If you have unfortunately been involved in an accident that wasn’t your fault, and you have suffered a personal injury as a result, you may have a claim for compensation. During the period after your accident you may have incurred some expenses which we at The Injury Lawyers feel you should not be responsible for. After all, the accident wasn’t your fault, so why should you bear the brunt of any costs?
Whilst we try and recover most of the costs back that you have incurred, all claimants must adhere to mitigating their losses: this means that claimants must make a genuine effort to keep their costs to a minimum. One example of this – if you have been involved in a Road Traffic Accident which has left you without the use of your vehicle and you need to travel, instead of taking a taxi, where possible, try and see if there is a cheaper option; for instance, taking public transport. Also, make sure to keep any receipts that can back up the use of alternative transport. This then makes it easy for us to justify the expense to the Defendants insurers.
There are certain circumstances where the losses are justified – a common one we can claim back is your loss of earnings resulting from any time off work you have had to take from the injury, or from attending medical appointments etc. This is seen as a reasonable expense to claim back. We would normally request that you send us at least 13 weeks’ worth of pay slips as evidence of your earnings.
Some more examples of acceptable expenses are things like: loss of enjoyment of a holiday – if your injuries have caused you not to enjoy your holiday then we can look into claiming an amount of money for this. Please remember to keep any invoices stating when the holiday was. Other expenses could be things such as medication – not always just prescription medication, but over the counter medication as well, or if you have had to buy special pillows or mattresses to help with any injuries.
If it is seen that you have unsuccessfully failed to mitigate your losses then the Defendants insurers can disagree the chargers that you have occurred and refuse to pay the sum within your compensation claim – so it is very important that you make a genuine effort to keep your losses to a minimum.
However, please don’t think that failure to keep your losses to a minimum means that your claim will be lost or not taken on with us. It basically means that if the case does go to court the judge has the overall power to decrease your compensation if they believe that you have failed to ‘mitigate your losses’. So, whatever you loss may be, it is definitely worth pursuing to make sure you never lose out on any money whatsoever.
