How much compensation is my whiplash claim worth? This is a common question that many of our clients ask here at The Injury Lawyers. To answer this question with any accuracy is extremely difficult at the early stages of a claim – although we can often give ball park figures using our extensive experience in the area of whiplash claims.

Valuing your whiplash claim…

The reason why valuing a whiplash claim can be difficult at this stage is due to the fact that we have to value a claim using a medical report which is obtained after liability has been admitted on your claim. This medical report not only assesses your injury, but also details the effects it has had on all areas of your life – areas such as professional, social, and domestic life.
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If you’re reading this blog then you may have recently been involved in an accident that has caused you to have an injury which you feel might be whiplash related. Whiplash is one of those injuries which can get a bad press, and one which many people (often those who have not suffered with it) can underestimate. I feel whiplash can be underestimated for many reasons – one of the main reasons being that it’s not so plain to see as a broken bone or laceration to the skin. At The Injury Lawyers, we have the exact opposite approach – we treat whiplash with the utmost seriousness as we hear from our clients on a daily basis the debilitating effect it can have on all areas of their life.

Causes

Whiplash is caused by a sudden jolt to the head and neck areas, which in turn causes the neck to move beyond its normal range. This movement causes muscles and tendons in the neck to be damaged; thus leaving the person with symptoms that I will discuss below. At The Injury Lawyers, we tend to see whiplash most commonly as a consequence of road traffic accidents. It can however be caused by anything which causes your neck to be forced beyond its normal range.
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A hot topic in the news recently has been the issue of referral fees highlighted by Jack Straw – the issue of insurers selling their customer’s information to law firms for profit.  Now, you may be thinking – what has this got to do with the amount of compensation I will get for my whiplash claim? Well, if you read on, you’ll see that it may have everything to do with it!

Relevance…

If you haven’t caught this latest news, I will give you a brief outline:

A constituent of Jack Straw had an accident and was subsequently bombarded with texts and calls for offers to take his claim on. Upon being notified of this, Jack Straw made a bid to find out how these various companies got his constituent’s personal information, including his mobile number. Jack Straw met with two major insurance companies who admitted to selling their customer’s information for profit. This has created much controversy, and has been reported in newspapers as a ‘racket’ and even against the spirit of data protection.
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If you have sustained a whiplash injury through no fault of your own, but because of the negligence of a third party, it is highly likely that you will be entitled to compensation for your injury.  At The Injury Lawyers we realise that a lot of people who get in touch with us regarding making a claim for compensation want to know how much their injury is worth.  As always, we advise at the beginning of their claim for compensation it is almost impossible to put an exact figure on how much their claim is worth, as there are many factors which have to be taken into account in order to properly value your claim.  This is not to say that we cannot give you a general idea as to how much your claim is worth – We can!  According to statistics, for example, Minor Whiplash claims are worth, on average, £2,500.

But here’s the thing – this is a rough average, and normally, one person’s claim is never identical to another.  Each claim must take into account the facts of each case.  Here’s a quick guide as to what factors are considered when valuing your claim:

Pain and suffering: As a rule of thumb, generally, the longer your whiplash injury persists, and the worse it is, the more compensation you will likely be entitled to.  A moderate whiplash injury lasting one year is worth more than a moderate whiplash injury lasting nine months.
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Ever wondered what you actually have to do to make a whiplash claim for a road accident? Here is a guide on the process, and what you should look for when making a claim for whiplash compensation.

Making a Claim – The Process

If your road accident happened after 30^th April 2010, your claim will likely fall under the new Road Traffic Accident Protocol for personal injury claims if your injuries are not classed as too serious. This new process was brought in to play to make the process much quicker, and allow injury lawyers and insurers to exchange information over the Ministry of Justices’ secure online internet portal.

Your lawyers will complete an online Claim Notification Form and submit this to the other side. The other side then has 15 working days to accept liability for your accident for the claim to remain in the new, faster system. So long as the claim stays in the system (i.e. deadlines are met by both lawyers and insurers), your claim can be resolved in a matter of months. The claim may ‘fall out’ of this new faster system for a number of reasons. For example:
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It seems apt right now to write a blog on the actions of our insurance companies being slammed in the media. I say this as it is has been widely reported in recent days that insurers are selling information on to personal injury referral agencies and law firms for profit.

It is Jack Straw which has spurred on this issue and highlighted the conduct of our insurance companies after one of his constituents reportedly had an accident and was swamped with personal calls and texts to take on his claim; despite the fact that he was not even injured.

