Ride through a pot hole or bunny hop it?

Is this the kind of thing which is claimable against the council that failed to fill in the pot hole? It was a sudden and deep-ish hole and really threw me when I hit it. Unfortunately in moving traffic it wasn't visible until way too late and sudden braking could easily have been more dangerous (I couldn't have swerved either... the traffic was close).

diable mentioned you need to report the hole first, since if they are unaware of it they can't be held responsible for it. Someone on here must have claimed.

Fortunately hippy is wrong.

Some years ago I had a similar problem where I was on a roundabout in heavy traffic so couldn't see the pothole and when it was visible avoiding it would have been too dangerous. I claimed (the council bounced the claim to TFL as it was maintained by them (they maintain all non principle arterial routes and most of those used by buses) and it was paid promptly. Admittedly I was working for the Department for Transport at the time and sent all correspondence from my work email address, which may have expedited things a little, but the claim was reasonable. I had not reported the pothole prior to the incident. Had I been aware of it, I would have taken precautions to avoid it.

On very minor routes there could be a claim of ignorance of the problem but the current awareness of potholes owing to the prior winter conditions implies that the council will know of the potential for potholes. Furthermore, if the pothole has been in existence for in excess of two weeks then the council has had adequate opportunity to become aware of the pothole through their own staff and contractors (rubbish and recycling collection at the very least).