QuestionI Am a rental car operator in the San Diego Ca area. I had a customer have an accident in a rental car early on a Sat morning. I asked him where the car was and he said the police towed it. He was given zero information about the whereabouts of the car. He couldn't find the incident notice until a few days later. When he gave me the incident note all it had was a date a time and the officers name on it. No phone 3 to contact and no information about the cars disposition. I expected to receive in the mail a notification and then to get the car out of storage. That never came. I followed up and spent allot of time tracking down the whereabouts of my car and when i did I was told it was $642 dollars towing and storage. My question is, do I have any recourse with the police dept as to timely notification of the whereabouts of the vehicle and any chance of recovering some of the money. I know that in the case of a "stored vehicle" the ordering agency has to notify the legal and registered owner of a vehicle within 48 hours by certified mail with return receipt signatures. Does this apply to my instance and if it does what section of the vehicle code covers this. Thanks very much,
Bill
AnswerBill,
I am in oregon, so laws will, of course, be different, and I am unsure of where to start to research california, and or san diego codes.
When we tow a vehicle from an accident, we are dispatched by the police, and then have to report the vehicles whereabouts immediately after the tow. So, if your situation happened here, then one phone call to the issuing police agency would have given you the information you needed. Your customer may not have been present when the car was towed, or if they were, they may not have felt as though they needed to gather any information.
I would call the police agency in question, and ask to speak to the person in charge of these matters, and ask them to investigate whether, or not, there was any procedural noncompliance.
Sorry, I could not be more helpful
Donald
