Accidents at work

If the accident happened at work, it should be recorded in an accident book. If your workplace does not have an accident book, you should write out brief details of the accident and injuries, send them to your employer and keep a copy. Your contract may say that you have to report an injury at work to your employer. If you are self-employed, you have a legal responsibility to report some accidents resulting in injury to the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) or to the local authority environmental health department. In England and Wales, there is more information about reporting accidents to the HSE on its website at www.hse.gov.uk

Making a complaint

If you have had an accident or suffered an injury you might be able to get an explanation of what went wrong and to receive an apology. In some cases, there may be an official complaints procedure you can use.

One disadvantage of using complaints procedures is that they are often time consuming and the final result will be no more than an apology. If you have suffered a personal injury and you also want compensation, you should be aware that there are time limits for taking legal action (see under heading Taking legal action) and going through a complaints procedure may delay matters.

If you decide that making a complaint will provide a sufficient remedy, here are some examples of the organisations you can complain to:

• a government department
• a local authority
• your employer
• the police
• your school or other educational institution
• your hospital or other National Health Service institution
• In Wales, new NHS Redress Arrangements which start from 1 April 2011, may allow you to combine making a complaint with claiming compensation.

If you want more information about how to complain to these types of organisations, you should seek specialist advice from an experienced adviser, for example, a Citizens Advice Bureau. To search for details of your nearest CAB, including those that can give advice by email, click on nearest CAB

What is a personal injury

A personal injury can be:

• a physical injury, disease or illness, or
• a psychological injury or illness.

A personal injury could result in death.

Examples of personal injuries are:

• an injury at work. This includes work-related illnesses such as a disease caused by working with asbestos
• a psychological illness caused by stress at work
• an injury caused in a traffic accident
• an injury received as a result of faulty goods or services
• an injury caused if you trip over paving stones
• a psychological illness suffered as a result of abuse as a child
• an injury caused by errors in hospital treatment or by vaccinations
• a physical or psychological injury sustained by a victim in the course of a crime
• a psychological illness caused by discrimination or harassment in your work-place.

If you have suffered a personal injury, or if you are acting on behalf of someone who has died because of a personal injury, you may want to consider the following:

• do you want to make a complaint to the person or organisation you believe was responsible for the injuries (see under heading Making a complaint)
• do you want to make a claim for compensation to cover losses you have suffered as a result of the injury (see under heading Compensation)
• are there any immediate financial problems arising because of the injury, for example, you are unable to work (see under heading Financial problems)
• do you want to contact an organisation that could offer support or counselling (see under heading Support and counselling).

• Assess your eligibility for compensation and duly appoint an expert solicitor where appropriate.
• Arrange an independent medical report to see how well you are recovering.
• Assess whether you need any more medical help – and, if needed, arrange it immediately.
• Advise you, whenever possible, of how long your claim will take and how much compensation you might receive.
• Make you aware of ‘after-the-event insurance’ to help you cover your opponent’s costs should you lose your case.
• Let our solicitor negotiate compensation on your behalf – regularly updating you about the progress of your claim.

The final stage of the process is when you receive a cheque compensating you for your injuries – more than 95% of cases are settled before going to court.

How to make a No Win, No Fee compensation claim

The process of starting work on your claim begins as soon as you make contact. 

Most of Claims Direct’s work is conducted by phone and email, meaning that you rarely have to take time-consuming trips to a lawyer’s office. Our No Win, No Fee solicitors will complete most of the paperwork for you, though we do ask you to check and sign claim forms once we have filled out the boxes on your behalf.

When you contact us, we will need to know:

• Your personal details, including contact details so that we can keep you fully informed about the progress of your claim
• The date your accident occurred / the date when you first showed symptoms of an illness
• The location of the accident and a brief account of what happened
• Any GP or hospital notes relating to the injuries you sustained
• Details of police reports relating to the accident
• Relevant details about the person or organisation you believe was responsible for your accident (name, address, insurance company)

Personal injury solicitors London, there are many personal injury solicitors in London. But be careful, you must go with a company that has lots of experience! If your personal injury solicitor in London do not deal with a huge number of clients like the commercial solicitors do, then you may not be optimising your full monetary reward. A small company may not know how far they can push the insurance companies for an out of court settlement. If the smaller London personal injury solicitor pushes too hard it may end up in court and you could end up with nothing!

If there are any questions you have or advice you need let me know and I will do my best to answer.