Talk:Write-off/Archives/2012

Love the image

Just got an image in my head of somone driving a long, seeing that car mangled by the road and thinking, oh that would be an ideal shot for the write off page on Wikipedia! AJUK ^Talk!! 00:37, 14 February 2008 (UTC)

On terminology: I'm not a finance expert, but I do know that debt has been commoditized- i.e. you can sell it as you would a commodity. My assumption is that lenders, when they "write down" bad debt, do not put a goose egg on the balance sheet, but rather the price of the debt on the open market to debt collectors. It's not that the debt is completely uncollectable, just that the bank can make more monay selling it than trying to collect it themelves. Any thoughts? (BTW good photo) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.88.236.241 (talk) 14:59, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Can someone who knows what they're doing add a redirect from 'writedown' (which currently doesn't exist) here? The hyphen's starting to be dropped in the news. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.2.17.193 (talk) 04:19, 2 April 2008 (UTC)

There is tautology in the banking section: Bad debts are uncollectable by definition, doubtful debt becomes uncollectable (becomes a Bad debt)Rolanbek (talk) 14:20, 29 March 2010 (UTC)

"Write-off" vs. "Totalled"

This article is UK-centric. It fails to adequately distinguish between the accounting practice (a reduction is value of an asset) and the insurance concept (when repairs to an insured item would cost more than a replacement). Importantly, the latter is known as "being totalled" in the US, which should be mentioned. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Njerseyguy (talk • contribs) 02:06, 3 April 2011 (UTC)

Merger between Write-off and Total loss

They're essentially the same article and even share the same picture. We need to merge them. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 09:23, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

I don't agree, personally, that write-offs and total loss are the same thing. A write-off is declared by insurance companies when they think the car is not economically viable to repair - a total loss is just that; you can't reuse anything from it (at least, that is how I would perceive it). However, I would definitely agree that, at present, the articles are merely duplicates of each other, rendering having both pointless. I'd go ahead with making write-off the base article and merging anything necessary from total loss in; and then making a redirect from the latter. Lukeno94 (talk) 21:58, 30 November 2012 (UTC)

Support merger. OSX (talk • contributions) 07:07, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't support. Auto insurance write-off should go to disambiguation and go to the total-loss page, and removed from the write-off article. Expense write-offs, tax deductions and repair vs replace vehicles do not belong together in the same article. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 08:01, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

Total loss does not mean the car has zero value. From reading the article it appears similar to Write-off, where the cost of repairing is not viable compared to buying another of the same car. Leaving only a car to weigh-in as scrap or an expensive repair job, which might not be road legal in the UK depending on chassis damage and the amount of welding. Total Loss appears just as an American term for the same thing. If that's the case as it currently appears then we need only 1 article, rather than both. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 11:50, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

I meant I don't support merging into this article, but I merged it the other way around. While totaled in American English is synonymous with "write-off" as used in auto-loss in the UK, it means something different from write-off as used in accounting. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 20:54, 2 December 2012 (UTC)

So you merged while discussion was only just started and erased all mention of what write-off means for a lot of people into total loss? You could have at least left a tag on the page telling people where to go for that. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 10:03, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

I haven't done the tag before and couldn't figure it out. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 22:01, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

• Write-off in the UK - "wear and tear, depreciation - decrease in value of an asset due to obsolescence or use" (As well as financial uses) - source
• Total loss in America - "Destruction of an asset or property to the extent that nothing of value is left, and the item cannot be repaired or rebuilt to its pre-destruction state." - source

That's two similar but slightly different terms, and after reading them i'd prefer if Write-off was merged again with the financial term. You can do what you like with Total loss but the definitions i went through suggest it's used in a similar fashion, and since write-off means the same for cars (at least in the UK) and financial industry, then removing it with no trace wasn't justified. I'll undo Cantaloupe's merge. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 10:32, 3 December 2012 (UTC)

That definition isn't quite right in America when it comes to cars though. "totaled out" cars often have substantial amount of salvage value beyond the melt value of steel and that is always taken into consideration by insurance companies. If a car sustains a damage costs $7,500 to bring to pre-loss conditions and pre-wreck market value is $10,000 and estimated salvage value is $5,000, insurance company would want to total it. I think that write-off for economics and totaled/write-off(cars) need to be in separate articles. What does the community think? Cantaloupe2 (talk) 09:56, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

Write-off is a term used by both the financial industry and the auto industry. Why merge into a different article when there is already one with the same meaning on Wikipedia? What they call it in America is of no importance, what matters is that the term means the same there as the financial term we already have an article for. So i argue it makes no sense to split off a word with the same meaning as the financial term, to write an article under a different name about how it means the same as in the financial industry. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 10:35, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

As a further point, and keep in mind that i'm commenting on your contribution here, not you personally...You've copied and pasted the sources i added to Write-off into the Total loss article. Not only is this stupid, as they are dictionary definitions for Write-off, but they also do not mention Total loss and so are not being used properly or supporting your argument in any way. Especially since you've added support by definition to my argument. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 10:39, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

I would like to chime in, and it seems that a consensus on this might be slowly developing - a write-off refers to any time a corporation removes an asset from its book, usually because they realize it is worthless. A recent example is that Hewlett-Packard recently wrote off Autonomy Corporation after concluding the company it acquires was worthless. This is also called an accounting charge. Total loss means that an insurance company has regarded something as not financially viable to repair after an insurable accident, like a car wreck. These are two different meanings. Thus the page write-off should be a disambiguation, point to accounting charge and total loss. Ego White Tray (talk) 13:48, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

write-off is also a common term for a damaged car with less value than an equivalent replacement. Please see the dictionary definitions in the lede of Write-off. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 14:14, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

That's what I've been trying to say. The only thing they have in common is the wording, but the two(accouting write-off; and British insurance industry terminology) have nothing in common. I think write-off should disambiguate into write off/accounting, write off/british insurance term, although I'm not sure how search for "write off" should get directed. Cantaloupe2 (talk) 21:56, 4 December 2012 (UTC)

That's why I suggested accounting charge and total loss, as neither, as far as I know, is ambiguous. Ego White Tray (talk) 00:17, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't see the argument of looking for write-off and being directed to either an article on the term which means the same thing, or being directed to an article on the same thing under a different name. Merge it all into Write-off, it just makes more sense. We already have an article with a meaning applicable to low value damaged cars, why create another under a different name? Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 00:58, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Rather than a disambig page, I left this page mostly as is, but put a hatnote to total loss for the benefit of our UK friends. I also removed the pictures of wrecked cars and moved them to the total loss page. I know I'm being a bit bold here, but it seemed to make sense. Ego White Tray (talk) 04:36, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

I don't agree. Write-off has a very similar meaning for the financial term and use in damaged vehicles. This isn't an USA vs UK argument, it's that the term is being split off and renamed from the article it shares the same name and meaning with. That's incomprehensible and i'll challenge it until we get more editors involved who actually use policies to justify it. Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 09:42, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

A similar meaning, but clearly not the same. I would be fine with a short section on the write-off page called Insurance that linked to Total loss as a main article, You could reasonably argue that a total loss is a kind of write-off, which makes a total loss a sub-article of the broader topic write-off. This probably makes the most sense. Ego White Tray (talk) 13:26, 5 December 2012 (UTC)

Well that makes sense (your last point), as i'm sure the financial meaning is likely the more common one though...Thanks ツ Jenova20 ^(email) 16:29, 5 December 2012 (UTC)