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Whiplash is a common injury which many clients approach us with after having experienced the trauma of a road accident. Having said this, however, whiplash can be experienced from accidents such as a fall. Basically, whiplash is caused by a sudden jolting of the head which causes your neck to move past its normal range of movement. So any type of accident which causes this jolting can cause whiplash.

Symptoms

The symptoms of whiplash can include:

• Tenderness, pain or stiffness to the neck
• Swelling to the neck
• Lack or even no mobility of the neck
• Headaches

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What is No Win No Fee? What does it mean? Is it true that it does exactly what it says on the tin? I know it’s a common term nowadays, but do any of you understand what it actually involves?

There are actually multiple answers to this question – but realistically, it all comes down to which lawyer you choose to represent you.

What Happens if You Lose?

If your compensation claim fails to succeed, under a No Win No Fee, you should not be liable for any of your lawyer’s fees. The reason I say should is because there are lawyers out there who are prepared to be sneaky and may try and get something out of you.
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We all use equipment at work – ranging from the trusty pen in the office, to a pneumatic drill on a building site. With any work equipment that is potentially dangerous, there are health and safety rules and regulations that you and your employer need to abide by in order to prevent an accident at work occurring.

If you are injured due to work equipment provided to you by your employer, you may have a claim for compensation.

There are several areas this covers –

• The provision of suitable work equipment where necessary
• The regular inspection and maintenance of work equipment you use – which ranges from handled tools to factory machinery
• The replacement of any outdated or overly used equipment
• Training in how to use work equipment safely

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The answer is YES!

At The Injury Lawyers we are passionate about getting our clients the best possible amounts of compensation. This is why issues such as Third Party Capture are a topic of great concern to us. We therefore feel the need to inform our blog readers of our concern.

Many clients come to us with a claim and report some disturbing news that they have been approached  by the defendants insurers for a potential personal injury claim. They report that they have either received an offer for settlement by the insurers or received an offer of a medical examination so they can value any potential claim you may have and make you an offer thereafter. This is a process that is commonly known as Third Party Capture. It is a process whereby the insurers of the potential defendants of a personal injury claim try to gain a settlement before the claimant obtains their own advice from an independent personal injury solicitor and instructs them to proceed with that claim.

If the insurers succeed in their task and the victim accepts the offer made to them, this offer may be accepted on a full and final basis, thus stopping any further claim proceeding. The claimant, therefore in accepting the claim without gaining the advice from an independent solicitor, are in serious danger of under settling their claim, and could be accepting an offer which is grossly less than what their claim is actually worth.
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If you have suffered a personal injury having been involved in an accident that was not your fault, it may well be the case that you are entitled to compensation.  After all, you did not deserve your injuries and it may be that because of your accident and the injuries that resulted, you have incurred extra expenditure that you should not be liable for.  So yes, in most cases where your injuries were sustained through no fault of your own you will be entitled to compensation and you can go about obtaining this compensation by contacting a lawyer who can guide you through the process.  Despite more and more people being aware that they are able to make a claim for compensation, some refrain from doing so because they are under the impression that the whole process of getting that compensation will be laborious and simply something that they cannot be bothered with.  The aim of this blog is to show you that making a claim for compensation is far simpler nowadays and can be over in a matter of months.

The Pre-Action Protocol for Personal Injury claims has made the process of obtaining compensation a great deal more straightforward.  Because of this, you are able to get hold of the compensation you may deserve faster.  What this Protocol has done is set out a series of steps that are to be taken by your solicitor and the other side when dealing with you claim.  For instance the first thing your lawyer will do for you is take all your accident details.  This will allow him/her to produce what is known as your Letter of Claim.  This sets out what your accident involved, the injuries you have suffered, and the details of any other losses (for example, a loss of earnings) that you may have also suffered.  This is then sent to the other side who have 21 days to acknowledge this letter and either deal with your claim themselves, or, as in most cases, instruct their insurers or solicitors to deal with your claim.  Once the other side has acknowledged your Letter of Claim they are allowed a maximum period of three months in which to investigate your claim.  This is not to say that the whole process of sending your Letter of Claim out and the period for investigations will take nearly four months, but instead to say that this is the maximum time it should take.  Your claim may be settled in a month or two months if everything goes well.

At The Injury Lawyers we are well aware that you want your claim to be dealt with as fast as possible and you want to be updated on any progress that is made.  That is why we promise to contact you every two weeks to ensure that you are always up-to-date.  We will also make sure we contact the other side on a regular basis to ensure that they are progressing their investigations of your claim.  The Injury Lawyers understand your anxieties and concerns and therefore aim to deal with your claim in the quickest time possible, and at the same time make sure you get the maximum compensation you deserve.

I dodged yet another pothole on the way to work this morning – it’s getting to be rather tedious if I’m honest. OK, so I know the councils budgets are rather stretched thanks to the giant pair of scissors that are David Cameron’s hands; but something needs to be done about it. In fact, if anyone watched Channel 4’s Selling Off Britain on Monday night, you might agree that there is room for a bit of financial redistribution to help us sort out the meteor craters littering our roads.

