Digsy

Woo! That's some size of aerial. Yeah, looks like Lomoto's cup of tea!

I love my Zed but not so much I need to carry tissues round with me......

Yeah, needs an outlandish respray IMO!

What? Coz he was the fit one?!?

Hi mate, They just charged me for one hours labour although to be fair as it was the 1st one that Paul had fitted, it took him a little longer. The rates were due to go up, but at the time it was about £40 without discount. I didn't ask about the discount as it had took longer than an hour so was going to take the mickey. Why, are you having an exhaust fitted? I love it now, got a really nice burble at low revs, then a real howl at high revs. Nicely loud, but not offensively so..... I think it surprised a few people at JAE with how it sounded. If you want to hear it, then we could always meet up. I'm over in Knowsley still quite a few days....... let me know. It also came up nice and shiney, although I would say that there are nicer lookig end pipes out there, as they ain't rolled or anything at the end. Got loads of pics that I never got around to posting about this getting fitted. PM me if you want further info? Ah, plans are afoot my friend but I won't spoil the surprise! If you fancy a swift pint after work and you're in Knowsley give me a buzz. Have you still got my mobile?

You've got some depth of shine on that, mate! Luvverley!!

Don't rise to the bait, Mark!

Mark, how much did TDi charge you to fit the zorst? Are you happy you made the right choice now?

Noooooo! IMO it'll take all the aggression from the front of the car and runs the risk of making look a bit blobby. Sorry, Tim, don't like the idea at all.

The Motor Insurers Bureau is set up by statute and funded by the aforementioned contributions from all insurers. It has two schemes - one for the victims of UNINSURED drivers and one for the victims of UNTRACED drivers. Where you are hit by a driver for whom you have full details (name, address, reg no. etc) but was not insured, the first scheme applies. Your claim in theory is treated in the same way as where there is an insurer involved i.e. you can claim for exactly the same losses and the MIB pay your legal costs if you are successful and the claim is not a "small claim". The MIB are severely underfunded and understaffed so these claims tend to take longer to settle but if they are messing around you can issue County Court proceedings against the uninsured motorist and if you obtain an upaid Judgment against him the MIB must meet it. I don't know how often the MIB try and recover what they have paid out from the uninsured motorist direct but in theory they can. Where the driver is untraced i.e. hit and run, the second scheme applies. This is far less favourable to the victim. Only if the offending vehicle is traced (i.e. they leave it at the scene) can you claim for property damage. Otherwise it's personal injury and related losses only. The MIB are even slower with these cases (I know of one still going after 12 years! ) and because there is no identified driver to sue there is no threat to make to speed them up. To add insult to injury the MIB only have to pay a contribution to your legal costs based on the value of your claim which in most cases does come close to covering the full amount and leaves you having to pay your solicitor the balance out of the damages. Both of these schemes involve lots of technical issues/deadlines which if not followed to the letter are draconian and allow the MIB to avoid the claim.

Hi Digsy This is exactly the sort of question i hoped we would get though to be fair traffic is proably my weakest subject The system as it is now involves two types of accident. Injury and non injury taking the latter first these are completed on a small form and submitted through a supervisor who SHOULD make sure all items have been dealt with. A hit and run with a witness with vehicle details SHOULD be followed up before the file is written off as completed. Often the vehicle details are wrong or in most cases refer to a previous owner three times removed. this can and does lead to severe problems in locating the driver. Injury accidents - sorry we cannot call them accidents now as that indicates negligence so they are road traffic collisions - are slioghtly different in that the form is more complex and more enquiries are expected. the same goes however for the owner driver thing. i have in the past located cars/drivers/offenders from details provided by a witness and once or twice pulled a stunt or two that illicted an admission The major trouble is that almost all road traffic matters are non endictable and as such are statute barred (cannot be proceeded with) after 6 months!! This is why many matters go un detected. A polite call / letter to the duty inspector of the officer dealing with the collision -there i go PC again - with a 'whats happening with my accident' - much better - goes a long way to getting action if things seem to be dragging on. we are in the era of accountability and a letter HAS to be answered. (I know i have had loads of them regarding either my jobs or my officers jobs) hope that this helps mate Ming the Cop Thanks for the insight, Ming. My experience is that in most cases no-one ever explains the situation to the victim of these incidents, so they just feel ignored and let down by the system. This means that where there are genuine reasons for a case not being followed up the police's reputation can be sullied by lack of communication. Of course there are officers who for whatever reason don't follow up these cases. One extremely pleasant elderly client who tried to enquire about his case found that the officer refused to speak to him and avoided his calls. The case was dropped and he was never given an explanation. Fortunately, I was more tenacious and with the help of the independent witness persuaded the third party's insurers to pay up. I imagine part of the problem will be lack of funding/manpower so that officers don't have the time to keep the victims in the loop but better communication would help the public perception of the police, who I believe in general do a good job.

Corporal or capital, mate? I'm not sure flogging them is going to work....

One thing that really winds me up is that I often have clients coming to me after being in accidents with hit and run drivers. The police seem to have no interest in investigating the cases notwithstanding that these people are genuinely injured. Often the clients are advised that they can pursue a claim against the Motor Insurers Bureau who will make payments for the victims of untraced drivers, however, in most cases that is only injury compensation and the client will be left with a damaged or written off vehicle, storage and recovery charges etc. potentially running into several thousand pounds and no recompense. I have had a couple recently where the third party vehicle details were recorded by an independent witness and the police have still closed their file without making further investigations. In 11 years handling road traffic accident claims I can only recall one occasion where the police located a hit and run driver. I am sure there is a police side to this which I would be interested to hear so that I can explain it to clients who feel the system has let them down. PS Ming, I hope you see this as a genuine question in the spirit of the thread.

At least it's pretty much on topic for a change! This new mod seems to be getting a bit cocky lads!

Over there it is an offence to insult or demean a police officer which is taken VERY seriously. hence the decent back handers and kicks up the ars*. Over here we have banned smacking, banned any sort of punishment in school so what chance do the boys and girls in blue have. A whole generation with no respect for anything and the child line telephone number tattooed on their hand at birth. HELP Ming the Fantasy Prime Minister Here, here!

it'd definitely cut down on the rate of youth giving cheek to policemen... never ever seen or heard of an Italian teenager answer back to or swear at a policeman like Ming told us a while back Presumably you can't shoot youths for giving you cheek though! If you can I'm moving!!!

Lazy arse!

Would a gun help, Ming (the Tooled-up)?

Update - Demon Tweeks in Wrexham can get me ET20 front and ET30 rear which sounds more like it. Any thoughts, oh wise ones?

Does Italy have better crime figures as a result? PS Just interested, I don't disagree!

Afreemason/Glynn over at the OC seems to speak highly of these guys. I've spoken to them today and I suspect it's worth your while to give them a call, Sarnie. PS I'm not on commission (am I? )

Strangely, I like that. OMG strip lights under the car next.........

When you give the delivered price on the Nismo, is that after import taxes? Just want to be clear.

Just taken it back to Dixons (or Currys Digital as it is now) - not a word of apology and wouldn't meet their internet price on a Tom Tom One. Got my money back and won't be spending it there in future.