Rear ended, but did not call police.

[ea6b607]

I was rear ended, but was stricken with a case of my own stupidity afterwards and decided to be nice and not call the police. He said he forgot his insurance card, so I copied the information I could from his license and told him I would call him. After I called (had to call several times before I actually got him to answer) he informed me that he did not have insurance and that the car was not his. He seams to accept liability, but is being quite flaky and I have reason to believe I may need to go to small claims. Damage is minimal, but we all know what car repairs can cost. I'm getting a quote today. Advice anyone?

edit: state is Nebraska

 

[justalayman]

Advice anyone?

Ya, follow directions.

It seems you failed to follow the directions to call the police when in an accident and now you failed to follow directions to post your state when starting this thread.
I think I see a common problem here and unless you intend on remedying the problem, offering you more advice would simply be useless.

 

[ea6b607]

Sorry it is Nebraska. Not an excuse, but an explanation I'm 19 weigh about 100 pounds and did not feel comfortable calling the police on the man, perhaps I will regret that.

 

[ecmst12]

Calling the police would not make the other person have insurance. Wouldn't change much, in fact. You can sue the other person in small claims court, or you can file a collision claim on your insurance if you have it and let them pursue the other party. If you want, you can call the police NOW and find out who owns the car and if the owner has insurance.

 

[ea6b607]

Ok, thanks. I do have full coverage insurance with USAA, but wasn't sure if I should call my insurance company or file for small claims. If I do file for small claims and I'm not able to prove my case well enough (don't have a whole lot of proof unfortunately other then call histories some information I wrote down from his license and a couple pictures), am I able to call the insurance company afterwards? I'm sorry I'm just really lost in this situation. I got a quote and will give the guy another call this afternoon. Hopefully this can all be avoided. Would figure the fist accident I'm involved in the person at fault is uninsured and driving someone else's car.... I guess my options assuming I can't settle this nicely with him are, call the police, call insurance, or file small claims. Don't know which is best.

 

[ecmst12]

Call your insurance NOW and file with them. Give them the other guy's info and let them do all the leg work on pursuing them for payment. Why would you go through all that when you don't have to?

 

[ea6b607]

Thanks for the help, called USAA up and they handled the situation. Should have just called them to start with... Lesson learned, actually several lessons learned. Thanks again!

 

[ecmst12]

USAA is awesome.