But – Where does the genuine duty lie? What are the councils and highways authorities responsible to do? You’d be tempted to say “naff all” given the current state of the roads; but there is a duty there.  Under the Highways Act 1980, local authorities responsible for the highways have an important duty to ensure that the highway is reasonably and regularly inspected and maintained. What is classed as “reasonable” is largely down to the authorities themselves; they can range from monthly inspections, to three monthly, bi-annually, or even annual only inspections. It’s all about what is deemed to be reasonable and practical.

If a pothole or defect is reported, the rules change a little. The council now must make the area safe – either by reparations or cordoning off of the area etc, as soon as is reasonably possible. Again, that lovely ambiguous word “reasonable” is in there. How this can be measured is hard to tell. At the end of the day, it’s likely the local authority will put forward the “public purse” argument as to why they are not able to satisfy the safety of highway users.
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Many clients that approach The Injury Lawyers with a potential claim are aware that they may be entitled to compensation for their injury. This heightened awareness may be due to the increasing amount of personal injury related advertisements on television and the radio. Many of these clients, however, are not aware that they may also be entitled to other losses they have sustained as a result of the accident.

When we advise clients we also advise and enquire as to their losses. These losses are then compiled in a document known as a Schedule of Loss which can then be disclosed to the other side and claimed for. There can be many items included in this Schedule and I have listed some of these below:

1. Care and assistance: – if you have needed care and assistance as a result of the accident then this may be claimed back at an hourly rate.  This means that, where you have required a carer or family or friend to assist you with personal care, such as dressing and washing, household chores such as vacuuming and cleaning, preparing meals or shopping (this list is not exhaustive), this may be claimed back. It must be of note however that due to the nature of the claim you may not get all of which you claim and whatever you receive is payable to your carer/carers.
2. Loss of earnings:- if you have suffered a loss of earnings as a result of the accident then you may be entitled to claim this back – it may be that you have had no pay at all or simply a reduced rate of pay such as Statutory Sick Pay.  If you are employed then a solicitor would usually ask you for 13 weeks of wage slips prior to the accident. Your loss of earnings is then calculated over an average of the 13 week period.  If you are self –employed this average is usually calculated over 3 years of profit loss accounts.
3. Treatment costs: – for many clients who come to us at The Injury lawyers we are able to arrange private treatment such as physiotherapy at no cost. This allows our client to have treatment quickly compared to the potential wait for the NHS treatment. This treatment can then be claimed back in the Schedule of Loss.
4. Other types of loss which may be included in the schedule could be travel expenses to medical appointments etc or even prescription costs – as long as they are a result of the accident.

The above list is not exhaustive so to find out more about losses The Injury Lawyers may be able to provide advice.

You may guess the general topic of this blog is accidents at work – but more specifically accidents stemming from a lack of/inadequate personal protective equipment (or PPE for short).

PPE is safety equipment which is given to workers to either wear or use to protect them from risks to their health and safety. These are risks which cannot be limited in any other manner and PPE is the last resort.  PPE can include protection for eyes – i.e.goggles; protection for the ears – i.e. ear defenders; gloves; respirators or masks; or even protection from adverse weather conditions. This brings me onto a news story which I have recently read whereby a former army chef who could no longer work within this field due to contracting a non freezing cold injury. The chef worked at temperatures as low as minus 14 degrees Celsius and was not given the correct PPE for these conditions. The chef successfully sued the MOD for £150,000.

It is also noteworthy that an employer should not ask for you to pay for the PPE, or ask you to make any contributions towards it. Regulations in the UK state that it is the duty of the employer to provide the appropriate PPE to their employees. Furthermore, employers should check that the PPE is properly maintained and stored, and properly issue instructions through training as to the correct use of the PPE. Employers should then keep a check that the PPE is used correctly.
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Many of our clients when they first approach us with a claim have many questions surrounding which losses they can claim for. All our legally trained advisors are able to answer these questions; however, we always feel it necessary to inform the wider public who may be sat at home equally unsure.

Losses from a claim can be wide ranging and can form a large part of any personal injury claim.  Compensation in personal injury claims is applied for in separate parts – there is the claim for compensation and there is the claim for losses suffered as a result of the accident. The latter is compiled in a document known as a Schedule of Loss and disclosed to the other side.

Below is a list of some of the types of losses you may claim in a Schedule of Loss:
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This is one of the most common questions I hear at The Injury lawyers when speaking to new (and existing) clients. It’s something that most claimers want to know right from the outset of the case.

But unfortunately, answering this question is a little trickier than you might think!

As a pioneer of the online compensation calculators, we know that they can help – but only as a guideline. Ultimately, the information you put in to the calculator dictates its response. The calculator (or at least ours) matches the information you put in to it to something called the JSB (Judicial Studies Board) Guidelines, which are official guidelines we as lawyers and judges at court use to value claims.

To value your claim properly, you need:

• A good quality medical report from a qualified medico-legal expert in the field of your injury (e.g. Orthopaedic for muscular / skeletal, Plastic Surgeon for cuts and burns, Dermatological for skin etc).
• An experienced, fully qualified and specialist personal injury lawyer.

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