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What to do in case of a car accident in Spain

January 15, 2023

Last modified on: December 5, 2024

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I wish I didn’t have anything to say about it, but yet here we are. Our car accident in Spain happened entering a two lane roundabout, while a driver that was in the inner lane decided to move to the outer one. Hubby was driving, Kiddo was on the back and I was watching how beautiful that roundabout was against the blue sky… Bum!

Above: the spot of our roundabout crash, in Torremolinos. Image from Google Maps.

Park right there or as near as possible to the site of the car accident

No one was hurt, luckily, and both cars were able to move to the side, so that we wouldn’t block the way. Had we parked exactly on the spot of the crash, no one would be able to leave Torremolinos for about half an hour.

There were already quite a few cars parked around that roundabout, regardless… as you would expect. So, partially blocking the already crowded way, Hubby and the other driver went out of their respective cars to talk. Hubby speaking only English (and perhaps some bad words in Estonian) and quite pissed, after all we had bought that car only 2 months before. The other driver speaking only Spanish. I divided between calming down Kiddo and going out to translate.

Kiddo was super excited, as he thought car accidents only happened in the movies. After convincing him to stay put and with seatbelt on, I left the car to help. Well, the good thing about having your car hit by a local is that they know what to do. Mr. Driver-in-a-hurry was smiling and mentioned he was quite experienced in car accidents, and that these things happen all the time. Courtesy of him, I’lll share with you what to do next. Note that it applies for accidents without victims; if there is someone injured, call 112 (emergency phone in Spain, equivalent to 911 in the USA).

Fill the Parte Europeo de Accidente

– If you bought the car from a dealership, new or used, you should have in it a paper called Parte Europeo de accidente (something like European accident info) or declaración amistosa de accidente (this really, not kiding, translates as ‘friendly declaration of accident’. It is a reminder to stay calm, I believe). From now on, let’s call it only Parte, for short. If you don’t have it, you can download it from this same page, a bit further below.

– Take the Parte and fill it in as much details as you can. It has spaces for drawing the accident, lots of boxes to chose from, spaces for names, phone number, document number, etc, of both drivers and lots more. Yep, fill it all there, in the middle of the road. The original Parte has a carbon sheet and a copy, so when you fill one, two identical copies are actually being written. Good, because one will belong to you, and the other to Mr. Driver-in-a-hurry.

– Both parts should agree with what is being written, so refrain from accusing each other. Leave it to the insurance companies to decide between them who should pay who. Simply describe the facts; which car was were, what happened next.

– Both sides should sign the Parte. After that, each driver takes one and are both free to go.

After arriving home: contact the insurer

Upon arriving home, contact your insurer and send them the paper. Our insurer has an app and asked for pictures of this Parte; I just filled a small form in the app and sent the Parte pictures. A few days later they contacted us saying we could choose a place to go fix the car and that the bill would be covered by the other insurer, as they concluded it was Mr. Driver-in-a-hurry’s fault.

Get new copies of the Parte (just in case)

Now, once you used your Parte, you don’t have it anymore. You can ask your insurer to send you more, but in the meantime, you can download it below.

The Parte sent by your insurer should be double and have a carbon copy paper in between; the one you can download below doesn’t come with a carbon copy paper, obviously, which means either you add a carbon paper in between two copies or it will have to be filled twice.

Parte Europeo de accidente.pdf Download

It was easy, in part, because Mr. Driver-in-a-hurry didn’t think much of it. I imagine things can get way more complicated when both sides are heated. After the initial shock (pun intended), when we arrived home and went again to see the damage, we realized that our car had barely been hit; we knew the other car had gotten noticeably damaged (or maybe it was already before?) but our’s barely even had a dent or paint missing. Such a big ‘Bum’ for nothing; better this way.