When was the last time you took a microwave in for repair? Or called the engineer out for a problem with your TV? As electrical goods become increasingly complex, while at the same time cheaper, the cost of repairing an item out of warranty is almost prohibitive. A friend with a TV repair business has just closed his shop. Where once there would be sets awaiting collection or repair stacked around his workshops, more recently he was lucky if he got more than half a dozen brought in a week. When an LCD flat screen TV can be bought for a couple of hundred pounds, it doesn’t make sense to pay almost the same again to repair it, especially if you can buy new and benefit from a fresh warranty.

When it comes to gadgets and gizmos, the ethos of ‘make and mend’ is fast becoming as antiquated as a valve based wireless. Once it stops working, we tend to bin it. All well and good for the home (but not the landfill), but what about when the technology is all wrapped up in something that costs a lot more? Something like a car?

More technology in cars, combined with rapid depreciation now means that cars involved in what previously would have been viewed as a minor shunt are now more likely to be written off by insurers. Air-bags and air conditioning systems top the list of features which are making even relatively minor collision damage increasingly uneconomical to repair.

At a recent conference by used car values specialist CAP and motor industry repair specialists, the focus was on the increasing cost of accident repair. CAP Operational Development Manager Mark Norman told the annual Refinish Industry Survey Conference (RISC) that despite their superiority in terms of engineering, performance and overall quality, today’s used cars are worth significantly less in real terms than their equivalent models more than a decade ago.

“A three-year-old Ford Focus 1.6 LX today is worth exactly the same in pound notes as a three-year-old 1600 LX Escort was 12 years ago,” he told the conference. “Even though all the technological features such as ABS, full electric windows, remote central locking, air conditioning, air-bags and generally superior engineering and quality, make it a far superior car, the used car buyer is paying less in today’s market than for the car it replaced.”

His comments were backed up by conference director Quintin Cornforth, who told the conference: “Falling residual values are making reparability much less viable and the inevitable result of all of this is increased write-offs.”

He revealed that typical collision repair costs have risen dramatically, thanks to SRS (Supplementary Restraint System) parts and air conditioning components. Using a two-year-old Ford Mondeo 1.8 LX as an example he revealed the extent of increased costs to rectify a relatively minor front corner impact, causing some damage to the nearside front chassis rail. The repair to a 1996 model year car, without airbags and air conditioning, would cost £3,865 - 52 per cent of the car’s value. The same work on a 2006 model car totalled £5,856 - 88 per cent of the car’s value.

Mark Norman added: “Insurers in particular are caught in a pincer movement between today’s lower residual values and the sheer cost of replacing the technologically sophisticated safety and comfort features of modern cars.”

As cars become increasingly complex, the number of total loss claim settlements is going to climb for what previously would have been a minor accident that would have been cost effective to repair at your local garage or accident repair centre. And you don’t have to be a genius to realise that the cost is eventually going to be passed on to all of us in the shape of increased premiums.

Thankfully, when it comes to houses, we don’t yet knock them down when the boiler packs up or the wiring needs replacing, but in the future I wouldn’t bet against it.

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