How to "File a Case"

According to your original thread, your first estimate of the damage was 6.000 peso. Thats way below, what it costs to bring a case to the court, so thats definitly not a solution.

You could try the barangay captain, as others have suggested. But if that does not work, then I have to site with those suggesting, that it is probably better to just let it go, and not let it spoil your mood to much.

I own a car in Dumaguete, and in 9 years it has happened maybe 4 or 5 times, that somebody has bumped into it and caused damages in the range of maybe 2.000-12.000 peso. And only at one of these occations did I get a partial financial compensation out of the counterpart. So its kind of normal and part of live here, that you often have to pay for damages yourself, even if they were clearly caused by someone else.

 

To elaborate a bit on the above, allow me to tell about the first and also largest of these incidences. It happened only a few weeks after, I bought the car, and a few month after arriving in the Philippines. So I was pretty "green" about it all. On one of the narrow backroads in Dumaugete, a truck carrying a very wide load was approching, so I pulled into the side of the road and stopped completely to let him pass.

His misjudged the width of his load, scraped the side of my car and burst one of the tires. Now since my car was not moving at all, it should be pretty clear, whose fault this was. I noted down the license plate of the truck and talked a bit to the driver, who fully awknodleged his blame. Then I changed the broken tire, so we could clear the road and move on, since obviously we were blocking the road completely.

I did not call the police, since nobody was hurt, so I did not see any reason or feel any obligation to involve the law. And I figured, that for sure the owner of the truck - or his insurance - would have no problem paying for this relatively minor damage.

That was of course very naive. What happened the next day was, that when I (or rather someone speaking visayan on my behalf) called the owner of the truck, he explained, that according to his driver, I had been driving very fast, so the accident was my own fault.

Now first I was quite angry about this and could not understand, why the driver would suddenly change explanation and deny all responsibility. But thinking a bit more about it, maybe he was just scared to loose his job, which I can kind of understand.

So I "charged it to experience", as nice_sherwood so kindly put it.

Now I could have handled this differently, had I been more experienced. I could have called the police and waited for them to arrive without moving my vehicle, blocking an important road during rushhour for maybe ½ hour or more. Then me and the truck driver could have gone to the police station, answered a lot of questions and filled out some reports. And then maybe after all of that, spending several hours of my time, I would have been able to optain some kind of financial compensation from the owner of the truck.

But even today, with me being a foreigner and alone in the car, that is noone to speak to the police in the local language, I somehow dought, if it would have been worth the trouble.

I could also have tried to bring the case to the barangay captain. But I am 100% sure, that would have resulted in nothing, since it would be word against word. And the driver would surely have been able to come up with several "witnesses", who could support his story. While I would have none.

Now in your case, maybe if you are lucky, you could actually get the guard of Why Not to witness for you in front of the Barangay Captain. But you should still ask yourself, how much time you want to spend on this. And how big you think the chances are, that this young guy is able to pay you at all, even if you get him to awknowledge his blame.

Finally there is also another way to look at this. The damages cost me maybe 8.000 peso to fix. But by not having a comprehensive Insurance, I am saving about 25.000 peso a year. In 9 years that is 175.000 peso. And in reality having comprehensive Insurance is probably the only way to avoid paying for these kind of incidences out of your own pocket.

 

I bet they will just say to call your vehicle insurance and claim it from them? I remember a friend's car been hit inside the parking lot of sm Cebu and my friend went to ask the head personnel if there's any chance that they will take part of the damages but then they said no. They're not reliable for it but if you have a comprehensive insurance you should be able to have it covered as long as you have the police report though because they will surely ask for it. For 6,000 pesos I think I'll just let it go and just be careful next time not to park my vehicle in a choc-o -block parking lot especially in why not. Park it somewhere safer with not many bikes around even if you have to walk abit. Wouldn't you?

 

Some parking lots even post an official statement warning, that the establishment owning the parking lot can not be held responsible in any way for mishaps to the vehicles parked there including theft of items left inside etc. Thats pretty standard not only in Philippines but in most countries.

If you go to Why Not or a similar place in the nighttime, the safer solution is to not bring a motorcycle at all, particularly if you are planning to consume alcohol. Even if you are a non-drinker, riding a motorcycle at night still involve the risk of getting robbed by criminals or having a road accident. So there are multible issues with it, and personally I never do it anymore.

 

Hmmm... If let's say you really want to take him up to the court, lawyer's acceptance fee alone ranges from 15,000-25,000 pesos then you have to pay him/her for every court appearance and documentation fees and its not just that, the amount of stress and pressure that you have to put up with if you really want to proceed on filing a case. I just don't think it's worth it, alot of drivers out there don't really give a sh*t if they damage anyone's vehicle thinking they can just get away with it especially when no one is looking. Hope it works out for and he will pay you at the barangay if it still doesn't work try getting a lawyer to make a demand letter asking him to pay without going through all the court dramas see if that'll work as well. Goodluck!

 

Since you are actually pretty far with police report and all, I hope a consultation at the barangay caption can bring some kind of solution.

Vigilantism is a dangerous path to enter. If he don`t pay, then let all ideas of revenge stay with the thought. Or make a voodoo doll of him, you can stick needles into :-)

Good luck with it all.

 

Make sure you get a copy of the police blotter for your records.......