12.20.2010 10:56 AM

A great way to start Christmas week

Pulling into the Canadian Tire near my office this morning, and a guy slams into my rear bumper and quarter panel. Interestingly, he doesn’t have his insurance information on him. I am now at one of the three “Accident Support Service” offices in the City of Toronto.

Three. For a city of five million people.

Whatever Christmas spirit I possessed is now fully gone.

30 Comments

  1. Conservative Peter says:

    You have my sympathies . This is why I stay away from malls , beer stores ,and liquor stores after Dec. 15 th . Just a bunch of crazy people .

    You did the right thing reporting it rather than just working it out with him on your own .

    Over 10% of the cars in the province have no insurance .We need a registry so that as soon as people get pulled over the cop can see if that car is insured .

    Bob Rae won back in the day because he promised public auto insurance . You would pay $800 – $900 for your sticker . If you wanted to cancel your insurance and get a refund you would have to bring in your plates .

  2. bigcitylib says:

    “Whatever Christmas spirit I possessed is now fully gone.”

    Welcome to my world.

  3. Andrew says:

    Welcome to the world of the common pleb when it comes to simple matters as reporting an accident or theft reporting.

  4. Brad says:

    most likely he is not insured, like so many people out there, I have had 4 friends that have been hit by uninsured motorists in the past year
    and everyone of them has been out of pocket either for the whole thing or the deductible

    you can thank your Mr. McGuinty for dithering on this for years, the insurance companies have been asking for real time insurance info available to MTO and police for years and it’s finally just starting to happen

    you see in Peel region where I live, they have the highest % of uninsured drivers in Canada, I pay more in premiums to cover it, and why is it peel region and nowhere else?

    • Namesake says:

      ‘cuz insurance premiums are unappeeling?

      • James Bow says:

        But why just Peel Region? Is it so much more dangerous to drive there than anywhere else in the province?

        • Conservative Peter says:

          People faking accidents is a very big problem in Peel . They can either get two cars and stage an accident outright . Or what they can also do is pull in front of you and stop suddenly . If you hit them its your fault .

          They then have 4 people get out of the car and grab their necks . If you come to Brampton if have to keep an eye out for this .

        • Namesake says:

          what, you thought I was fielding a serious but lame answer? You must be pun-ch drunk. Ok, here’s a semi-serious stab at one:

          1st) looks like you may have the causality backwards: from what Brad was saying, the premiums there are higher cuz there are so many going uninsured (not cuz there’s more accidents there: just more accidents where they’re unable to get compensated from the at-least partially-at-fault drivers’ side), since:

          2nd) too many of the inhabitants there are like Rob Ford’s constituency: free riders, who want to enjoy the protections, freedoms & services of society w/o paying their fair share to make that possible for all of us.

          • Conservative Peter says:

            Check out for you self namesake , the next time you go to an insurance agent ask them where the highest premiums are . There have also been numerous newspaper articles here regarding people getting arrested for stageing accidents and commiting other forms of insurance fraud .

            A personal injury claim can end up being well over $40 if the person can collect disabilty for a year or so .Lawyers and phisical therapists have also been investigated for billing the insurance companies .

            Remember Jag Badureia(?) . He was the Liberal Mp who collected from an insurance company even though he was well enough to play base ball .

          • Namesake says:

            Huh. Ok, I’ll take your word for it (esp. since you’re “Going off the talking points” by — gasp — calling FOR a registry), and so stand corrected.

            So, we’re back to the original q., then. Makes for an interesting criminology thesis topic:

            What is it about the Peel region which makes its people commit a disproportionate amount of insurance fraud (Jack D. Ripper’s “flouride in the water”?),

            which, in turn, has been jacking up the rates, causing a disproportionate no. to commit the _other_ major type of insurance crime (foregoing it altogether).

    • Shaun says:

      So if it’s finally happening under McGuinty, but not the Harris/Eves combo, who was more successful?

