Last night on the A13, coming home from Lakeside, A13 was not gritted and driving conditions were trecherous, I was in the slow lane doing maybe 40 or so for a while and had some drivers in front of me doing all sorts of weird things so indicated to overtake, looked in the mirrors and saw a pair of headlights a little way back and went...
A few seconds later and the car crashed into the drivers side of the coupe. Both me and the 2 girls in the other car were ok thankfully. Don't really know who was at fault, could be me or them? I think it was unavoidable (jointly responsible?) because of the trecherous conditions and it seemed they may have been going too fast (she said her brakes did nothing when she stamped on them, not surprising really) and I was'nt exactly going at 60+ changing from inside to outside lane bacuse it was too risky to do that, like you normally would, otherwise I would have been off the road long before that point.
Details exchanged coupe damaged on drivers side and mirror destroyed as well. Not sure it's even worth repairing as I would have struggled to get a grand for it selling it, so bit upset but what can you do, eh?

Oh and it's my very first accident in nearly 19 years of driving. I have protected no claims bonus with Admiral(about 10 years no claims built up).
What's it likely to do for my premium, which is currently £400 a year comprehensive?

Sorry but for me the above says it all....

The road wasn't gritted, you knew it was trecherous, yet you were still doing 40 and you went to overtake. I am afraid to say you have no-one to blame but you. Good to hear you are OK, but you really need to be more careful in these conditions!

Agreed, sorry to hear about the coop and glad to hear you are all ok but.........

Sounds like it was their fault!

Sorry to hear this mate, hope you get sorted out with the insurance (although your premium will go up as it will probably be classed as your fault - as you changed lanes).. glad to hear that everyone was okay and walked away from the accident

Take the money and buy a bargain coupe. Mistakes happen mate so don't blame yourself (too much)

my premium was similar.

After an accident that was my fault it increased massively.

After my accident the premiums did rise becuase the accident was my fault but I had protected my no claims bonus, apart from the accident I havn't had an accident in 15 years so the premium didn't go up very much (< £200)

[qquote]Originally Posted By: weylandand it seemed they may have been going too fast (she said her brakes did nothing when she stamped on them, not surprising really)
[/quote]

But not to fast to be overtaken obviously

Thanks for the all the kind words guys
I was probably doing about 30 mph when I changed lanes ( I may have got up to about 40 mph in the couple of miles previous to the accident as I was keeping up with the traffic flow but it was generally below 40 obviously!).
I certainly was not doing 40 and accelerating to a dangerous speed above that to overtake a car I should have stayed behind because it was driving ok and sensibly, ie, I just felt I would overtake gradually and carefully to get in front of it to clear an erratically driving car and I checked my mirrors and the other car was a safe distance behind and I assumed their speed was similar or slightly faster to my own. Obviously not.
I changed lanes just to avoid a car in front that was emergency braking a number of times and I left plenty of space between me and it and almost went into the back of it so I felt uncomfortable behind it.
Anyhow, I am at fault for changing lanes I guess so I have no problems taking it like a man and most importantly, avoiding driving in the snow in future because I was "careful out there" but still mis-judged the situation.
As said above, be very carefull out there in the next couple of days, dudes.

Err, didn't he pull out into her path? Seems the OP didn't anticipate the speed of the other car. Glad all OK though.

im sorry wayland, its just one of those what if's..... sounded to me like it was inevitable there was going to be a accident at some point

i expect this to be the first of many such storys today...its bloody started to snow here again...

Or, the OP made a sound decision based on what he could see and given the conditions (not expecting them to be driving really fast), and the idiot behind had no idea how to drive in the snow ('slammed her brakes on').

if you were shunted up the ass (excuse the pun) its always there fault regardless of weather
they should caterd in there stopping distance for any movment like that and were clearly going to fast to stop

or the OP also stated conditions were trecherous, and he was driving at night on un gritted roads and then tried to overtake someone!!!

So who knows how to drive in the snow....

I would actually hazard a guess that there are very few people who know how to drive in conditons like this, and my simple reasoning behind this statement, is that people are out there now trying to drive in it, or driving at 40mph on an ungritted motorway and then opvertaking someone!

No offence to the OP, and i don't think he is taking any, but he was as much as fault as the next person in my eyes.

But hey whats done is done and no-one was seriously harmed so thats the upside as it could have been alot worse

The A13 is a dual carriageway with a central reservation. Overtaking would have been inside to outside lane, not into the path of the oncoming traffic. Thought I would point that out.

i know that if it gets any worse out here, the car wont be going to pick up emma

your right about not knowing how to drive in snow, ill openly admit i haven't got much of a clue and have had an accident in the past via my own stupidity
i drive like i have got a cot on top of the roof when i drive in ice, no sudden moments, no sharp breaking and drive as fast as i know i can stop
i think i drive too slow in snow and ice as i get people overtaken me all the time emm had a crack at me this morning for sliding the car off the top of the driveway
i just wanted to know how slippy it was...and it was very slippy

Sorry to hear this Weyland

A freind of mine who used to work at an insurance claim dept said it's the person chaning lanes fault 99% of the time.

Sorry dude, don't give up on the coop tho!

Driving home from Brighton last night in the same conditions, 30-40mph was as fast as you could safely go, yet there were still numskulls doing 60mph+ or following way too close behind the sensible drivers. I was getting quite irate by some of the goons in vans.

Also saw a foreign driver, drive straight round a Corsa in front who had slowed at a mini-roundabout as a car was coming from the right. Good one.

Hope you get things sorted fella.