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Well – me personally, I do. But what I’m talking about here is the common question accident victims ask me when they are looking for advice as to whether they are entitled to make a claim for compensation.

The best way to find out if you have a potentially winning claim is to speak with an expert at a specialist personal injury law firm. The guide below will hopefully help you out on your quest to find out if you are entitled to receive what could be thousands of pounds in compensation for any injuries you have sustained in an accident.

 Who’s at Fault?
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This is a common question I am asked when I am advising accident victims about their potential claim for compensation. How much does it costs to have a lawyer? Will anything be taken away from the compensation?

Well, I have some fantastic news for you – so read on!

The No Win No Fee is rather self explanatory when it comes to what happens if your claim loses. With most reputable firms, it does exactly what it says on the tin. Your lawyer will only accept your case on a No Win No Fee basis if they believe they have a good chance of winning it. We don’t take on claims that we feel we cannot win. So, we guarantee that, if it loses, we do not charge you.
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There are, literally, loads of acts, rules and regulations that employers must abide by to ensure the health and safety of their staff is always maintained adequately. If your employers have good practices and procedures in place to ensure all of these are followed, there should rarely be any accidents or incidents taking place.

Your employers, for example, have a duty in the following common areas of regulation:

Traffic Routes (Floors, walkways, paths etc)

Your employer must ensure that all traffic routes and walkways are free from defects and hazards. To uphold this, there should be a regular system of inspection and maintenance in place to ensure that any defects are rectified or cordoned off, and any spillages or other material hazards are removed as quickly as possible. The simple example is that it must be someone’s job to look out for spillages on a regular basis, and make sure to cordon them off and clear them away as soon as they are spotted.  A regime should be in place to check for these – e.g. every half an hour for each area or so.
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Ever wondered what you actually have to do to make a whiplash claim for a road accident? Here is a guide on the process, and what you should look for when making a claim for whiplash compensation.

Making a Claim – The Process

If your road accident happened after 30^th April 2010, your claim will likely fall under the new Road Traffic Accident Protocol for personal injury claims if your injuries are not classed as too serious. This new process was brought in to play to make the process much quicker, and allow injury lawyers and insurers to exchange information over the Ministry of Justices’ secure online internet portal.

Your lawyers will complete an online Claim Notification Form and submit this to the other side. The other side then has 15 working days to accept liability for your accident for the claim to remain in the new, faster system. So long as the claim stays in the system (i.e. deadlines are met by both lawyers and insurers), your claim can be resolved in a matter of months. The claim may ‘fall out’ of this new faster system for a number of reasons. For example:
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The Injury Lawyers: Proud to never pay insures, claims companies, or other companies money for claims; all of our clients come directly to us, meaning we can dedicate all of our resources on to our fantastic service, and fighting tooth and nail for a maximum payout!

How do you make a claim for whiplash? Here is the best advice on what to do, and what to avoid.

What to Avoid
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Legal Expenses Insurance, Motor Legal Protection, and the practice of insurers allocating you a solicitor after a road accident is a topic we regularly cover as an independent firm that refuses outright to get involved in this practice. We have been advising people about the downfalls of letting your insurers refer a solicitor to you for years, and it now transpires that former Justice Secretary Jack Straw has done some investigation into the matter, and has spoken out against what he has labelled as the insurers industry dirty little secret.

Following complaints from his constituents, which Mr Straw followed up aand he has publically brought to light and blasted what he has termed as the “huge racket” of insurers passing on details to personal injury lawyers for extortionate fees; a practice we have been speaking out against for years. The BBC and The Guardian are currently reporting on the matter as we speak (http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9524000/9524476.stm), (http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/jun/28/jack-straw-insurance-customer-details).

The reports confirm that Straw has said that “the practice had driven a surge in no-win, no-fee claims this year which put up premiums – all with the insurers’ knowledge”. We often see the insurers complaining that personal injury claims are driving up premiums – as you can see, it’s the insurers themselves that are akin to this apparent problem.
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What is whiplash? How does it affect you? How can you make a claim for it? These are three of the primary questions that people ask about whiplash claims and whiplash injuries. So – Here’s a little advice to help you out!

Whiplash Explained

Whiplash is a general term used to describe the damage to muscles, ligaments and tendons, normally in the neck, back, and shoulders area, from the areas being stretched beyond their normal range of movement. The stretch occurs from a the fast back, forwards, or sideways movement caused normally from a collision or a harsh brake in a vehicle, or even from slipping over and falling fast, or a fall from height.
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A whiplash injury is normally caused after a road accident – it can also be caused after a slip or a fall, however. Basically, anything that involves your neck / head being jolted forwards, backwards, or sideways quickly can cause a whiplash injury. It’s called whiplash for a reason – imagine an actual whip hitting a tree. It flies forward at speed, cracks the tree, and whips back. It’s this sharp movement that normally causes the injury.

When a whiplash injury occurs, your muscles and ligaments are stretched beyond their normal range of movement. This can lead to several symptoms that sufferers will endure; the below are all classis symptoms of a whiplash injury:

• Pain in the neck, shoulders, and all over, or just particular sections of, the back.
• Reduced movement and stiffness in the affected areas.
• Sleeping difficulties caused by the pain.
• Headaches – sometimes drowsiness, dizziness, and even vertigo in some cases.

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How do you recover from a whiplash injury? What’s the best course of treatment to aid you with a faster recovery? What do you do!?

If you are currently suffering from whiplash, I have some potentially bad news for you:

• Whiplash is a much more complicated injury than most people think
• Whiplash recovery is difficult to predict; most victims’ suffering gets worse before it gets better
• Whiplash can not only cause pain and stiffness in the neck, shoulders, and back: it can also cause headaches, dizziness, pins and needles, and even sickness and vertigo in some cases.
• There is no magic cure for whiplash!

So – what can you do? You can aid your recovery by firstly seeking advice from your GP, a walk in centre, or a hospital, and you can help to speed up your recovery by getting treatment from a physiotherapist, or chiropractor, or an osteopathic expert if your symptoms warrant their intervention.
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This is a common question I hear when advising accident victims about their road accident claims whilst I’m setting them up on our systems and getting their claims rolling forward from day 1. It’s quite easy, with a good law firm that takes client care seriously, to get your whiplash claim up and running in a matter of hours; but, it’s a difficult to question to answer when asked how much compensation you are entitled to get for a whiplash injury!

Realistically, there is only one way to value a whiplash compensation claim: with an independent expert personal injury lawyer, and an independent medical report from a fully qualified medico-legal expert. Basically, you attend an appointment arranged through your lawyers, and they use the evidence given by the expert to value your claim and assess any further treatment needs you might have.

I can, however, give you guidance as to how much compensation you can receive for a whiplash claim. As well as the medical evidence, your lawyers will use their wealth of experience and knowledge, previous cases with similar injuries and circumstances, and what’s known as the JSB (Judicial Studies Board) Guidelines, in order to give you the best valuation possible.
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