29/08/2017
Neil Seddon
New research has shown that hundreds of thousands of people could end up having to pursue their own personal injury litigation for road traffic accidents.
The study, which was commissioned by lobbying group, Access to Justice revealed that 80% of road traffic accident claims settled by solicitors over the past year were for less than £5,000. Although the Ministry of Justice has yet to confirm it, this is below a new threshold outlined in plans put forward by the government to introduce reforms to personal injury compensation claims.
Currently, the point at which solicitors are able act on behalf of victims of road traffic accidents is set at £1,000. Under the new proposals, however, the limit will rise to £5,000, leaving claimants with the prospect of having to pursue their case through the small claims court themselves. At the moment, it’s not clear what the government has in mind to help people who want to bring a claim as it’s anticipated that many people won’t be able to afford the cost a solicitor.
The research carried out by Capital Economics analysed cases supplied by 58 law firms, which had settled 171,939 RTA claims between them in the previous year, accounting for almost a quarter of such cases. The average value of damages was £3,029. The figures were investigated alongside the government’s Compensation Recovery Unit(CRU), which recorded 780,324 motor claims in 2016/17.
Access to Justice believes that the limit should be set to £2,000 to match the limit being suggested by the government for other types of personal injury claims. A spokesman for Access to Justice said that a £5,000 limit would “open up the floodgates to the injured public being targeted by an increase in unqualified claims farmers and cold callers”. He also stated that a £2,000 limit would reduce the number of claims registered with the Compensation Recovery Unit a year by around 140,000, which the group has estimated will save insurers around £400m a year.
Please note that this article is meant as general guidance and not intended as legal or professional advice. Updates to the law may have changed since this article was published.