100% No Win No Fee probably means that, should you lose the case, there will be no fees (as it says on the tin!) – but this doesn’t necessarily mean that you will receive 100% compensation should the claim be successful. 100% compensation on the other hand means that should the case be successful you would receive 100% of the settlement – a subtle difference on paper but a potentially a big difference in reality.
The reason for this is that in April of 2013, changes were brought in by way of legislation which changed the way which No Win No Fee agreements and the solicitors who run claims on this basis work. Prior to the 1st of April, Solicitors were able to recover all their legal costs from the Defendant including something called a Success Fee and an after the event insurance premium. Following the changes in April, Solicitors are now unable to recover these two fees from the Defendant and consequently Parliament’s intention was that Solicitors recover these from Claimants compensation settlements.
To try and control this, Parliament capped the Success Fee at 25% of damages with the insurance premium being whatever this is for the case; therefore a lot of solicitors are offering 100% No Win No Fees but are deducting the fees for the Success Fee and the Insurance and consequently NOT paying out 100% compensation!
Furthermore, in July of 2013 a new protocol was introduced for accidents occurring after this date. Along with this new protocol however came fixed fees! This means regardless of how much work is done on a case a Solicitor can only recover a set amount of money (and unfortunately this is quite low when you consider the expense of court fees and the work that is required!) and therefore this is another reason why many are deducting from the compensation.
The good news is that for certain claims we are still able to offer 100% compensation! We do not look to recover the success fee or the insurance from your compensation as we simply do not feel this is correct. You’ve had the accident, you’ve been injured and it is you that is entitled to compensation; 100% of it.
So how do we do this?! It is not compulsory to charge for the above fees, although from our experience it does sound like a lot of firms are making it out this way, and therefore we have chosen due to our experience and our efficient way of handling claims that we will not deduct this from your compensation.
If this still all sounds a bit daunting the best thing to do is to contact us and we can talk you through the changes and any questions you may have.