My gazebo blew away and may have damaged a vehicle.

gdayjr · Senior Member

My gazebo blew away and may have damaged a vehicle.

Whenarewethere · Guru

Firstly write down as best as possible the entire timeline & what was said by every party before you forget. Any information is better than none. It could be very handy at a distant future date. I hope not!

Since I gather it was not attached to your vehicle in any form. Then no claim can be made on your vehicle.

It would be a civil case against you would be my understanding. The legal fees would probably be a magnitude or two more than the few scratches.

Have a look at all the parts of the gazebo for any fleck of paint. Go over it with a magnifying glass. Photography every section very closely & document process.

Hopefully that there is not any paint that shouldn't be there. Wrap up the gazebo & keep for evidence. Don't use or repair it, get a new one.

RickJ · Senior Member

gdayjr wrote:
I have a question for the more seasoned travellers out there. I am touring Tasmania for 7 weeks in my R.V. Today during very bad wind and rain, my 3x3 gazebo was torn out the ground and tumbled into another bay behind and below me. The two people in the hired camper van helped me return it to my bay, which resulted in a few broken bits, rendering it unusable. No big loss however and it can easily be replaced. I did ask them if they thought there was any marks or damage, but they both said no. This afternoon the driver rang the caravan park for my number, which they obviously declined to provide, bit he did leave his phone number for me to contact him. It seems the campervan hire company have found some marks on the duco and the driver has said it must have been from my gazebo hitting it. What's the legal issue here? Obviously I won't be involving my insurance company, but is this just a case of bad luck mate, claim of your travel insurance?

I might ask if this situation was reversed then would you want the damage caused by an insecure piece of equipment owned and erected by another, be compensated by the person responsible.

I have stayed at parks where gazebos and tarps on poles are not permitted.

I have witnessed gazebos fly to bits in wind and rain which renders them useless to the owner and dangerous to others in the vicinity.

Most of these gazebos are cheap Chinese junk and they should be treated that way.

yobarr · Guru

gdayjr wrote:
I have a question for the more seasoned travellers out there. I am touring Tasmania for 7 weeks in my R.V. Today during very bad wind and rain, my 3x3 gazebo was torn out the ground and tumbled into another bay behind and below me. The two people in the hired camper van helped me return it to my bay, which resulted in a few broken bits, rendering it unusable. No big loss however and it can easily be replaced. I did ask them if they thought there was any marks or damage, but they both said no. This afternoon the driver rang the caravan park for my number, which they obviously declined to provide, bit he did leave his phone number for me to contact him. It seems the campervan hire company have found some marks on the duco and the driver has said it must have been from my gazebo hitting it. What's the legal issue here? Obviously I won't be involving my insurance company, but is this just a case of bad luck mate, claim of your travel insurance?

Tell the campervan hire company to get lost. The hirers said "No damage" so party's over. Cheers

-- Edited by yobarr on Thursday 30th of March 2023 07:42:12 PM

Craig1 · Guru

Are you seeing some good Southern Lights ? , btw

Are We Lost · Guru

The easy thing to do is ignore it because it will be just about impossible for a claim to be made on you. The motorhome company would want their pound of flesh from the hirers and would not try getting it from you. The renters would have to to make a claim on you and that would not be easy. But maybe you feel that would be unfair on them as they will likely be shafted by the rental company. How much depends on what insurance cover they chose for the hire. The costs could easily be in the thousands ... apart from the repair cost add lost rental revenue.

As Whenarewethere said, examine the frame for any paint. No paint, probably not the cause of the damage.

If you choose to .....

You can call the hirers anonymously be prefixing the call with 1831. 1831 04xx xxx xxx. It will display as Private number and they will not see your phone number. Even if they had it, what could they do?

-- Edited by Are We Lost on Thursday 30th of March 2023 11:33:29 PM

TimTim · Senior Member

Marks had to be noted at the time of the accident not some time later. If neither of you noticed any marks then there were none and the hire company will be trying to get every penny they can from the hirer. You have no idea now if you are being taken for a ride.

At least you tried to do the correct thing at the time. I recommend that you dont back down on this because if you make a claim off your insurance company then you would have needed to note the damage at the time of the accident.

