Post Accident Advice

Pr1vate_Piles

Hello,

I had my accident back in March of this year. Group of five cars travelling to paintballing, first car turned sudden, second braked, third then permormed emergancy stop, the forth (me) braked however i did hit him (at that point minor damaged to both only needed a new headlight), the fifth car then hit me hard causing severe damage to my car and pushing me furthur into one in front. The car in front and behind me had their cars repaired however my insurance company decided to write my vehicle off. At the time of the accident i wasnt aware of any damage to myself. Over the next couple of days i did suffer from bad back and neck aches, went to hospital who said it was whiplash. After around a week the pain went away so i thought nothing of it and didn't bother seeking compensation. However for the last five weeks i have been suffering from constant headache, bad in morning but i manage to ignore it during the day, also i keep getting pain in my neck and top of my back. The doctors prescribed tablets (no effect) so i think ill be having to visit hospital.

My question is this, should i start seeking compensation from this accident since i am suffering injuries from this? I have never sought this before so i am unsure of procedures/companies to talk to. Also curious as who pays the compensation out, the person who hit me or her insurance company? Would she find out that i have claimed?

any help/advice is geatly appreicated.


PP

Quentin

You have 3 years from the date of the incident to claim for personal injury.

Your claim will be against the driver who drove into you. If they have insurance, then their insurer will pay any compensation you win, if they have no insurance then they will be personally be liable.

The driver will find out about your claim.

Seek legal advice, or contact a claim handler to deal with this for you.

Astaroth

Ok... first thing to do is check if you have legal expenses/ protection cover on your car insurance as this will cover the cost of instructing a solicitor to act on your behalf.

If the circumstances are that you hit the car in front and then you were hit from behind then you will only get a proportion of the damages for the injury as there is "no way to tell" if the injury was caused by the first or second impact - you are responsible for the first, the trailing car for the second. You can argue what you want regarding speed of impacts but you can be unlucky and get a terrible injury from a 5mph crash and be lucky and walk away from a 100mph crash without even a scratch.

Legally speaking you will be suing the driver of the vehicle behind you, however assuming they are correctly insured their insurance company will answer the claim and pay any monies due on their behalf. The driver will know that you are suing them! As their insurers are acting on their behalf they are entitled to know most the details about the claim though the reality is that the majority of people pass the initial letter of claim to their insurers and never ask for any more details.

Astaroth

Quentin wrote: »

You have 3 years from the date of the incident to claim for personal injury.

Sorry for being padantic but it is 3 years from the date of knowing not the date of the incident - ie in this case from the date of knowing you were injured (for minors it would be from their 18th birthday or knowing their injured, which ever is later etc)

Pr1vate_Piles

Astaroth wrote: »

Ok... first thing to do is check if you have legal expenses/ protection cover on your car insurance as this will cover the cost of instructing a solicitor to act on your behalf.

If the circumstances are that you hit the car in front and then you were hit from behind then you will only get a proportion of the damages for the injury as there is "no way to tell" if the injury was caused by the first or second impact - you are responsible for the first, the trailing car for the second. You can argue what you want regarding speed of impacts but you can be unlucky and get a terrible injury from a 5mph crash and be lucky and walk away from a 100mph crash without even a scratch.

Legally speaking you will be suing the driver of the vehicle behind you, however assuming they are correctly insured their insurance company will answer the claim and pay any monies due on their behalf. The driver will know that you are suing them! As their insurers are acting on their behalf they are entitled to know most the details about the claim though the reality is that the majority of people pass the initial letter of claim to their insurers and never ask for any more details.

my insurance covers legal expanses as part of my policy

Pr1vate_Piles

having never done anything like this before i do have strange feelings towards it of is it right or not. True i was only one to loose car, do suffer from this pain and facing way higher insurance, i just dont know what to do...

Quentin

Of course it's right that you be compensated for the negligence that has caused your injury.

You aren't compelled to use your insurer's solicitor (the insurers get paid a backhander by p i solicitors for passing on cases like yours).

Get a local recommendation for a pi claim handler - any solicitor acting for you should get their fees paid by the third party - in fact should anyone suggest you will have to pay them for acting for you, then go elsewhere.

Pr1vate_Piles

i was thinking of talking to national accident helpline not sure how good they are to deal with

Quentin

Look online for pi solicitors who will give you some commission for instructing them. (Some firms happily pay clients for going direct to them - £250 to £500 - as this is far less than they have to pay insurers by way of a backhand for passing on leads).

Google injury claim cashback.

Pr1vate_Piles

thanks very much i shall do that now

sarahg1969

You will also need to persuade the third party insurers (and possibly the court) that the problems that appeared 7 months post-accident (after settling completely one week post-accident) are, in fact, accident-related.