Personal Injury

Please contact our office and we will email you one of our claims funding factsheets for your type of claim.

This benefit is paid if you are an employee and you have an accident at work or suffer a listed industrial disease. Disability is medically assessed and must be in excess of 14% to qualify for a payment.

This benefit is paid to persons under 65 who have needed help with personal care or personal mobility for at least 3 months (subject to exceptions). There are minimum ages of 3 months/3 years/5 years of age depending upon the circumstances. The benefit is not means assessed.

This is paid if you need constant care and attention because of your injury or disease. You must be seriously disabled to qualify.

This is an extra allowance if you are already entitled to constant attendance allowance at the middle or higher rate and your disability are permanent.

A personal injury claim is a means of obtaining, often by negotiation, compensation for the pain, suffering, loss of function and financial impact caused to a victim of an accident or to a person exposed to a harmful substance. Injuries can be physical or mental and in the case of mental injuries, it is possible sometimes to claim for the shock of seeing a loved one injured. Claims can also be brought for stress, and as the victim of bullying in a workplace. In order to make a successful claim, it will be necessary to identify who, legally, was responsible for your injury. You may be able to claim even if you were partly responsible as well as someone else. In order to identify whether anyone is lawfully responsible, it is often necessary for a personal injury solicitor to consider the past decisions of judges in similar-fact cases, laws passed by Act of Parliament and regulations which often set very detailed standards to be applied. As best as money can do, the function of this branch of the law is to put the injured person into the position he or she would have been in if the accident had not occurred. Compensation is paid for the injury itself, for losses which have already occurred and for losses which may be incurred at some point in the future. Most claims are brought against persons, companies or corporations who are insured. They are represented by highly experienced negotiators and solicitors specialising in this area of law and whose function is to defend the claim in its entirety or at least to reduce the amount of compensation which is paid. It is therefore vital that you have “equality of arms” and that you appoint a solicitor of your own to represent your interests. If you need to locate a solicitor, please consider the following:-

• Are you someone who would prefer to instruct a local solicitor – it helps if long face to face meetings may be required and promotes a better service – it may mean your receiving more compensation
• The Law Society have an expert panel of Personal Injury Solicitors in your area

Alternatively, you can contact us since all our personal injury claims are dealt with or supervised by Stephen Brookes, who has been a member of the Personal Injury Panel since 1996 but who has conducted personal injury claims for approximately 25 years.

On the 1st April 2013 Legal Aid was severely restricted in the Legal Aid, Sentencing and Punishment of Offenders Act 2012 and the general rule is that no legal aid is available for any claims for personal injury compensation, clinical negligence or criminal injuries. There are however a number of very limited exceptions applying to cases involving these quite rare matters:-

• Claims involving abuse of a child or vulnerable adult taking place when that person was a child or vulnerable adult
• Claims for judicial review involving a personal injury element
• Claims involving injury from the abuse of power or a significant breach of Convention Rights by a public authority except where it is clinical negligence
• Claims of obstetric clinical negligence for severely neurologically disabled children where the injury was caused whilst in the womb/during birth/ in the 8 weeks after the birth
• Claims for injury ( including those made through employment law ) arising through the exploitation or human-trafficking of an individual who is a victim of that trafficking or exploitation
• A claim arising through a sexual offence
• Assistance at an inquest into the death of a person
• A claim for personal injury arising through a cross border dispute

AND to obtain this restricted form of Legal Aid

• You will have to qualify financially
• The case will have to satisfy a costs/benefit test which many cases cannot satisfy

In short legal aid is ( almost ) consigned to the history books. Speak to Salmons for Personal Injury Legal Aid If you need more advice about your legal aid please speak to Salmons Solicitors today. We have a reputable track record for successful cases and were one for the first firms to offer a no win no fee service. Salmons work and welcome clients from Staffordshire, Cheshire and Derbyshire and our service cover all aspects of personal injury.