Good luck

-- Edited by TimTim on Thursday 30th of March 2023 11:43:06 PM

gdayjr · Senior Member

To answer one question. Yes the lights are awsum. The mainland should see som this weekend, starting Friday night Look south after 10pm. As for insurance, it has nothing to do with any vehicle of mine, so that's not the issue.

Mariner30 · Senior Member

A fantastic sunset as well last night on the east coast.
My wife is considering sending her pics of it to the the Mercury.

Yep, has been windy...and cold...last few days

Jfyi
We had a heavy duty tarp made up out of the stuff truck curtains curtains are made off,

4 alloy tent poles on the corners and a taller one in the middle to allow for rain runoff,
We would put our cooking stuff under it or just use it for shade, relaxing,
Then we'd use it as a cover on the trailer when we would move on.
We could pull it down in about 3 seconds if windy.
Fantastic thing.

Other folk had your type and if lucky it would only break without spearing some thing or someone

RickJ · Senior Member

Mariner30 wrote:

Jfyi
We had a heavy duty tarp made up out of the stuff truck curtains curtains are made off,

4 alloy tent poles on the corners and a taller one in the middle to allow for rain runoff,
We would put our cooking stuff under it or just use it for shade, relaxing,
Then we'd use it as a cover on the trailer when we would move on.
We could pull it down in about 3 seconds if windy.
Fantastic thing.

Other folk had your type and if lucky it would only break without spearing some thing or someone

I tried to help a camping neighbour with a gazebo during a storm.

The vinyl on on side filled with water and the wind on the other side was lifting the legs off the ground.

There was not much either of us could do to manage the Gazebo in the wind but during our fight with it, the bracket on the lower end of one of the legs raired up and took a fair slice of skin from my neighbours lower leg along the shin.

I could easily imagine that those gazebo legs flying around uncontrolled in a storm could easily damage vehicle paint let alone a child or another person.

Mariner30 · Senior Member

RickJ wrote:
Mariner30 wrote:

Jfyi
We had a heavy duty tarp made up out of the stuff truck curtains curtains are made off,

4 alloy tent poles on the corners and a taller one in the middle to allow for rain runoff,
We would put our cooking stuff under it or just use it for shade, relaxing,
Then we'd use it as a cover on the trailer when we would move on.
We could pull it down in about 3 seconds if windy.
Fantastic thing.

Other folk had your type and if lucky it would only break without spearing some thing or someone

There was not much either of us could do to manage the Gazebo in the wind but during our fight with it, the bracket on the lower end of one of the legs raired up and took a fair slice of skin from my neighbours lower leg along the shin.
I could easily imagine that those gazebo legs flying around uncontrolled in a storm could easily damage vehicle paint let alone a child or another person.

I can remember a couple of incidents in a caravan park where the gazebo's would go flying in high winds, fortunately with no damage or injury,

I 've actually got two of them...one às a xmas gift...l'll only use either in family backyard birthday celebrations etc etc

The xmas one has not been opened up.

-- Edited by Mariner30 on Friday 31st of March 2023 01:48:49 PM

Greg 1 · Guru

Car hire companies pull this stunt on a regular basis. I used to hire a lot of vehicles mainly in the north of the state for business. I made it a habit to go over the vehicle with a fine tooth comb before I had even got in it and take pictures from every angle with time and date attached. That saved mine and the companies bacon on many occasion from unscrupulous hire car companies who tried to offload damage onto me. One time in Pt Hedland, they tried to back charge me for a missing two way aerial. I had taken my photos before hand as usual which clearly showed no aerial. When I received the backcharge bill, I rang them and said that the aerial wasn't there to start with and would they like some dated and time stamped photos to prove it. It suddenly went away as did a few other occasions. They had to find some other sucker. My advice. Ignore it. The damage could have happened elsewhere and most likely did.

yobarr · Guru

Greg 1 wrote:
Car hire companies pull ths stunt on a regular basis. I used to hire a lot of vehicles mainly in the north of the state for business. I made it a habit to go over the vehicle with a fine tooth comb before I had even got in it and take pictures from every angle with time and date attached. That saved mine and the companies bacon on many occasion from unscrupulous hire car companies who tried to offload damage onto me. One time in Pt Hedland, they tried to back charge me for a missing two way aerial. I had taken my photos before hand as usual which clearly showed no aerial. When I received the backcharge bill, I rang them and said that the aerial wasn't there to start with and would they like some dated and time stamped photos to prove it. It suddenly went away as did a few other occasions. They had to find some other sucker. My advice. Ignore it. The damage could have happened elsewhere and most likely did.

