Legal Expenses Cover

GlynD

Legal cover is a waste of time. If it's your fault your insurance company pays out. If it's the other drivers fault your family lawyer will be delighted to get the fees (£1,500 - £7,000) for claiming on your behalf. That's why all these ambulance chasers have set up companies to pursue your claim for you (us). Don't give it any more thought. I've had car accident injury claims before and my solicitor almost took me to dinner when I told him.

lisyloo

Most solicitors will if you pay them.

If you insist they take the case then of course they will.
However they should advise you of your chances and whether to proceed.
I guess there are good and bad in any business but my experience is that "most" won't inappropriately advise you to proceed just to get money.
Of course if you insist on proceeding against their advice then they will take the money.

The poster got the £120, so it couldn't have been that complicated a case, for the legal expenses solicitor to take it on.

Well that was my FIL.
The legal expenses did not take it on they simply paid out.
I'm not saying that can be guaranteed but it certainly would not have happened without the cover in place.
The insurer did not want to pursue the pedestrian for fear of provoking a much higher cost personal injury case against them.
After 18 months the PI claim arrived, it was repudiated, after 3 years it expired.
At that point I asked then to pursue the excess (no fear of PI as time limit had expired).
They decided to simply pay £120 rather than pursue it.
Obviously this couldn't be guaranteed that a company would act in this way, but if you were on your own you'd have to pursue the pedestrian (who possibly has no assets or insurance) AND you have to PROVE liability as that has not been done.
I'm not saying every case works like this.
I am just pointing out that in some cases it's not as simple as just writing one letter to tag on your uninsured losses to the claim.
There will be cases (like the above) where liability has not been agreed or perhaps there is no motor insurance in place (e.g. cyclist) and perhaps you don't know whether the person has the means to pay.
There will certainly be cases where legal insurance cannot or will not help either e.g. no means to pay, but without the proper advice you wouldn't even know how to asses that legally.

If it's the other drivers fault your family lawyer will be delighted to get the fees

Not in all cases. They will not get any fees for chasing a small excess.
They will only pursue the cases where they get juicy fees.

I've had car accident injury claims before and my solicitor almost took me to dinner when I told him.

You won't get the same reaction if you wanted to claim for an excess I can assure you.
There are differnt types of cases and they are not ALL covered by "no win no fee".
They are ONLY interested in the ones where they get paid and they don't get paid for recovering small excesses.

If you are happy to do it yourself or you don't mind losing your excess then don't get the cover.
If on the other hand you want the cover in case you are hospitalized, traumatized or get a difficult case, then I would advise shppoiing around, getting a free policy and not buying it forom the insurer.

mikey72

lisyloo wrote: »

The legal expenses did not take it on they simply paid out.
I'm not saying that can be guaranteed but it certainly would not have happened without the cover in place.
The insurer did not want to pursue the pedestrian for fear of provoking a much higher cost personal injury case against them.
After 18 months the PI claim arrived, it was repudiated, after 3 years it expired.
At that point I asked then to pursue the excess (no fear of PI as time limit had expired).
They decided to simply pay £120 rather than pursue it.
Obviously this couldn't be guaranteed that a company would act in this way, but if you were on your own you'd have to pursue the pedestrian (who possibly has no assets or insurance) AND you have to PROVE liability as that has not been done.

So your insurer just gave the excess back at the end of the day?
After 4 and a half years of paying the legal expenses at about £25 to £30 a year, that's actually probably more paid to them than the £120 paid back, so I'll keep my money in the bank in the first place I think

lisyloo

So your insurer just gave the excess back at the end of the day?

Yes (well my FILs insurer - NU), which wouldn't have happened without the cover and it would have been difficult to pursue the pedestrian without agreement on liability or knowing whether he had the means to pay.