Loss of earnings is often the largest head of loss in a personal injury claim, though not always. Past and future loss of earnings can be claimed. Future losses are assessed using actuarial tables which discount for the advanced receipt of earnings, for the prospects that earnings would have been lost in any event through redundancy etc and for the risks of ordinary mortality. Prejudice on the labour market can be claimed. Other common heads of loss include:-

• Care/attendance provided by family members or the loss of home maintenance, DIY and gardening ability
• Damage to pension funds from not being able to maintain contributions
• Damage for loss of an enjoyable job
• Housing adaptation costs
• Mobility/transport costs
• Medical treatment costs
• Loss of free time

The receipt of compensation can affect a client’s entitlement to state benefits if those state benefits are means assessed. If you think this could be a problem, download our factsheet on setting up a Personal Injury Compensation Protection Trust.

Legal expenses insurance is often termed “family legal protection” and may still be included either free or for a small additional premium for a few more months at least in your household or motor insurance policies. These policies pay for the fees incurred by your solicitor in acting for you in various types of legal claim and a type of claim often included is a personal injury claim. Some credit cards also have legal expenses insurance. There are significant problems with this insurance but under the right circumstances, it can be of some use. Here are the problems:- The first point to be aware of is that originally the insurer wanted you to claim on the insurance because it could sell your details for several hundred pounds to one of its panel solicitors who were very likely to be at the other end of the country – this money making scheme proved very lucrative for many insurers. However, on the 1st April 2013, the payment of a referral fee in order to obtain the details of a person wanting to claim compensation for personal injuries was made illegal. As such may, insurers are linking up with law firms in order to get around the ban. The second point is that this insurance is going to start getting more expensive as it no longer becomes a license to receive back-hand payments from law firms. It is going to have to be sold at a realistic price and take up by policy-holders will start to decline. The third point is that the insurance company will attempt to be very persuasive and try to avoid your consulting a local firm – but this is not for your benefit – the motivation here is the desire to avoid paying normal fees – the firms who are on the insurers’ panel are likely to have agreed to reduce their normal fee rates The fourth point is that the panel solicitors, because of the reduction of fee rates, frequently can only afford to put less experienced lawyers on to the case, perhaps clerks or paralegals. The fifth point is that the insurer will ignore your legal right to appoint your own solicitor from the outset ( with one exception concerning breakdown insurance) and your legal right to insist that the insurer underwrites the fees – see Regulation 6, Legal Expenses Insurance Regulations, 1990 ( click on this link to see for yourself LINK to Regulation) Indeed, one particular insurer has established a very successful business model by flouting this fundamental point with full co-operation from the Ombudsman but now European case-law has confirmed that freedom of choice arises at the outset and not when the claim is going to be issued at court. If you prefer face to face meetings with your solicitor, and the ability to call in to drop off documentation, etc., or to see how your case is getting on, the insurance company’s choice of lawyer will not be for you. Contact Salmons Solicitors for Further Information about Legal Expenses Insurance Do not hesitate to contact Salmons Solicitors for more information about legal expenses insurance or any aspect of personal injury cases. The nature of personal injury covers a vast selection of categories and areas. Over the years we’ve worked with clients from Staffordshire, Cheshire and Derbyshire – thanks to our reputation and proven track record for offering a no win no fee service. Speak to Salmons at either our Stoke on Trent or Newcastle under Lyme offices.

Over 80% of our work is from former clients and from recommendations made by former clients and we are always very grateful to any former clients who can either recommend us directly to friends and family or who can post positive comments on our yell.com and Google advertising. For more details or to refer a claim to us, use the website contact facilities to communicate with us – you have the options of telephoning us, requesting a callback, emailing us or a live chat facility. At Salmons, we were one of the first firms in Newcastle under Lyme and Stoke on Trent to offer a no win no fee service. We’ve been one of the top solicitors in Staffordshire and South Cheshire. These are just two of the many reasons why clients choose Salmons as their go-to solicitor and refer our team to others looking for legal guidance.