Great post Greg, telling it as it is. Such practices are a regular occurrence with unscrupulous hire companies, and your practice of taking dated photos is highly recommended. To the OP I say "Forget it". Cheers

-- Edited by yobarr on Friday 31st of March 2023 06:01:50 PM

nomadz · Veteran Member

Agree with others in that you should ignore any requests for damages payment.

However, if it does turn nasty, you could possibly get some relief from your household contents policy, under the Public Liability cover relating to damage to another persons property. This cover is normally Australia wide and may not even have an excess apply to it.

Regards,

Ian

elliemike · Guru

We had a tree fall on us at the Emu Point Caravan Park, Albany, W.A.

0300 in the morning, not windy or even breezy, and this tree between the camping site and our neighbour just decided to Die. It looked healthy, but was rotten under the soil ground level.

With a trunk of say about 400mm to 450.mm diameter it keeled over the roof of our Mitsubishi Challenger and also hit the roof of the Avan.

No damage to the Avan but the trunk was on top of our car and horizontal and had pushed the roof rack rails into the roof and damaged the drivers side windscreen pillar. Stagely the windscreen was OK

They had to use a Front end loader to remove it.

The outcome was that the Caravan Park was not liable to repair the damage as it was "An Act of God" Our RAC insures were excellent and dealt with the CP insurance people. But RAC had to fix up the damage for us.

So I would just tell them to send the claim to heaven. No. 1 Pearly Gates,

Heaven, 1010,

Godknows.

-- Edited by elliemike on Friday 31st of March 2023 09:36:03 PM

-- Edited by elliemike on Saturday 1st of April 2023 04:48:34 PM

Bas + Eve · Senior Member

The hirer would have had to have insurance to hire the vehicle. They had an option to reduce the excess albeit at extra cost. It cannot be proven with evidence that your gazebo caused the damage.

Mein · Senior Member

Applicable / relevant terms:-

Act of God - any event not caused or contributed to by human activity such as rain, flood, wind, earthquake, tsunami et al. (This principle is currently being challenged by a number of law suits around the world whereby claimants are seeking compensation from companies and governments for loss and damage allegedly caused by weather events said to be consequent upon climate change.) And, flooding of property caused or contributed to by development of or on neighbouring land is not (usually) deemed to be an Act of God.

Principle of Foreseeability - if an Act of God or some other exceptional event occurs that results in loss or damage which is deemed to be foreseeable, then the party who should have foreseen the loss or damage cannot rely on a defence of Act of God. A simple example would be that the windows of a house are always kept open. It is foreseeable that, at some point it will rain (even if it hasn't rained in the past two years), that rainwater will enter the house and that the contents of the house will be damaged by rainwater.

Balance of Probabilities - basically, a court decides, based on evidence / testimony presented, what is the most likely circumstances of the event / incident. It is a much, much lower burden of proof than the principle of Beyond Reasonable Doubt that applies to criminal proceedings.

Finally, insurance cover for hired vehicles, even when the renter has paid extra for the damage excess waiver, only covers loss or damage resulting from the normal use of the vehicle. If the renter's toddler draws on the side of the vehicle with a permanent marker - not covered. If the renter's dog throws up on the back seat leaving a permanent stain - not covered.

gdayjr · Senior Member

I have decided to ignore the drivers request to contact him. We exchanged no details, and he does not have any contact details for me. So sad, too bad.

yobarr · Guru

gdayjr wrote:
I have decided to ignore the drivers request to contact him. We exchanged no details, and he does not have any contact details for me. So sad, too bad.

Great decision Graham. The modern world is full of con-men taking advantage of "nice guys". FU CU. Cheers

vince56 · Senior Member

A hire vehicle damage argument, who would have thought?

RickJ · Senior Member

We are becoming more and more litigious as we copy the USA.

The comments here mainly say just stuff it as it was only a hire or rental vehicle.

So that is OK, fair enough, they will never trace the one person responsible.

Does it end there?

No it doesnt as the hire company charges the the renter / client for the damage.

