In November a white van belonging to a scaffolding company crashed into a car belonging to a neighbour's father. He was reversing into the driveway of his daughter's house, which is opposite. The van careered across the road, mounted the pavement and ended up embedded in my five-foot hawthorn boundary hedge doing, as you can imagine, considerable damage.
I was told by the scaffolding company that my neighbour's father had accepted full liability, apparently because he was reversing at the time. So I sent photos of the hedge and an estimate for repair (though, of course, renewal will take years) to his insurers, Acromas. I received no reply and wrote again a month later, but heard nothing.
I have already spent £65 for posts to support half uprooted branches. I am nearly 89, a widow and living alone with children abroad.
Please help. ER, Winscombe, North Somerset
As so often happens, this was down to an "administrative error" on the part of the insurer, Saga. Saga is part of the Acromas group.
It put one letter you sent in the wrong file and lost the second.
However, it was very quick to resolve this once we became involved. It has sent you a cheque for £288 to cover the whole of your claim and has asked you to get in touch again if you incur any additional costs. It also sent you a bunch of flowers. You are happy that the matter is now closed.
We welcome letters but cannot answer individually. Email us at consumer.champions@theguardian.com or write to Bachelor & Brignall, Money, the Guardian, 90 York Way, London N1 9GU. Please include a daytime phone number
