8mths old so cant risk ignoring it as anti corrosion would be void, they didnt know the cost when we went to speak to them as we only thought it would cost a few hundred but shocked when manu approved gave us estimate! police were involved, i no what you mean about someone knocking saying they have to pay for damage but our neighbour watched them and chased them so there is no doubt that they did it. unfortunately one set of parents chose to believe their 5 yr old who said he didnt do anything and they were not punished or made to apologise, they are not nice people. its easy to just claim on insurance which is now the only option but when people get off with things like that and its me that will suffer when i need to renew my policy its very infuriating. on the otherhand car insurance is there to protect not only if i hit someones car in an accident but to also protect me from having to repair a car i didnt damage myself, i can see it from both sides i would not like it but a decent person would see that they are responsible and at least offer to pay something for the damage that their unsupervised 5 and 3yr old have done.

[Hypognosis]

See also:-
https://www.gov.uk/child-under-10-breaks-law

and

https://www.gov.uk/if-my-child-gets-in-trouble-with-police
(The expectation for the child to sign the parenting contract could prove a stumbling block, when a 5 & 3 year old are involved).

I have no kids so I'm curious as to what ages kids begin to understand such concepts as property (i.e. other people's), actions and consequences (eg of damaging someone else's property), what money is, what the family doing without 2 grand might entail (eg effect on holidays/Xmas). Forgive me stating the obvious but at below such ages, they should not be allowed outdoors, unsupervised.

Which reminds me, why were the police so blasé about such young children out on their own, unprotected? Isn't that straightforward neglect?