Compensation is awarded for “pain, suffering and loss of amenity”, which has occurred in the past and which is likely to occur in the future. Loss of amenity is the reduction in the ability of the Claimant to perform everyday tasks, enjoy life and follow hobbies and interests. Compensation is assessed by reference to guidelines of the Judicial Studies Board and by reference to decided cases which set a bracket or range of awards for specific types of injury. This type of compensation is known as general damages, and to be assessed properly requires a detailed statement from a client and medical evidence from one or more medical specialities. For cases where a no win no fee agreement was signed on or after the 1st April 2013 compensation for pain and suffering is increased by 10% to act as a rough and ready recompense for such claimants losing part of their compensation in the payment of certain legal fees which they can no longer recover from the opponent.

The general rules on personal injury time limits are:-

• For a claim brought in negligence – 3 years
• For a claim brought under a contractual liability or an assault claim/infliction of deliberate harm – 6 years
• Criminal Injuries Claim – 2 years
• Time limits do not start to run until a Claimant is 18
• If a Claimant is mentally incapacitated, time may never run out
Time runs from the date of the injury or the date of “knowledge” if later. Knowledge is defined as knowledge:-
• That the injury was significant
• That it was attributable to the Defendants actions or failures
• Of the identity of the Defendant
With very good reason, time can be extended in appropriate cases.

You may be injured at work or require advice about employment law and be a member of a trade union. Your union may have their own solicitors who may take on your case under a no win no fee or under a damages-based agreement. It may be unlikely that your union solicitors can offer any better service that we can offer and we regularly hear misgivings from clients about union facilities and services. You do not have to use your trade union even if you are a member of one and it may well be the case that the service we can offer is both better and cheaper for you in the long run.

It is beyond the scope of this factsheet to provide detailed information upon the conditions which have to be satisfied to obtain the payment of state benefits. The information which appears here is provided to enable you to decide whether you should seek further information upon these benefits from the Department for Work & Pensions (DWP) or Citizens Advice Bureau. We would firstly remind you that the receipt of state welfare benefits may affect your entitlement to part of your claim for personal injury compensation for a period of up to 5 years from the date of the accident or event giving rise to the claim. For example, if you claim for loss of earnings, earnings replacement benefits such as Incapacity Benefit and Industrial Injuries Disablement Benefit can be deducted from your loss of earnings claim and paid by the compensator not to you, but to the DWP. Similarly, if you receive personal injury compensation for care or mobility problems, Disability Living Allowance may be deducted from it and paid by the compensator. The organisation responsible for collecting payment from the compensator on behalf of the DWP is the Compensation Recovery Unit.

If you are employed this is generally paid by your employer when you are unable to work for a period of at least 4 days. It is paid for up to 28 weeks. When entitlement expires, consider applying for Incapacity Benefit. SSP is not means assessed. The terms of your contract of employment may provide a more generous scheme than SSP, but usually, this is only for a limited time. Where is a more generous scheme in operation, SSP is generally paid in addition but is included within the contractual entitlement? Unless you have a generous private sick pay scheme with your employer you should not expect your sick pay to be comparable with the earnings which you received before your disability commenced.

Incapacity Benefit is paid by the DWP for those under the retirement age who cannot work because of sickness or disability and whose claim for Incapacity Benefit was made before 27th October 2008. There are low rates, middle rates and high rates depending upon the duration of the disability. It is not means assessed. Claimants for this benefit after the date mentioned receiving Employment Support Allowance instead. For more information on these benefits, try this link.

A case can be funded by a no win no fee arrangement when the prospects of success seem better than 50/50 but it is often down to the discretion of the solicitor taking on the case. Sometimes, cases are uncertain at the outset, so the solicitor may then decide to look into the case until an outcome prediction can be made.

Generally yes. Most cases worth less than £25,000 are subject to rules limiting the amount of legal fees the other side have to pay to a set amount, often very modest in amount. You will have to pay from your compensation the difference between our fees and the other side’s contribution. In cases worth more than £25,000 you may still have to pay the shortfall between fees incurred and the fees reimbursed by the losing opponent.

In the majority of cases we do not charge any success fee at all unless the case goes to trial and any success fee we do charge is capped at 25% of the compensation.

