Michael and Jan Reed can remember the moment their family business received its first indelible blow. It was 2015 and three of their regular customers were standing in the reception of their accident repair centre in County Durham. It had been a busy period and, unusually, all three had come to collect their cars at the same time.
One had got a call from an accident management company trying to persuade him to make a personal injury claim. Unusually, the caller knew the make and model of the car and the date of the accident. The second man said the same had happened to him. By the time the third customer confirmed he had also got the cold call, the three of them were pulling out their phones.
