On the 9^th September it was confirmed by the government that there would be a ban on referral fees for personal injury claims.  A referral fee is a fee paid by a solicitor or claims management company in return for the details of people who have been involved in an accident, and have got good prospects for a successful personal injury claim. 

This fee is often in the region of £200 to £1,000.  Worst of all, the victims who’s details are getting passed to third parties probably do not want their details being distributed if they knew that they were.  A solicitor will often pay this referral fee because they consider that in the long run they will be able to make money from the claim.  For example, a solicitor may pay £400 for your details – they get you to pursue your claim with them and win it, and they get paid a few thousand pounds by the Defendant’s in respect of their costs.  In other words, they make a tidy profit.

At The Injury Lawyers we have always spoken out about referral fees and have never paid a referral fee to any company.  As such, we welcome this ban on referral fees.  This is because we do not consider that they are a good thing for the client.  For example, if we were to spend £400 on your buying your claim through a referral fee, that is £400 less we now have to spend on progressing your claim as efficiently as possible.
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Your employer has a duty to make sure you’re safe from the risk of personal injury whilst at work. This obviously includes making sure that you are not injured whilst going about your everyday job, but it also includes protecting you from risks to your long term health.

One common danger, especially in heavy manufacturing and industrial workplaces, is hearing loss.  Many people don’t realise that they can claim for damage to their hearing – or they simply put it down to getting older. However, damage caused to an employee’s hearing is very much a personal injury just as any other injury caused by an employer’s failure to protect the health and safety of their employees.
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Claiming compensation for injuries resulting out of a relatively straightforward road traffic accident is simple.  Your claim can be over in a matter of weeks or months, and what’s best, with the right lawyer on hand, you won’t even have to go to that much effort – they will do all the work for you.

Prior to April 2010 claims for compensation from road accidents could take months or sometimes years.  The Defendant had a period of 21 days to acknowledge your claim and then a further 3 months to investigate it; and that was just to provide an admission or denial of liability. 

Things have changed thankfully.  Now, what is required is for you to submit what is known as a Claims Notification Form or ‘CNF’ through an online portal on the Ministry of Justice website.  Once your lawyers have done this on your behalf the Defendant must acknowledge the CNF within one business day and then they have a further 15 business days in which to admit or deny liability.  This is wholly different from before.  Liability could be admitted for your injuries within 16 days; whereas under the old system, investigations into your accident may not have begun at the same point.  It really is a fast and straightforward process nowadays and an injury lawyer will be more than happy to take you through the process and make sure everything is done correctly.
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If you are injured or experience ill health because of a faulty or defective product, you may be entitled to claim for compensation.

The Consumer Protection Act 1987 (CPA) provides important safeguards to protect consumers from defective products. It makes it easier for a person to claim compensation if they are injured because of a fault in a product.

Nearly everything we buy could be a product that is covered by the CPA.  The CPA recognises that, if not manufactured or sold properly, any product could potentially be harmful to a person’s health. Product liability covers a wide range of products including everyday items such as food, cosmetics or clothes, through to one off items such as electrical goods and children’s toys.
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On the 9^th September the media confirmed that the government had finally announced that it will ban the referral fees that are paid to insurance companies in return for them passing on the details of the victims of accidents.

This move is welcomed by us at The Injury Lawyers. We have always criticised these payments in the past because they are, in our opinion, bad for the client and the personal injury profession.

Referral fees are paid by some firms of solicitors, mainly to claims management companies and insurance firms, but it can be to anyone who passes on details of an injured person, such as a garage or even the police. Many insurance firms, large and small, have passed on the details of their policyholders after they have contacted them to report an accident that was not their fault. In return for these details, many personal injury solicitors pay a referral fee to the insurance company.
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Over the past few years or so, we have seen an increase in personal injury claims stemming from poor quality services in the beauty industry that have left people bruised, burned, scarred, and emotionally down when they end up injured through a beauty treatment gone wrong.

One of the more common ones is treatment involving hair extensions that have gone wrong; so, if you have stumbled upon this article because you are looking for some information on this topic, look no further, and know that you are not alone!

We have had claims ranging from hair dye gone wrong, where skin testing has not been completed correctly or at all, to hair extension treatments performed incorrectly resulting in patches of baldness, uncomfortable head, irritations, and scarring.
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At The Injury Lawyers, we strive to get our clients the maximum compensation they deserve in the shortest time possible.  We are able to do this because we are experts in our field and have the knowledge and professionalism to know how to progress your claim in the best possible way.  That said, our clients can go a long way in helping us get their compensation in the fastest time possible as well.

In most personal injury claims, excluding those which arise from relatively straightforward road accidents, a Letter of Claim will be produced and sent to the opponent.  This is in most cases is the first bit of correspondence between your legal representatives and the Defendant, and outlines the details of your accident, the injuries you suffered as a result of the Defendant’s negligence, and why we consider the Defendant was indeed negligent.  It is therefore key that the Letter of Claim is thorough and that it provides as much detail as it possibly can.  This way the Defendant should be able to get on with their investigations sooner and come back with an admission of liability.

So how can you help make the Letter of Claim as clear as possible?
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The referral fees involved in personal injury claims is a topic we have blogged about and condemned on so many occasions. We, as in independent firm of specialist personal injury lawyers who hate the concept of referral fees where middlemen profit from injury victims in return for passing details around, are proud to have never been a part of it.

Just in the last few months we were ecstatic to hear that our former Justice Secretary Mr Jack Straw had exposed what has been called the insurance industries “dirty little secret” when he investigated how the details of one of his constituents was passed around for profit following a road accident. We were overjoyed to hear the investigations concluded that the real reason for insurance premiums being driven up was a symptom of the referral fees rackets.

Now, it appears we are finally making some headway in ridding the country of the referral fee disease.
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One of the most common questions people ask when they make a claim is ‘how much will I receive from my claim?’ If you have been injured as the result of an accident that was not your fault, you are entitled to claim compensation. In the majority of cases, financial compensation is the only remedy available and it is only natural for claimants to want to know how much they will receive.

There are two types of compensation, or ‘damages’ as they are formally called – ‘special damages’ and ‘general damages’.

Special damages are those paid to compensate the claimant for the actual financial losses caused as the result of an accident.  The aim of a personal injury claim is, as far as is reasonably possible, to put the injured person back in the position that they would have been in had the accident not have occurred.
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Injured in a road traffic accident whilst a passenger in a taxi?

Have you been involved in a road traffic accident whilst travelling as a passenger in a taxi, and as a result of this sustained injury and/or incurred losses, you are not sure of your rights, or you are contemplating submitting a claim but do not know the process?

As a passenger you are seen to be an innocent party as you are not the driver of the vehicle and you are likely not at fault. You are entitled to submit a claim for compensation up to three years from the date of the accident whether it was the taxi driver at fault or another driver involved.
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