Your personal injury solicitor is required to make all funding options clear to you from day one.
There are several ways to pay for your personal injury claim.
a) Paying Privately
You can pay for your claim privately. This means that you will pay an hourly rate and the firm will be sending you interim bills during the course of your claim and a final bill at the conclusion of your case.
b) Conditional Fee Agreement
Most Personal Injury cases are paid for by way of a Conditional Fee Agreement (so called “No Win No Fee”). No Win No Fee generally means that you will only be charged on condition that you win your case and if you lose you will not be charged anything. The actual terms of the agreement vary from firm to firm. Some firms may expect you to pay for disbursements even if they lose the case, most have circumstances in which the case will be abandoned by the client and you will be expected to pay fees incurred as well as disbursements, normally in situations where the client has been uncooperative.
In order to reflect the risk your injury solicitors are taking they will also charge a “success” fee which is up to 100% increase on the fees that are charged. Some personal injury cases have a fixed pre-trial success fee percentage. Road traffic accidents are fixed at 12.5% pre-trial and Employers liability claims are fixed ay 25% before trial.
c) After the Event Insurance
After the Event Insurance (ATE) is insurance that you will take out after the event has occurred (after the accident). It is normally taken out in cases where a No win No Fee Agreement has been entered into.
In personal injury litigation in most cases, the “loser” pays the “winners” costs. The “winner” is the person who either wins at trial or in the event that a settlement is reached, the one to whom the settlement is made.
In the event that you lose at trial, you may be ordered to pay the other side’s costs. The role of the After the Event Insurance is that it will cover these costs (subject of course to the amount covered etc).
If you win, your opponent will pay your legal fees as well as the insurance premium.
It is possible to arrange ATEs which provide for an “insured deferred premium”. This basically means that you will not have to pay the premium up front, it will be deferred until the end of your case, and if you lose, it will pay itself off because it is insured. The upshot is that you will then pay nothing.
Before entering into an ATE, it is important to check that you do not have Before the Event Insurance.
d) Before the Event Insurance (BTE)
This type of insurance is one which you take out before the event occurs.
Legal Expenses Insurance
Sometimes you may have cover for legal costs added to your motor insurance policy, home and building contents insurance or even as part of a credit card agreement.
It is important that this option is explored with your solicitor as it is the most cost effective way for you to fund your personal injury case as you would already have paid the premium for this insurance.
e) Trade Union
If you were injured at work and you are a member of a trade union, your injury solicitor must advise you that you may be entitled to free legal advice and representation through your union membership. It is very unlikely that a Trade Union will appoint a solicitor who is not on their panel, but your solicitor must always keep your best interests in mind even if it means that they may have to let you go to another firm of solicitors. This is also a form of BTE.
f) Seriousness of the Injury
The rule as it stands at the moment is that if you sue somebody in the civil courts and you win, you may apply to the court for a costs order against the losing person. Basically the loser pays all. More often than not the Courts will make an order that the loser should pay the winner’s legal costs and disbursements.
This rule however only applies to claims where the injuries are worth more than £1000.
This means that from a practical point of view a personal injury solicitor, will only take on a case where the injuries involved are worth more than £1000, if not, even if you are successful, the other side will not be ordered to pay your legal fees.
g) Solvency of the Your Opponent
This is a very important consideration for your solicitor. If your opponent is not insured or does not have any money, there is really no point in pursuing the case because any judgement that you obtain in your favour will not be satisfied. In other words if a court orders that the Defendant to pay you an amount of compensation, the Court Order will be useless if the Defendant is not able to pay. It will be a hollow victory.
In road traffic accident cases, this is not usually a problem. Even if the Defendant was driving without insurance there is an organisation called the Motor Insurers Bureau (MIB) who, subject to the merits of the case will compensate the innocent injured party as though they were the insurance company of the Defendant.
It is compulsory for all employers to have Employers Liability Insurance, so in the majority of Employers’ Liability cases, the Defendant employer will have enough funds to compensate the Claimant if needs be because they would be insured to cover that cost.
Local Authorities will also always have insurance to cover Public Liability claims and “Occupiers” such as supermarkets etc will also have compulsory insurance for Occupiers Liability claims.
However we have seen cases where a client may have had an accident in a small shop which does not have insurance, in these cases it would serve no useful purpose to pursue the matter as it is very easy for the shop owner to pack up, or change ownership leaving you with a hollow victory.
This Personal Injury Guide was prepared by Balinda & Co Personal injury solicitors.
Balinda & Co have many years experience and have helped a lot of people who have suffered injuries to get compensation.
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Want help with your injury claim? Please contact us or call 0800 321 3287 and let us talk it through.