'Crash for cash' fraudulent claim prevented by camera

By Fleet News
|
17 January 2014

An in-cab camera from the Vehicle Group has clearly shown the blatant fraud of a 'crash for cash' scam.

The video shows both vehicles travelling at 50mph on a dual carriageway when the car in front suddenly slams its brake on causing the vehicle with the in-cab camera to perform an emergency brake.

Due to the speed of the incident the vehicle behind shunts this vehicle up the rear pushing it into the third party.

When the accident was reported the driver of the blue Peugeot reported the driver as being at fault for the accident but using the video footage the system was able to exonerate the driver. The total cost saving for the claim was estimated at £45k.

Elliot Goff, head of sales for The Vehicle Group, said: "With cash for crash at an all-time high and an annual spend of £392 million and over 84% of motorists concerned about rising policies due to fraud, the video goes to show not just the financial gain but also the safety of the driver in the event of a staged accident."

Since launching the Eyescan product in 2012, the system has been adopted by some of the UK’s largest fleets and in some cases give ROI in less than three months. The system is equipped with a g-force sensor and GPS and gives enough clarity for a business to make out vehicle registrations.

Allan Davison, Hoyer operations director, has implemented the Eyescan camera on his fleet of HGVs, vans and cars, and described it as a “fantastic investment".

"We installed the cameras due to the increasing number of spurious third party damage and injury claims and the impact these were having on our overall costs and insurance premiums," he said.

"The system provides invaluable evidence when defending staged accidents or incidents involving third parties and significantly reduces the amount of management time required in investigating such events.

"Furthermore, it gives a detailed insight into the true causes of accidents so we can learn from such events and amend our training programmes as required.”

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Author: Fleet News

Comments (13)

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Comments

Darren Campbell - 17/01/2014 11:42

I'm interested to know who got to pay the bill for the three damaged vehicles in this case? Did the Peugeot drivers insurance have to pay it? Or the driver himself? Or the other two vehicles involved in the accident, did their insurance have to cover the damage?
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- Haydn - 17/01/2014 16:03
  
  @Darren Campbell - It says in the article, the Peugeot driver payed what was about £45k of costs
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- Tom - 16/05/2014 00:21
  
  @Haydn - It does not say that at all Haydn. Read it again.
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- Norm - 21/05/2014 03:54
  
  @Darren Campbell - I don't know about UK law, but in the US your Insurer is not liable for you committing an act of fraud. He *should* go to jail. His car goes to the junkyard where it belongs. The third car back is liable for inattentive driving. He should have noticed the vehicles ahead slowing.
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- Seano - 27/05/2014 12:41
  
  @Norm - I actually dont think this example is a 'Crash for Cash' 'accident', I think this is a motorist hacked off with a lorry/van drive tailgatting him and doing the idiotic thing of braking/coming to a stop rather than pulling over and letting the lorry/van past. The force of the impact was very severe and the driver going in to the back of the lorry would not have any indication if the force was great enough to shunt the lorry into the Peugeot if it was a C4C and what would the benefit be to him? No this was just an example of highway idiots (both of them) Peugeot for braking to a halt and the van driver for tailgatting, see it all to often..
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PETER ORRELL - 17/01/2014 12:03

Was the Peugeot driver prosecuted or did he get away with it and the third car's insurance had to pay up !
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- Richard - 17/05/2014 11:45
  
  @PETER ORRELL - Yes I wan to know, did anyone get prosecuted?
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Roland Waters - 17/01/2014 13:06

While the images rarely lie, albeit photo shop has been attempted insurers say by their Bodyshops, it remains astonishing how obstructive insurers are to disclose in-car recorded data when they appear to be the liable insurer - it usually requires Formal Reports under the DPA to the ICO as few claims handlers appear to have any idea of the law and evidence and FCA regs to behave as expected - but then agin, evidence and profits seem linked from what the CoA considered in the AutoFocus and Accident Exchange hearings - perhaps the 5,000 plus cases now reported to have costs the unreliable insurance evidence providers/insurer so many times more £millions than the 'evidence' created - perhaps some way to go yet until evidence is treated as evide4nce and not Profit Opportunities?
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Andy Titterton - 17/01/2014 13:13

