Unfortunately we have been learning all about what to do when you get into an accident in Portugal. Kyle was leaving the mall and there is an awkward area where two lanes come together from different levels. There is a mirror so that they can (theoretically) see each other. Kyle left the parking garage and was waiting to turn onto the street when another driver came down the ramp. He didn’t see Kyle and side swiped him pretty good. Luckily there were no injuries and the cars are drivable. It looks worse in person because the bumper is coming off a bit.

We really should have looked into things more before we started driving. When you get into an accident in the EU you have to fill out some forms detailing what happened. Each driver signs it and then sends it to the insurance companies. From what I understand the police are not typically called in Portugal unless the drivers are in disagreement, although I’m not completely sure on that. The other driver was at fault and he admitted it.

He was driving a work van and Kyle didn’t have the paperwork, so the guy’s boss met with Kyle the next day to fill out the paperwork. It was a little scary for a while because the boss didn’t bring the paperwork and thought Kyle was at fault and the other driver should have called the police. For a second it seemed like he was trying to set Kyle up to take the fall. Kyle showed him where the accident took place and explained what happened. The other guy had a stop sign and Kyle didn’t, so it’s pretty obvious…So the guy admitted his driver was at fault and said so in the forms.

After Kyle and the guy each filled out identical forms and signed them, we then had to get them to our insurance company. From my understanding each person takes a copy of the incident report and sends it to their insurance company. Kyle just got off the phone with our insurance company and he is emailing them the forms. The next step will be for them to send an adjuster out to our house to inspect the damage. From there they will send us a list of authorized repair shops. We take it to get estimates and let our insurance company know. They approve the repairs and we go get them done. At least this is all according to Google, lol. I’ll update as we go, but for now we will wait to hear back from the insurance company.

Here’s a picture of the blank accident report. It’s easy to find online. I guess they also have copies of them in government buildings and those ones have carbon copies. We’re going to go on the hunt to find some later, but for now we just printed some online and will put them in the car. It looks like this is standard in all of the EU and you can easily find the forms translated into various languages.

In expat groups people always ask if they can get by in Portugal without knowing the language. Kyle and I can finally have basic conversations in Portuguese (super basic, lol) but we have gotten really luckily when it comes to bigger things. The two people involved in the accident spoke some English and the insurance agent Kyle talked to spoke great English. We have made it almost 2 year so far with English, google translator, and some basic Portuguese. We found a tutor we like on italki who does classes with the both of us together and we have been learning a ton from her. Maybe we will have to have a class that focuses on driving and words to know in accidents or when we get pulled over.