      • Brad says:

        neither, two of my friend were hit by uninsured, driving under suspension persons and 1 was impaired, neither of these people should have been able to renew their plates

        denying plate renewals to people without insurance won’t keep all of them off the road, but it will help

        it will also hopefully keep a few more drunks off the road, it should have been done a long time ago

        • Conservative Peter says:

          But you can buy ins. go get your sticker and then cancel your ins.
          If you are paying monthly you just stop paying or you can go get a refund . Some companies fight this by only giving out 6 month slips for people who do this a lot .

  5. Brent Sienna says:

    I agree an accident you get dragged into is a pain in the ass but you walked away from it unharmed for the most part. Those two guys killed on the QEW accident this morning won’t be coming home to their families tonight and Christmas is a total bust for those families now.

    Merry Christmas Warren, I’m sure that Holiday Spirit will return shortly after some hugs from your family.

    • Dave says:

      Amen, brother.

    • James Bow says:

      Agreed. It could be worse. I’m in Des Moines, right now, and we were fortunate that we had dry and clear conditions to make the trip from Kitchener in just two days. Earlier last week, you’ll remember, they closed down part of the 402 and had to airlift stranded car passengers out of there. They even found an individual who foolishly tried to walk, and was found frozen to death fifty metres away from his car in a field.

      Driving down to Des Moines, I noticed more than a few cars lying abandoned in the ditch. Let’s remember that a lot of people have had or are having worse luck than us, and be thankful.

  6. Paul R Martin says:

    It is the pits Warren. At least it did not happen on the 24th. You still have your health, family and friends. Best wishes for the rest of the season.

  7. Lipman says:

    Brent:

    You’ve got a good point. The same goes for the family of the 154th Canadian soldier killed in Afghanistan, and all the others who lost someone this year. I remember on October 25th feeling a lot of disappointment about the the municipal election. A day later, I found out a former co-worker of mine was murdered in Regent Park. On the 26th, I wasn’t thinking about the election at all… It puts things into perspective.

  8. Conservative Peter says:

    They were going to have a better way to check on the day you buy your sticker that your ins. slip is valid but a week later you could cancel your ins. and the cop that pulls you over has no way of knowing or checking if you cancelled your ins.

    They were looking at that type of system that could be used by the cops and it was a campaign promise in the last election but they were afraid the project would result in a mini ehealth so they canned it . Why these types of data base information projects can’t be done by a private sector company for a set price is beyond me .

    Alberta is very Conservative and they have public auto ins.

    We should be able to go in and buy ins. and our sticker at the same time . They should be able to see how many tickets and accidents you have and then charge people accordingly .

    If you are a high risk driver and your ins. is $3000 then that’s what you pay .

    Can’t afford to pay all at once ? then go to a bank or payday advance place .

    Putting a car on the road is a privilege not a right .

    The people who are driving without ins. are also the people who have suspended lic. and who are driving junk cars that have no business being on the road .

    They should have ride stops where they pull over cars based on a profile . Check for drunk drivers , do an insurance check and a mechanical inspection .

    I bet that if you let cops use their instincts in choosing who to stop , every other car would result in a fine that the province could use to pay down the deficit .

    A few years ago there were random checks and the insurance companies provided cell phones and they had people standing by to check policy numbers .

    In peel region they brag about a fancy police car that has cameras all around the outside that , useing pattern recognition software , can take in all the lic. plates #’s as the officer drives up and down the aisiles . They can they see who has outstanding warrents or other issues .

    But they can’t see who doesn’t have ins. If they could they could call in 200 tow trucks and have all the crap towed away .

    I drive my car with ins. and I keep my car cerified at all times . Everybody else should to .

    • Riley Robertson says:

      Alberta does not have public autio insurance, but Manitoba, Saskatchewan and BC do … and gues what? It’s WAAAAAAAY better than private insurance. I used to live in Toronto. Moved to Winnipeg …. premiums fell 30% … I can go to any neighbourhood insurance broker and get my (“Autopac”, license plates and driver’s license. Liability insurance is part of your driver’s license, collision and 3rd party is part of auto insurance. No waiting in line — ever. I had one accident. All the details done over the phone, except for the actual visit to the adjuster. Again … government run claims centre … appointment booked, car brought in, adjuster looked at it, wrote up claim in about 30 minutes … took the car to my autobody centre of choice. Done.