Generally, no, provided you have been open and honest throughout. A personal injury claimant has the benefit of legal rules which ordinarily prevent the winning opponent recovering costs from the claimant, though different rules apply in the case of an offer to settle which you reject and the case then goes to court where the court makes an award which does not exceed the offer. In such a case you may have to pay the opponent’s legal costs after the offer was made out of your award. We may provide you with insurance to meet this risk.

If multiple defendants are liable, the better course is to look to the Defendant who has insurance and who is most closely connected with the cause of the injuries, if that person blames another person, then careful consideration can be given to adding a second Defendant into the claim but it is necessary to tread wisely since a claim could succeed against Defendant A but lose against Defendant B so Defendant B’s costs may have to be paid from the compensation which could be wiped out, unless the court orders Defendant A to pay everyone’s costs.

This is a common scenario. Fault can be divided amongst the parties before the court. When a claimant is partially to blame, we call it contributory negligence and it reduces the claim value pro-rata.

You will almost certainly need to attend for a medical and often more than once and in multiple injury cases to a number of doctors from differing specialities. The Defendant will want their own doctor in many more valuable cases but generally not in sub-£25,000 cases.

Yes, but you need to be careful what you say to your GP. It is best to assume the Defence insurer will be reading it one day what you say.

A claimant carries the burden of proof. If the case is just 50/50 you may well not succeed. You will need whatever evidence is required to prove your case on the balance of probabilities which means to convince the court that your evidence establishes a claim and its value against opponents who will argue that there is no claim on the evidence or even if there is the claim, the claim is of much smaller value than is suggested by the claimant.

Yes, possibly you can, but sometimes the occurrence of the accident is not in doubt so if that is the case you do not need a witness who saw it take place. The Defendant may admit the accident occurred. However, sometimes witnesses are required to prove fault or a state of affairs which prevailed pre-accident or maintenance and cleaning regime in a factory for example. Witnesses may also be required to prove losses and in brain damage cases, it is better to start the task of assessing the injury by asking close family members rather than the victim.

Generally, compensation can be claimed from the driver or his insurers. If the driver was driving on works business, it will be his employers’ insurance who should meet the claim. Where there is a hit and run or the driver was driving a car without any insurance arranged at all (no policy) then the Motor Insurers Bureau will meet the claim.

No. The amount of compensation depends on the extent of the injuries and losses.

Possibly. In order to claim against the education authority or the school academy running the school, it would be necessary to prove fault and the accident must generally occur within the boundaries of the school grounds.

There are a number of persons who can be legally responsible for faulty products such as the seller, the organisation who trademarks or markets the product or the importer.

Yes, but persons who conduct themselves in such a way as to commit attacks upon other persons generally have little or no assets, so a claim becomes problematic. In most cases, unless the assailant has some assets such as a reasonable income or land or property against which a judgment can be enforced, the claim, in reality, becomes a claim to a Government body tasked with providing a basic level of compensation to the victims of crimes of violence.

Possibly and possibly not. Everything depends on how you arranged your holiday, where your accident occurred (in which geographical jurisdiction) and how you came to be injured. Many claims are brought in the UK against UK travel companies under package tour regulations which impose liability for faults in the supply chain under the control of the package tour company. However, in other cases where a claimant has arranged his or her own holiday, it may be necessary to take proceedings in the country where the accident occurred using local lawyers.

For a highway trip, the answer is generally yes, but only if the defect is dangerous and has been there a reasonably long length of time. A Highway authority may have a defence if it has a maintenance and repair policy which it follows. Claims against non-highways are less certain and tripping claims upon a right of way or upon open access land (such as hill paths) are in fact far more likely to fail than to succeed. Claims involving slipping at work or in a shop have better prospects of success.

