‘Hello, Miss Kite, this is the RAC solutions centre.’ Oh, dear god, it’s all over, I thought. Nothing except the exact opposite of a solution ever comes out of a place called a solutions centre.
I had hit a curb while driving over Chelsea Bridge and my front tyre was in shreds by the time I’d nursed the car to a side street. I abandoned it (it’s a convertible with no spare) and went to wait at a nearby friend’s house for the recovery people.
For a while, however, I could not remember who I had breakdown cover with. This is because, like everyone else, I suspect, I have to change car insurance every year using price comparison websites guiding me towards increasingly improbable-sounding insurers in order to get a reasonable price. Why is this? You start off with Direct Line, then it’s Sheila’s Wheels, then Kwik-Fit, then before you know it your car’s covered by Burger King Finance.
Eventually, after resorting to insurance offered by Ikea or the Boden catalogue, I will become such a distant memory of Direct Line’s that it will decide it wants me back.
As it was, my tax disc holder said Sheila’s Wheels, and, although I was sure that was at least five companies ago, I rang its breakdown number anyway, whereupon a vicious-sounding woman demanded I recite my membership code.
‘Oh, dear. I don’t have it…oops, hang on, I need to move the car up a bit it’s sticking out.’
‘Wait! Are you driving the vehicle?’ she barked.
‘Um, I’m just reparking it a bit.’
‘You must exit the vehicle immediately! I cannot talk to you while the vehicle is in motion!’
‘But I’m trying to. Oh, dear. I just need some help here.’ And I confess I started to sound a bit weepy.
‘You’re shouting!’ she shouted. ‘I’m not going to deal with you unless you stop shouting!’
‘I’m not shouting,’ I said. ‘I’m upset. I’ve had an accident.’
‘Stop shouting!’ she screamed hysterically. ‘I really cannot deal with you, I WON’T deal with you until you stop shouting!’
I had to sit in silence for a good ten seconds before she would accept that I was not abusing her. ‘Are you OK now?’ I asked.
‘Stop shouting! If you don’t stop shouting,’ she shouted, ‘no one is going to help you all night!’
It was hopeless. She was a mental case. I hung up the phone.
At my friend’s house, I suddenly remembered I was with Aviva. But when I phoned them the line was closed.
After another half-hour of musing, I recalled having some kind of breakdown assistance with my bank account. Sure enough, there was a card in my wallet with the number to ring. It turned out to be the RAC, who told me a recovery team would be with me in about an hour.
‘But you may face an on-the-spot charge if the car has to be lifted on to the truck using specialist equipment.’
I said I thought it likely that all cars would always need to be lifted on to the truck using specialist equipment. But there was no arguing with him, especially using the subversive medium of sarcasm. He insisted there might be a charge. Then I had a brainwave.
‘Do you by any chance do the breakdown cover for Aviva?’
The answer was affirmative. ‘Ha! Then I think you will find I’m a member of your organisation twice over. Surely that entitles me to a totally free service?’ It did not.
I was getting to the point where I would happily have bought a new car and left the one with the flat tyre to rot. But as it was 10 p.m. and there was no car dealership open, I agreed to the RAC’s terms and sat down to wait.
After an hour, a man called to say he was there and I went to meet him. He was in a tiny little orange van. ‘If you don’t mind my asking,’ I said, ‘how are you going to put my car on top of that?’
‘I’m not, madam,’ said the man, who had a clipboard. ‘I’m here to assess the situation and if it is necessary I will send for a recovery truck.’
He was the RAC triage nurse. Nothing was getting recovered without it going through him first.
I was sent back to my friend’s house and told that the next stage of the operation would commence within an hour and a half.
Half an hour later I got a call from the solutions centre to say it would be at least another three hours, and maybe not until the next morning. Ten minutes after that, the driver of the recovery truck rang to say he was there. Or possibly somewhere nearby. Oh, whatever.
Melissa Kite is deputy political editor of the Sunday Telegraph.
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