      Ontario needs public auto insurance right now.

      • Namesake says:

        Ah, the life of Riley.

        And there are 8 counterparts to those ‘Accident Support Service’ ctrs. in Wpg, for a pop. of somewhere north of 630,000 (1/8th of the GTA’s 5 mil.)

        Lesse, so that’s one claim centre per 78,750 pop. in Wpg. region, so by that standard, To. should have: 63.

        Oh well, I guess the efficient private sector’s all about service… and queues.

        http://www.mpi.mb.ca/english/locations/locations.html

        • Namesake says:

          Similarly, Regina & Saskatoon, w. pops of about 200 & 260,000, each have 3, for about the same ratio as Wpg

          http://www.sgi.sk.ca/sgi_pub/about_sgi/locations/locations_claims.htm

          ICBC has an even dozen spread over the Lower Mainland,*
          for a pop. of about 2.5 million; which isn’t so hot:

          that’s 1 for every 210,243 (using Wiki’s 2007 pop. figure) … or 2.7 times worse than SK/MB. (It should have 32, using the Wpg ratio.)

          But, hey, it’s 21 times worse in TO.

          * (from http://www.icbc.com/home search “Find a location,” toggling ‘Claim Centre” for: (type in) Vancouver (6) & Surrey (another 6))

      • Brammer says:

        Absolutely.

        Manitoba’s MPIC is a great model to follow.

      • Conservative Peter says:

        Alberta is not public ? My mistake I still hear people sing its praises . I just want more done to take the uninsured off the road as well as drunks and people driving with suspended lic.’s.

        Things are messed up in Ont. . I heard a friend of mine in law enforcement say that they have scaled back ride stops because of back logs in cases .

        The way its set up now the penalty for 1st time drunk driving is the basically the same
        if you plead guilty or if you fight it .

        It should be a 3 year suspension for driving drunk and a five year suspension unless you agree to plead guilty through the mail within 90 days of your arrest in which case its a 1 year and $2000 . This , I believe , would result in far fewer people tossing the dice in court .

        Drunk driving enforcement could then be turned into an efficient form of revenue generation .

        The system now isn’t designed for justice its designed to generate bilable hours for lawyers .

  9. Winston Higgs says:

    Cheer up, Whiskey Kilo!

    It’s an easy fix, just download the Bondo App on your iPad…or just patch over the quarter panel with the iPad and some duct tape and voila!

    Yer welcome and Happy Xmas!

  10. smelter rat says:

    Crown Corp run No Fault insurance here in Manitoba looks better and better all the time.

  11. Darren says:

    I don’t mean to sound like Ned Flanders (diddily) but maybe go out and do something nice for someone else. Go help out at a soup kitchen or homeless shelter. If you see someone at a local coffee shop who looks down on their luck, buy them a coffee. Pay for the order of the person behind you at the Tim Horton’s Drive-Thru. As Jethro Tull points out “the Christmas spirit is not what you drink.”

  12. hugger says:

    When faced with the tribulations of life, I try to reflect on things that offer perspective and may bolster ones beleaguered spirit. Things like old dogs and Children, and watermelon wine.

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgaDhMg62jI

    Too bad it isn’t physically, chemically or physiologically possible to graft some of that fella’s DNA to Mr. Ignatieff.

  13. PETE says:

    I recently had a similar accident and when I called my agent he simply told me to go to a good body shop, get an estimate and send it to the insurance adjuster directly. He had approval within an hour and repaired the car next day. never went near one of those accident reporting places

  14. CQ says:

    I sympathize with you on this misfortune. Yet here we are in Toronto, Ont. with three whole reporting offices – while I can always walk to more annually funded, and extensively growing, cultural festivals throughout every single year here and wave to the majority out-of-town uniform police officers either standing besides oft delayed road construction crews or calmly riding their outfitted bicycles during our dangerous urban daytime hours.
    ‘Bread before Circuses’ isn’t just for the far left protesters anymore. Can we blame this on Harris and Lastman and Harper? (commenting strifes aside, my wishes for an improving and more cheerful season to you.)

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