In response to this, Jack Straw, in a bid to discover how these companies had got hold of his constituents details, including his mobile telephone number, uncovered the fact that it is indeed insurance companies that had been selling on customers information.
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Did you know that if you have been involved in an accident that was not your fault, you may be entitled to compensation? I would say that most of you are aware of this, given that there has been a lot of advertising on this matter in recent times.  However, are you aware that the compensation that you could be awarded does not solely relate to the injuries you have suffered? I would hazard a guess that most are probably unaware of this.  The reality is that if you have been involved in an accident that was not your fault, you are entitled to make a claim for compensation that covers ALL of your losses. 

What do I mean by all of your losses? 

Well, here is a very quick example – if you have had to take time off work because of your accident, it may be that you have only been paid statutory sick pay, and that you have lost out on a certain amount of wages. Well, your lawyers can make a claim for this loss of earnings to make sure that you are put back in the position you would have been in had the accident not have occurred.  So, what exactly can a claim for compensation incorporate?  Here is a quick guide:
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If you are reading this blog, you may have been involved in a road traffic accident, and are suffering the effects of whiplash. If you are keeping up with the latest news, then you may also be expecting to get some calls and texts from law firms or referral agencies saying that they would like to take on your claim.

I say this as this is what happened to one of Jack Straw’s constituents after he had suffered an accident.  It was subsequently found that insurers actually sell on the information of their customers who have been involved in accidents. We of course have known about this practice for years. The good news is that it’s now more out in the open!

Law firms can pay up to £800, or even £1000, as it was reported in the Telegraph, for a claim. So if a law firm has paid so much for your claim, the profits they stand to make from the claim are greatly reduced. In order to redress the balance, it can then mean that they reduce the amount of time they spend on your claim, and therefore give you a poorer service. This in turn could impact on the amount of compensation you receive if they are not willing to fight tooth and nail to negotiate you the highest amount possible.
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Where you have been involved in a road traffic accident, and you have suffered an injury, if the accident was not your fault, it is highly likely that you will be due compensation for those injuries, and any losses that directly resulted from your accident.  This is because it is relatively straightforward to prove where the other side was negligent in road traffic accidents.  For example, if a third party vehicle drives into the rear of you vehicle, and you suffer whiplash, then it is quite clear that the accident was their fault and you should be due compensation.  So, what happens then if you believe you have a claim for compensation? How do you go about getting this compensation?

The first thing you should do, after seeking medical attention for your injuries, is to contact a specialist injury lawyer who has plenty of experience in dealing with road traffic accident claims.  This is because their experience should mean that they know what they are doing, and they are best positioned to advise you on your claim.  If the other side gets in touch with you and they want to settle your claim directly with you, our best advice is: do not settle it.  It is probably not in your best interests.  You should seek legal advice first to see if their offer is a good offer, or whether it should be rejected, and you should instruct someone to fight tooth and nail for your claim.

So – how long do claims take?
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If you have been involved in an accident where you have sustained an injury through no fault of your own, you may well be entitled to compensation.  For example, if you have been involved in a road traffic accident whereby a negligent third party driver has gone in to the rear of your vehicle, and you have sustained whiplash, in all likelihood you will be entitled to compensation for your injuries.

Although you may not be aware that you are entitled to compensation, there is no doubt about it that the other side’s insurers are fully aware of your position.  As such, they may somewhat, out of the blue, get in touch with you and offer to settle your claim with you direct.  They may offer you £250, £500, or maybe even £750.  At first instance, this may seem attractive; after all, you were not expecting any compensation, and you think that the offer sounds great.  But please take a step back for a minute.  Should you not look into how much your injury is actually worth? Why not get in touch with a quality injury lawyer who may inform you that, actually, your whiplash injury is worth over £1,000?

The process where the other side gets in touch with you and settles your claim directly with you is called ‘third party capture’.  This is because the other side have settled your claim for compensation in full and final settlement and you cannot go back and ask for more if your injuries have worsened, and you have not recovered.  That is it – your claim is finished.  At The Injury Lawyers, we have people ringing up each week asking us about their potential claim for compensation, only for us to have to break the bad news that they have under-settled their claim, and that there is nothing we can do about it.  What we ask is that if you receive an offer for compensation, you ask yourself why they are making this offer, and where they came up with the amount.  Are they doing it out of the kindness of their heart, and because they care about your suffering? Or are they doing it because they know that if they can get you to accept their offer, they have saved hundreds, if not, thousands, of pounds in not paying the true amount of compensation they would have had to have paid you with an expert injury lawyer on your side.  I believe the latter is the most likely.
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