A non – disclosure agreement is an agreement not to disclose certain stipulated facts. Non-disclosure agreements barring out injury claims are of doubtful enforceability and it is not possible through a contract to exclude or restrict liability for negligence. However, an employment compromise agreement, entered into to bring about a consent termination of a person’s employment, often for a compensation payment for loss of employment, do contain enforceable provisos which bar out injury claims or which make the compensation repayable if a claim is brought, though it is not legal to bar out a claim for an injury which the employee did not know he or she had ( and could not be expected to know ) at the time the agreement was signed.

This depends on the facts. If the operation was not a success but someone else caused the injury which brought about the need to operate, a claim may be considered against the person who caused the injury and if a claim is viable, it will include compensation for ongoing pain. If, however, the operation was negligently performed, and the standard of the surgeon was not the standard of the reasonably competent surgeon and this has brought about an avoidable injury or condition which would otherwise not have occurred then a claim for clinical negligence may be possible.

For employees with a two-year qualifying period which gives protection against unfair dismissal, if the employer does sack the employee it may amount to an unfair dismissal claim. Loss of earnings arising from dismissal can also be included in the personal injury claim. It is actually a fairly rare occurrence for an employee bringing a claim to be sacked since many claims proceed against insurers and are not funded from the employers’ financial resources. It is compulsory for employers to carry insurance to cover the injury claims of their employees. If a person is dismissed for the assertion of a defined statutory right no two-year qualifying period is necessary.

Yes. We can assist with rehabilitation in three ways. Firstly, we can ask the insurers of the Defendant to offer a rehabilitation package and this can extend from an initial nurse-lead assessment to the provision of therapies, medical consultations and equipment. Secondly, we can obtain an interim payment in some cases so a claimant can buy private treatment. In serious cases, we can arrange paid-for home care and even adapted accommodation all funded via interim payments. Finally, we can include in the claim financial outlay which has paid for treatment and recover incurred and expected future costs of it. In serious cases, we can arrange paid-for home care and even adapted accommodation all funded via interim payments. We can also arrange car hire, but we suggest that you avoid “on credit car hire”.

The defence insurer or the claimant through an interim payment but the needs are included in the claim.

Most cases are funded through no win no fee arrangements. In some cases, it is possible to fund cases through a union (for accidents at work) or through domestic insurance products through such insurance (often known as family legal protection) is best approached with considerable caution. Many schemes are unlawful referral – fee generation devices and though you are supposed to be allowed your own choice of lawyer from the very outset, you will hardly ever be given that choice, and preventing you from exercising that choice is illegal under rules made in 1990.

It is possible to lose by losing at trial and it is also possible to partially lose by not recovering as much as a pre-trial offer. For an outright failure of the case, and provided a claimant has been honest, a claimant should not have to pay opponents’ legal fees/expenses; as for own side legal fees these are likely to be written off under a no win no fee arrangement. Own side expenses are funded via a loan but the loan is insured by no win no fee insurance so the insurance should pay off the loan. If a claimant fails to beat a pre-trial offer it is possible that the court will award the claimant the costs up to the time the offer was received and award the Defendant the costs after the offer was made, which the claimant will have to pay, but the amount will be capped at the amount of the damages and should be insured under the no win no fee insurance.

If you win the result depends on whether the case is one where fixed cost apply. Fixed costs determine what the opponent has to pay, and the amounts were set in 2013 by regulation. Fixed costs operate in most cases with a value of less than £25,000. The fixed costs are set low in order to reduce insurance premiums for the public and bear little or no relation to the legal work actually required. So, in such cases, the Claimant will have to use part of the compensation to meet the difference between the actual costs and the fixed costs the Defendant will pay. Costs recovery in a case worth more than £25,000 is subject to negotiation. The Defendants tend to make offers to settle the costs and if the costs cannot be agreed the court determines the amount to be paid. There are often shortfalls between the costs incurred and the costs recovered from the Defendant which the claimant may have to pay in whole or in part. Whatever the case value, the Claimant will also have to pay for no win no fee insurance and possibly a success fee though many firms no longer charge success fees in straight-forward cases.

No. compensation for injuries is normally assessed on the amount net of tax and it is compensation which is not generally subject to tax through the receipt of compensation may affect the entitlement of a household member to means assessed state benefits so a trust may be required to prevent this from occurring.