Whilst an interesting article, is this just an advert for the Vehicle Group? We can all buy suitable cameras for under £100 which I'd bet a £20 John Lewis voucher is a lot less than their costs.......
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- Dave Elliot - 20/01/2014 13:41
  
  @Andy Titterton - Lot's of cameras for sale on Ebay but they only last about 3 months. i bought one for 14.99 and it lasted 6 weeks. They are unreliable and can be unplugged, SD cards removed etc.
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- Mike - 16/05/2014 10:42
  
  @Andy Titterton - get yourself a G1W DVR straight from ebay. It's around 35 pound. I've been using it for at least 6 months now. Works like a charm. I highly recommend it as it is insanely cheap and decent quality.
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Adam - 21/01/2014 15:11

Great Video , least it shows what is going on in the industry at present
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Greg J - 17/05/2014 10:36

So what the vehicle behind the one with camera has to do with it then ? Surely he is to be blamed in this case for not stopping and slamming into this vehicle. People do drive too close to each other on roads in Britain.
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- Steve - 18/05/2014 01:29
  
  @Greg J - are you serious? How at any point could it be the guys behinds fault? If he had slammed on his breaks then you'd be blaming the guy behind THAT guy cause the car would then have gone into the back and so on and so on. Always somewhere to shift the blame, when it's obvious who was at fault.
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- D - 18/05/2014 01:58
  
  @Steve - It is the guy who hit the camera car fault. If he kept the distance and reacted he wouldn't have hit the camera car. The camera car had to do an emergency stop and so the car behind, if at a correct distance could've reacted in time and stopped as well. The camera car stopped and didn't hit the peugeot, however, the car behind the camera car didn't manage to stop and so it hit the camera car, causing the camera car to hit the peugeot.
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- sevi - 18/05/2014 03:07
  
  @D - Are you guys serious? Its ina dual carriageway, there is absolutely no reason for you to slam your brakes on the right lane (any lane in fact) when there is nothing in front of you... God i cannot believe that people like you have a driving license.....
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- James - 18/05/2014 03:42
  
  @sevi - I'm with you Sevi, all you idiots saying it's the the driver behind the camera car fault have no commen sence. Yes, they say you need a 2 second gap but that 2 second takes into account reaction time which is more the you might think no matter how good of a driver you are. There will sti be a gap between when you see a hazard and when you break. Luckily for the camera car, they did have a camera or else I'm sure they would have been sued following our stupid, uk legal system even when it's clear to everyone what's happening. It's all too commen these days, people trying to make money of others causing then to technically break the law putting them at fault. I think everyone needs to wise up and look at this logically. And as many people have said, even if he did have a technical problem with there car you would NOT slam the breaks on in the inside lane. Traveling at 50-60mph you could coast for atleast half a mile giving you time you pullover safely.
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- Norm - 21/05/2014 03:41
  
  @James - Here's the way it would go in the US - Camera car is NOT at fault. He was able to stop in time. Third car back is liable for damage to the camera car because he was not aware enough to notice the camera car slowing. Inattentive driving. The front car driver that stopped GOES TO JAIL for attempted fraud. His insurance (if he has any) pays NOTHING because of the mans attempted crime.
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Danny - 18/05/2014 11:48

At the end of the day the Peugeot was to blame for the hole thing yes the law states the driver that rear ends the other driver is at fault but from this footage u can see the Peugeot driver stops on a busy road for no propper reason resulting in a accident at the end off the day the camera is the evidence and if he hadn't of stopped there would be no crash he was the cause of a rta and it could of been a lot worse
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Brian boulnois - 18/05/2014 12:23

When I was at a speed aware course I was told this "if you hit some up the back end, it will always be your fault as the law see it you are too close to the vehicle in front as you should have enough gap to stop. Now this is where it gets weird, if you are shunted into another car as what happen to the camera car, then the car you hit claims off you as you are too close to them even that you was shunted.
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- mikmik - 18/05/2014 14:32
  
