Child locked in rental car - damage to open door

Tonymcc82

Registered User
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Hi,
We had an incident yesterday with our rental car. To summarise our baby got locked in the car with all our luggage, keys were on the drivers seat.
Response had to be quick so we managed to crowbar the door open a bit and fish the keys out with a coat hanger.
Thankfully all is okay and baby didn't really react.
Problem is now with rental insurance, as it was not accidental damage, we had to damage the door to get keys.
There was a lock out policy on insurance, in that you needed to call rental company to send out an authorized mechanic, but we did not have time.
I'm concerned we will be left to pay for the damage?

Any advice?
 
Yes, we paid the bill.
My thoughts are that, that is what we have insurance for? in case of such incidents.

If i locked the keys in an empty car, and waited 3 hours the insurance would have covered that.
It was a bank holiday weekend, car rental company were not open when incident occurred so could not recommend a mechanic if we were to wait, not that i was willing to wait.

My point is that there does not seem to be an exception for emergency situations.
 
Ok, to explain.
Paid damage fee with hire company, (the full excess) i have insurance with a third party (annual car hire excess insurance), which i then claim back the amount paid (hopefully).
Car rental was in Ireland but insurance is from UK company covering all EU.
 
Just to say we also had this very stressful expienced. My wife wanted to break windows and everything!

we Googled the emergency contact number for rental car for our car. When called Toyota the girl took details from and advised her was a child stuck in car. breakdown guy was out in under 20 min's.

He ballooned the car door and unlock the car using long stick on key fob on seat. less then 5 mins our son was out.

we luck no damage done to car and the call out was covered by Toyota policy. Have to say Toyota support we brilliant she called back to update us on progress of the call out.

The call out guy advised us before ballooning the car that this might damage the car and our insurance would not cover it.

we were very lucky our son happy out in the car. He tough it was very funny and no damage. Contact your excess company to check.
 
Why the panic? Ambient temperature less than 20C, no danger to infant.
 
Just for others that this may happen to the Gardai know how to open car doors. If you meet a friendly one they'll do it for you. I'm not sure if they can do it on modern cars with the electronics though.
 
Also to note, breaking a side window will result in a significantly lower repair costs than using a crow bar to force a door.

You will need to read the T&Cs of your excess insurance policy carefully. Insurance4CarHire for example have specific cover for getting locked out of a car, but that cover is limited to €77 and explicitly calls out that the rental company must approve the locksmith used. Failure to follow that 'may void this cover'. Insurance4CarHire and others have an emergency contact phone number as well, too late for you now but you should have phoned for advice.

I expect your excess insurer will not reimburse you for this.
 
"Why panic?" Try telling that to a histerical one year old.

But ... as you said:

Thankfully all is okay and baby didn't really react.

we were very lucky our son happy out in the car. He tough it was very funny and no damage.

SirMille was only using the information you gave him when he said:

Why the panic? Ambient temperature less than 20C, no danger to infant.

As Leo said, why didn't you go for the cheaper/easier option of breaking side glass to get in? At least you wouldn't have caused damage to the bodywork.

IMHO, an insurer should not be paying for what you deliberately did as it wasn't accidental.
 
response had to be quick?

I can accept that, but would it now have been quicker and cheaper to break the window??????
 
Breaking a side window takes seconds, much quicker than finding a crowbar, forcing the door, getting a coat-hanger and fishing out the keys.

Replacement side windows cost ~€100 and take minutes to fit. Once you use a crowbar on a door, it will likely not be possible to repair fully without replacing the door, and any damage to the frame will require a couple of days in a body shop resulting in loss of income to the rental company. You could very easily run into thousands of Euro.
 
I suppose the most pertinent question would be if it was your own car, would you have rushed to get a crowbar to open the car?? I highly doubt it somehow...
 
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