In most cases, a loss of earnings claim can be brought provided the loss is attributable to the injuries. Such claims can be for historic losses which have already been incurred and for losses of earnings likely to arise in the future, for example, if a claimant cannot, because of an injury, work to normal retirement date or perhaps the range of jobs open to a claimant becomes more restricted due to injury.

Not generally. Emotions are not injuries but feelings and changes of feelings do not attract compensation, so worry or anxiety or fear are not able to be compensated but if there is a recognised psychological injury that is an entirely different matter and conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder or adjustment disorders and depressions are recognised mental health injuries for which compensation claims can be brought.

We can always look at taking over a case from a firm of solicitors already handling the case but there are often practical difficulties over the payment of the fees of the first solicitors. It can increase overall legal charges so the question to be decided is whether swapping solicitors will be more beneficial than the resultant fee increase overall.

Personal injury is the term used by solicitors to identify legal work which generally involves acting for claimants or defendants (or their insurers) in pursuing or defending a compensation claim for bodily injury.

A personal injury is an injury to the physical body or to a person’s mental health.

If an injury is likely and has been caused by a person’s actions (or failure to act) which amounts to the breach of a common-law duty owed to the victim or by a duty laid down by a statute it may be possible to bring a claim. Some situations do not require a breach of duty, however, such as trespass to the person, and assault (a threat of violence) and battery (acting upon that threat of violence). Claims can also be brought for injuries received through a crime of violence, but such claims are to a Government body rather than against the assailant.

No, but you will need to thoroughly familiarise yourself with the law, procedural steps required and a number of pre-action protocols. You will also face Defendants who are professionally represented and who will do their best to trap you into errors. So, whilst you can act for yourself, it would be foolish to do so without legal training and experience in the relevant area. Mistakes could be extremely costly. There are a group of organisations called “claims managers”. These are licensed but generally unqualified claims agents who chase work by making nuisance phone calls and they are paid by taking a large cut from the compensation.

Yes. The time limit is three years from the date of the event relied upon or three years from the date of knowledge if later. However, if the victim is a child when injured, time will not run until that child’s 18th birthday. If the victim has no legal capacity, mentally, time never runs. Once the three-year clock starts it will render the claim a legal nullity three years later unless a claimant can negotiate an extension of the three year period with the opponent or in some cases ( for example, abuse cases ) a person can ask the court to extend the three years. For criminal injury claims the time limit is two years though in abuse cases it is readily extended. Cases involving ships, aircraft and airports are subject to a two-year time limit. Different time limits apply in different jurisdictions.

This depends on how much work is involved and upon the type and severity of the injury. For example, a simple claim can take 9 to 12 months, but a severe injury can take a number of years and a severe injury to a child should not be concluded until at least the child becomes a teenager so the effects of the injury can be properly assessed.

It is impossible to give any meaningful guidance here since it all depends upon the type of injury and duration of suffering and extent of recovery. It is not just a claim for the injuries themselves. Financial needs and losses must be identified and claimed both in the past and in the future.

Many claims are settled before the court process starts in the pre-litigation phase so if the claim is settled before court proceedings start it is unlikely you will have to physically attend court. Even if the claim becomes a litigated claim it is still unlikely you will have to go to court unless the claim reaches a trial outcome, and this is relatively unusual.

It is necessary to consider if there is a claim and how it can be proved. The evidence must be gathered and a Claim Notification Form submitted through the Ministry of Justice portal or a Letter of Claim sent for a larger claim – once that has been achieved, and the claim is considered to be worthwhile, the injury and losses must be quantified through the assistance of medical and often other experts.

Yes, we offer no win no fee funding – in fact, this is how we fund most claims for personal injuries.

In a no win no fee arrangement a solicitor agrees to take the claim on the understanding that if the claim proves to be unlikely to succeed or fails at trial the solicitor will waive all fees but the expenses which have been paid to third parties must still be paid but these are generally insured by no win no fee insurance. The premium for the no win no fee insurance is often “no win, no premium”.