Evidence & investigations · video a claim can stand on
Before a claims handler or an investigating officer will rely on a recording, they need to be satisfied it is what you say it is, and that case gets made at the recorder rather than afterwards. A written hold goes in while the machine can still reach the half-hour you need. Your rights under data-protection law are used properly. What we release then carries hash values and a dated record of everyone who held it. Lifting the video off the disk is the lesser part of the job.
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| What counts | What has gone wrong | Do this now |
|---|---|---|
| The 31-day habit | No law sets it; a recorder with several cameras laps itself long before day 31 | Ask for a hold the same day |
| A calendar month to answer | The month runs from the day your request reaches the operator | Send yours in writing now |
| Third parties obscured | Anyone else who could be recognised is masked before release | That is a duty owed, not a delay |
| A video doorbell facing the street | Once a household camera looks beyond the property line, its owner takes on the duties | Households have to answer as well |
| Continuity of custody | Written down at each stage, from the disk in the recorder to the copy we send out | Nothing leaves here without SHA-256 values and a signed method statement |
The diagnosis costs you nothing. Every item that arrives is logged under a case number of its own, and an engineer works out what has actually failed — then tells you plainly which files can come back and which cannot. The price follows that: one fixed figure, in writing, and no work begins until you have read it and said go ahead.
The first thing out is a written hold to whoever owns the system. Then we work out what the recorder actually retains — a figure that falls out of camera count and frame rate, not out of the handbook.
Two files come out of the image: an MP4 anything will play, and the recorder's own format — a .dav, say, or another maker's wrapper — packaged with the software that reads it.
A SHA-256 value goes with each file, along with a written account of how it was made, and a dated log of every hand it passed through. Those three separate a clip forwarded by email from material a court or a loss adjuster can use.
Nothing is billed while you are still deciding. A complete listing of what came off the drive reaches you first, and the invoice only follows your yes. Files travel back on media bought new for the job, return postage ours, and we do not close it here until every one of them opens on the machine you will use.
What the insurer is looking at: ABI figures published in November 2025 put detected claims fraud at £1.16 billion for 2024, with 51,700 motor cases accounting for £576 million. Good video pays a genuine claim quicker and kills a staged one, but only if it arrives documented rather than forwarded.
The insurer wanted proof that two vans had collided in a yard. By then the recorder had gone round the loop several times and that day was long gone. One export survived — made by a manager at the time, then deleted from an office PC. We carved it back off that machine, hashed it, set the method down in writing, and the claim settled without a hearing.
Yes. Once you are identifiable in the frame, that footage is your personal data and a subject access request reaches it. The operator has one calendar month, must obscure anyone else who can be recognised, and rarely charges.
Start by asking politely — plenty of operators just hand over a copy. If the answer is no, two formal routes remain: a data-protection request, and beyond that an application to the court.
Sooner than the owner expects. No statute sets a retention period; data-protection law asks only that nothing is kept longer than needed, and 31 days became the habit. A busy system with several cameras laps itself well inside that.
It must open on an ordinary machine and withstand a challenge, so an export leaves here as four things: an MP4, the original recorder format, SHA-256 values, and a signed note describing how each was made.
While that recorder keeps writing, the clip you need is being covered over — and your deadline has not moved. Book it in. The first look is free, and it stays private.