{"id":18700,"date":"2015-08-14T13:52:50","date_gmt":"2015-08-14T12:52:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theinjurylawyers.co.uk\/injury-lawyers-blog\/?p=18700"},"modified":"2016-10-13T10:49:36","modified_gmt":"2016-10-13T09:49:36","slug":"what-percentage-do-lawyers-take-for-personal-injury","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theinjurylawyers.co.uk\/injury-lawyers-blog\/2015\/08\/14\/what-percentage-do-lawyers-take-for-personal-injury\/","title":{"rendered":"What percentage do lawyers take for personal injury?"},"content":{"rendered":"

There once was a simpler time when you could expect to receive 100% of your compensation<\/a> when you made a claim for personal injury compensation. This was because it was recognised that you should not have to pay for the legal fees you incur – which are needed to pursue a case – as you would end up out of pocket. I.e. you would not have been fully compensated.<\/p>\n

But the government in its infinite wisdom caved to pressure from the vastly wealthy insurance industry who have many friends amongst parliament. The result? Victims losing out…
\n
\nSo you might know that you will be charged, but how are all these percentages worked out and explained? You may already have seen that law firms left, right, and centre are charging all sorts of different things, and many of them don’t explain what you are exactly going to have to pay.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s confusing!<\/strong><\/p>\n

But if you are seeking a much needed explanation then you have come to the right place. At The Injury Lawyers<\/a> we pride ourselves on communicating to our clients in plain English, we thought we’d write this little article to try and put you in the know about the charges.<\/p>\n

What is the charge?<\/h2>\n

The percentage now being charged is usually to cover something called a Success Fee. This Success Fee used to be recoverable from the opponent until the government went and (frustratingly) changed the law. As a result of this, the success fee is now commonly deducted from your compensation.<\/p>\n

What is a Success Fee?<\/h3>\n

A Success Fee is a fee that is usually worked out as a percentage of your lawyer\u2019s legal fees for pursuing the case. It exists because lawyers can offer you a no win, no fee guarantee<\/a> which means you will usually not be charged if a case loses. Offering a no win, no fee is obviously quite risky for a law firm because in many cases we cannot guarantee that you will win a case unless we actually pursue it. Pursuing it means us lawyer\u2019s spending money on you and then potentially having to write that money off if you don\u2019t win.<\/p>\n

The percentage is often worked out depending on the risk of the case \u2013 so for riskier cases we may charge a higher success fee based on the costs we incur.<\/p>\n

BUT<\/strong> \u2013 and this is a very big one \u2013 there is usually a difference between what the Success Fee actually is and what you are charged.<\/p>\n

The law change means that the amount for the Success Fee can now be deducted from your compensation, but there is a cap on it meaning that no more than 25% from your claim for injury and past losses can be used to cover the fee. Now, 25% of your damages is obviously going to be dependent on whatever you actually recover \u2013 but whatever that amount is does not reflect what the Success Fee actually is because that is based on a potentially different percentage of our own fees.<\/p>\n

The Success Fee could be 50% of our costs, for example. But by law we can only recover up to 25% of that fee from you. So the amount of the actual Success Fee charge is usually different from the fact that most lawyers will take up to 25% from your claim.<\/p>\n

\nConfused? Here\u2019s an example<\/strong><\/p>\n

We\u2019ll keep the figures nice and easy here. Let\u2019s say:<\/p>\n