Claims can take a while – especially slippers and trippers, which is largely down to the Defendant’s love of defending them for prolonged periods of time!
But when Mrs C approached us for help after she slipped on water from a leaking roof in the staffroom where she worked, she was able to take advantage of the new quicker system for running a claim, and she benefited from our efficient way of working.
Most cases nowadays are electronically submitted via a portal that the Ministry of Justice set up for solicitors, insurers, and Defendants to communicate more efficiently. In the olden days it would all be about letters between parties and the other side would get around at least four months to investigate a case.
Rapid claims settlement – the efficient way of working
Now they have 30 business days for work claims and they have access to the claim information in seconds when we electronically submit it to them via the portal. Most major supermarkets and large companies have accounts on the portal system and we can access insurer details as well.
In Mrs C’s case they admitted liability early, which the new rules encourage them to do, because they are penalised quite heavily on costs if they try and defend a claim and then later accept liability for it. If a Defendant knows that they must accept liability for a case, they are encouraged to do so and keep the case within the portal system. If it falls out of the portal system due to a lack of correspondence with us, or through disputing liability, or breaking the rules, the cost burden for them increases if we later go on to win the claim.
This new efficient system has allowed cases that should be settled right away to achieve just that – settlement quickly without insurers ‘trying it on’ with fruitless arguments in efforts to stop a case or avoid a payout.
As a firm of specialist injury lawyers, our aim is to resolve a case as a quickly and as efficiently as we can. This means we’re prepared to take action where necessary – although the insurers in this case accepted liability early, they failed to adhere to the rules by not providing vital wage information for our client that helps with the settlement of the case.
With a breach of the rules comes necessary court action – something that we as a law firm are not afraid to get done right away. We swiftly issued and formally served the proceedings on to the opponent for their breach of the rules, and we quickly received a good offer in the sum of £2,524.06 which our client was happy to accept.
It’s often the case that we need to do a lot of negotiation with the other side when it comes to offers which can increase the length of the case; but given our swift action in issuing and serving court proceedings for their failure to adhere to the rules, we backed them in to a corner and they made the sensible decision to make a decent offer to get the case wrapped up right away.
When the court is involved it can be very costly indeed – this case is a classic example where the combination of the new rules and our swift and assertive court action has significantly sped up the process.
A good result in a quick timeframe – that’s what we like to see here at The Injury Lawyers!
Call us 0800 634 7575 to get your claim started today. If you prefer, why not arrange a call back from one of our team, for FREE instant advice on whether you have a claim to make! Just fill out the quick form below and we’ll call you back at a time which suits you.
