Someone has just driven into my car!

(I have to say, though, the last time I was injured in a car crash it basically paid for most of my time at university)

Any witnesses?

Take pictures of the damage to your car.

however, on the other hand, Jared Harris naked you did get to talk to the cute girl! Well done.

just give your insurance people a call right away and they'll be very nice and helpful. when this has happened to me, i've been given a hire car (with aircon, cd player, electric windows, central locking - all the stuff my atual car doesn't have) for FREEEEE which is great fun, because i got to rag it round and feel like a RICH PRAT with a DECENT CAR. seriously, i LOVE getting my car dented by some goof. it makes my month.
my favourite time was when somebody pranged the back of my free hire car a few days later. and that was hassle-free too! how i laughed. seriously, i honestly laughed.
don't panic. it should be stressless.

He was actually pulling out *forwards*, so god knows how he didn't see me.

I have all his details apart from his insurance, which he didn't have on him. He let me see his driving licence to confirm his name and address were correct.

No witnesses - well, there were probably lots, but I didn't think to flag any down.

I'm uninjured, although I'm feeling a bit hyper at the moment, which is probably the shock.

My manager has just said I can go home a couple of hours early to sort out the insurance claim. Woo!

(is there one already? if not why not?)

It would have taken ages to get hold of a police officer - god knows where the nearest one would have been.

if you have everything though it'd save you that trip if you get pulled over, obviously.

a bus scraped my car a couple of months ago, when it was parked outside the house. i know it was a bus because of the tell-tale magenta paint up the side. grr. but i have no witnesses and can prove nowt. luckily, i know a very, very cheap and brilliant bodyshop in glasgow, who did such a good job that the rest of the car now looks a bit shabby in comparison.

i'm still keeping up the pressure on the bus company, though. i'll get nowhere, but fuck it, i'm a vindictive little bastard with a grudge ;)

is there a "what does your car look like" thread? go on, someone else start it.

I think the police can write you a fix-it ticket or even give you a fine for not having it with you. I've met people who don't keep it in their car because of theft concerns, but I really don't see that as too much of an issue since it would still require some serious social engineering to get anything other than your name and policy number.

But yeah, it's usually no big deal, no need to be paranoid. I've known someone who was given completely fabricated insurance information after an accident and another person who had his car hit by someone who was likely an illegal immigrant near a construction site. It was likely an honest mistake in the latter case, but my friend was skeptical of the construction foreman's claims that he'd cover any damages.