  @Brian boulnois - I've been the meat in the car sandwich twice, and never been at fault.. if u are at a complete stop, no matter if u are an inch, a foot, or 10 feet from the car in front, u are not at fault if another car hits u from behind into a car in front.. the person that hits is moving is at fault as they are the ones that were driving too close and couldnt stop in time.. all claims are put to the car that was still moving (the one that pushed me into the front one).. the only claims that come back onto the middle driver are injury claims which are covered by the compulsary third party insurance in australia, but claims to car damage are all put on the moving drive
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- brian boulnois - 18/05/2014 14:56
  
  @mikmik - the laws are different in Australia then they are in the Uk law. Get into a five car shunt and you hope and prey that if you the five car someone else hits you otherwise you get the other four cars claim off you. That doesnt happen in the uk, you claim off the person that hit you and they claim off the person that hits them and so on. As i said this was from the police them selfs.
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- james - 18/05/2014 19:21
  
  @brian boulnois - not quite, in the uk the car that is moving is the one at fault therefore if you were in a 5 car shunt,it would play out as the 5 car being at fault and not a chain reaction of insurance claims,
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denis bonnici - 21/05/2014 00:07

If there was a motorcycle following the truck then he would not have stood a chance.!!..
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JWalker - 23/05/2014 15:31

The idiot blue car driver aside, the van driver also sucks. He is leaving a gap smaller than i could measure, like 0.2 seconds, which is 10 times smaller than what the rules of the road state he should leave. He is dangerously close regardless of how good or bad the blue driver is. If someone cut infront of the blue driver or something ran in front of it and the blue car needed to do an emergency break(not slow down slowly like he did) , then the lorry/van driver would have went right into the back of him and it would be 100% the van/lorry drivers fault. The law has recently changed too so that in this case the van/lorry driver could get a £100 on the spot fine and 3 points on his license. So yeah regardless of how idiotic the blue car driver is, the van/lorry driver is also a very dangerous driver too.
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- brian boulnois - 23/05/2014 16:25
  
  @JWalker - goes to say if it wasnt for the video camera to prove what happen the person that hit the blue car would be at fault after all it be "his word against theres" unless there is indy witness to back up whats happened.
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- John Adams - 21/06/2014 11:24
  
  @JWalker - i was only that close after the numpty in the Peugeot started to brake, when stopped i was still 8 ft behind him
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John Adams - 21/06/2014 11:21

This info is bogus, I was the driver of the van, the Peugeot driver was arguing on the phone with his wife. His 8 yr old daughter was in the front too.he stopped, i stopped, the Audi behind me stopped, but the 40 ton articulated truck didnt... The Peugeot driver lost his license, got a 16 jail term and must retake his test. I got severe whiplash, broken ribs, fractured skull and a stroke 3 months later. The footage is from a road angel dash mounted camera
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- Amy Tookman - 07/11/2014 15:57
  
  @John Adams Hi John, I'm so sorry to hear about your injuries, I hope you are recovering well. I am currently working on a documentary for ITN about road incidents in Britain caught on dash cams, and the real stories behind the footage. It would be great to have a quick chat with you if you could spare the time. I would be very grateful if you could email me on amy.tookman@itn.co.uk. I hope to hear from you soon. Amy.
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- feng - 09/05/2018 15:38
  
  What happened to those behind you? This is worse than I though.
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Sean O'Neill - 24/04/2015 11:55

Sorry, how can this be crash for cash....the car in front slowed down, slowly, typical crash for cash brake abruptly, make late turns without indicating. This footage was shown before and was more likely a pissed of car driver with a truck driving up his backside slowing down to irritate the truck driver, but lets not get in the way of a good headline/story hey!.
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Seano - 24/04/2015 12:05

Having just read the comments below, the actual driver has confirmed that this was NOT crash for cash but a a man and wife having a domestic in the car in front.
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