So the person who was not responsible pays for the negligent actions of the person who is responsible.

Mmmmm!

I wonder if it was an insecure load on a truck that caused the damage would the participants be happy to just dodge and weave the real issue.

As it was explained the gazebo blew away in the wind.

It was either not secured or erected correctly or it should have not been used in a predicted storm or strong wind. I think the instructions for most gazebos state this warning. Remember the litigious society we are all participating in.

I wonder what would be the case had the renter of the van had a gazebo that due to it being erected during a storm, became unsecured and damaged the O Ps brand new vehicle.

Now that would be a different tale when trying to track down the person responsible for the damage. disbelief

hufnpuf · Senior Member

RickJ wrote:

The comments here mainly say just stuff it as it was only a hire or rental vehicle.

No, they are saying that the vehicle was inspected immediately after and no damage was found. There's no evidence that the gazebo caused the damage the hire company is talking about. It could have happened anywhere, trolley in a carpark, tree in a caravan park. Motorhomes can sustain damage when being driven around in the country by inexperienced drivers. And hire companies can make stuff up.

You'd think the gazebo incident responsible, EXCEPT both parties checked the vehicle over afterwards and found no damage then.

yobarr · Guru

hufnpuf wrote:
RickJ wrote:

The comments here mainly say just stuff it as it was only a hire or rental vehicle.
No, they are saying that the vehicle was inspected immediately after and no damage was found . There's no evidence that the gazebo caused the damage the hire company is talking about. It could have happened anywhere, trolley in a carpark, tree in a caravan park. Motorhomes can sustain damage when being driven around in the country by inexperienced drivers. And hire companies can make stuff up.
You'd think the gazebo incident responsible, EXCEPT both parties checked the vehicle over afterwards and found no damage then.

Great to see that at least someone is able to discuss the subject logically.

How many times does it need to be said that what is now claimed to be a damaged vehicle was inspected immediately and it was agreed by both parties "No damage".

How long after the incident is the gazebo's owner at risk of being held responsible for alleged damage to the hire van?

What part of "no damage was found" do you not understand? CU. Cheers

RickJ · Senior Member

When I was a very young man a wise fellow one said to me.

Never inspect a vehicle for purchase in the rain or in bad weather and never inspect a vehicle with the seller closely looking on.

From here I can only say *no damage was found* at the time.

Maybe during the recovery of the wayward gazebo by the wayward gazebo owner, the damage could have easily been missed.

None of us that commented including me were actually there apart from the OP.

As a side note Yobarr I am quite able to understand the written language. It is apparent that some however, tend to lack the capability to be able to assess the broader picture.

The fact that the vehicle was damaged is in dispute not the fact that the erector/owner of the gazebo was at fault, for obviously he was.
I made mention of my experience with a wayward gazebo earlier in the topic and although not impossible I find it difficult to believe that this gazebo in flight did not cause damage to the vehicle of which it came into contact.

In any case all the prosecutors and defendant legal eagles on this forum have little influence on the OPs financial outcome.

Maybe we re read the topic title;

*My gazebo blew away and may have damaged a vehicle.*

On the other hand, Karma can be a bitch.

-- Edited by RickJ on Wednesday 5th of April 2023 10:48:40 AM

PeterInSa · Guru

Re (From here I can only say *no damage was found* at the time.

Maybe during the recovery of the wayward gazebo by the wayward gazebo owner, the damage could have easily been missed.)

I agree,
Unfortunately what could have been a easy touch up, IF in fact there was some damage, and noticed at the time with a careful inspection by both parties, however it can be a costly exercise when the hire company gets involved.

hufnpuf · Senior Member

RickJ wrote:
for obviously he was.

There's no "obviously" about it. Just because something happened earlier in time doesn't make it the cause.

Gazebo blows away. Motorhome gets hit by a truck. Obviously, the gazebo did it, the damage could have been missed......

No, just no.

RickJ · Senior Member

hufnpuf wrote:
RickJ wrote:
for obviously he was.
There's no "obviously" about it. Just because something happened earlier in time doesn't make it the cause.
Gazebo blows away. Motorhome gets hit by a truck. Obviously, the gazebo did it, the damage could have been missed......
No, just no.

Maybe we re read the topic title;

*My gazebo blew away and may have damaged a vehicle.*