With more people on the road travelling longer distances, people working longer hours, and the frantic pace of most people’s lives these days, the truth is that there will be an increase in road accidents over the Easter period. To complicate things, public holidays will mean that repairers will be closed, insurance call centres will be on skeleton staff or closed (including Club 4X4), and many of you will be a decent distance from home if something goes wrong.

As we mentioned in an earlier blog you can soon look forward to a 24hr claims service with Club 4X4. In the meantime, if something does go wrong on a public holiday, what should you do?

1. Stay calm – The truth is that nothing can change what has happened. Try to focus on what needs to happen from here.

• Take photos of the scene if safe to do so.
• Exchange details with the other driver if there is one. Make sure you get registration numbers and descriptions of any other vehicles involved; including the name and address, and Licence number of any other drivers (a photo of the license is even better), and the name and address of the registered owner (these might be different!).

2. Don’t admit liability – the road rules are complex, this means that determining fault is best done by experts. Don’t admit it was your fault, even if you think that it was. Record details of the facts as you remember them and get the details of any witnesses if you can.

3. Take necessary actions to secure your vehicle

• If your vehicle is not driveable, then have it towed to the nearest secure facility (likely the tow truck company’s yard, but the towie will advise you on this) and we’ll take over from there. Note that “a safe place” may not be to your home.
• If your vehicle is driveable, but not secure (E.G – broken window), then take measures to make it secure and prevent any further loss or damage (E.G – remove any valuables from the vehicle, move it into a garage, tape up the window etc)

Club 4X4 will reimburse the reasonable costs of towing or securing the vehicle following the acceptance of your claim.

4. Remember that you have cover to assist with:

• Emergency repairs – if less than $1,000.00 can be spent to return the vehicle to a driveable condition, you can have emergency repairs undertaken and we will reimburse you for the cost of them upon acceptance of your claim.
• Emergency travel and accommodation – if you are more than 250km from home, we’ll pay up to $500.00 to help cover the cost of getting you home, or the provision of temporary accommodation.
• Offroad Recovery – you have $1,500 of Recovery Cover included with your policy (more if you’ve had it added to your policy). Check out our article on how to use this if you need it

5. Notify us ASAP via email of the incident – you can email yourclaim@club4x4.com.au . As soon as our call centre is open, a member of our claims team will get in contact to get things moving for you.

Remember: If you experience a loss when our call centre isn’t open, it doesn’t mean you are stuck. Upon accepting your claim we will reimburse you the reasonable costs of securing the vehicle or towing it if not driveable. We will also reimburse you up to $1,000.00 towards emergency repairs if you can get the car back on the road for less than $1,000.00. Additionally, we’ll reimburse you up to $500.00 for emergency accommodation or travel if you are more than 250km from home.

So don’t stress if you have an incident on a public holiday this season. Do what you can, make use of the cover you have, make sure you and the family are OK, and then let us know via email. We’ll get in contact as soon as possible to start the process of formally reporting the claim, so we can get your claim authorised, you reimbursed for the costs outlined previously, and repairs happening as soon as possible.

Club 4X4 will be closed from Friday the 19/04/2019 up to and including Monday 22/04/2019. We will follow-up any email received during this time on Tuesday 23/04/2019. If you urgently need any advice, we will monitor and respond to any messages posted on our Facebook page

We hope you have a safe and happy Easter break!