After 4 and a half years of paying the legal expenses at about £25 to £30 a year, that's actually probably more paid to them than the £120 paid back, so I'll keep my money in the bank in the first place I think

Well I pay £10 for composite (bike, car & house) cover, but yes ultimately it's down to personal choice.
I agree the £30 policies are not best value for money and my advice if you want a policy has been not to go for those policies and get something much cheaper or free.
Or don't get one but accept that some cases (like the above) may cause you a loss.
I have no issue with people not taking it - just pointing out the genuine downsides to be aware of in some cases.
Where two motorists are involved the insurers eventually agree on liability.
With other types of 3rd parties e.g. pedestrians and cyclist, the process is not the same and if you want them to pay you will have to sue them often without knowing whether they have insurance or assets.
I accept that legal expenses insurance MAY not help you in these cases and might not take on the case.
You won't know until it happens.
For £10 a year I'd rather know I was covered and look to make savings elsewhere in my budget.
But totally agree with personal choice.

Spiderham

In reply to OP, I would say that if it was attempted to be sold to you how described that really isn't on and it may be worth calling up the insurer and letting them know so they can retrain the staff. They're also making it very close to being an advised sale which depending on their FSA permissions could be a big no no.

In my opinion Legal Expenses cover is handy to have but as others have said it's down to personal choice.

lisyloo

I agree, the sales tactic is dreadful.
I would have got the persons name and complained about them as I think it's a service to others to do so.
Someome less savvy like my 83 year old MIL would fall for that hook line and sinker and it's not fair.

InsideInsurance

GlynD wrote: »

If it's the other drivers fault your family lawyer will be delighted to get the fees (£1,500 - £7,000) for claiming on your behalf.

Firstly, your solicitor can only claim fees from the other driver in the Fast Track and Multi-Track court levels. So in injury cases its easy enough - injury related damages over £1,000 but in non-injury cases its damages over £5,000...... thats a lot of excess or Group A hire car charges!

I have to say I used to love it when dealing with family lawyers as a claims handler. Have to remember that many have not even looked at an RTA case since graduating from law school 20 years ago. At one organisation I worked with they used to reduce settlement estimates by 20% if it was a family lawyer dealing with it (but increase case handling time by 30% and chance of litigation by 40%)

lisyloo

So in injury cases its easy enough

If liabiity is agreed against the other person yes (e.g. car accident).
If not then you would have to PROVE your case rather than just claim (e.g. pedestrian).

At one organisation I worked with they used to reduce settlement estimates by 20% if it was a family lawyer dealing with it

Very interested to know. Thanks.

One of the reasons I like the composite cover (going off topic from motoring) is the cover for things like employment, tax affairs, motoring convictions
In these cases e.g. a defence against a motoring conviction or HMRC investigation, there would be no 3rd party to sue, so on a lot of these matters there is no choice of "no win no fee".
Although the likelihood of using it is small, I'm prepared to pay £10 a year just to cover one of those eventualities.

no-oneknowsme

lisyloo wrote: »

If liabiity is agreed against the other person yes (e.g. car accident).
If not then you would have to PROVE your case rather than just claim (e.g. pedestrian).

Very interested to know. Thanks.

One of the reasons I like the composite cover (going off topic from motoring) is the cover for things like employment, tax affairs, motoring convictions
In these cases e.g. a defence against a motoring conviction or HMRC investigation, there would be no 3rd party to sue, so on a lot of these matters there is no choice of "no win no fee".
Although the likelihood of using it is small, I'm prepared to pay £10 a year just to cover one of those eventualities.

Lisyloo - Are you saying that you have cover for HMRC investigations ? That sounds like a very handy cover to have seeing as mu Husband is self employed.....I didnt realise this cover existed.

What type of insurance would I need to take out and if you dont mind me asking , what Company do you hold yours with as £10 per year sounds good to me .

Thanks

lisyloo

I have NO connection to this company (except customer).

I have combined family legal care

[FONT=Tahoma, sans-serif]Underwritten by:
AmTrust

The Coverholder:
Composite Legal Expenses Ltd, Suffolk House, Trade Street, Cardiff, CF10 5DT [/FONT]

The tax cover is as follows

[FONT=Tahoma, sans-serif]

Taxation

[/FONT]

[FONT=Tahoma, sans-serif]Professional Fees arising from or relating to an in-depth Inland Revenue investigation of your personal tax affairs subject to a Limit of Indemnity of £75,000 per Insured Incident.[/FONT]

Note this is PERSONAL tax affairs, so I suspect it would not extend to self-employment affairs but it also covers home rights, employment disputes, consumer disputes, defence against criminal prosecution etc. as well as the motoring stuff.
I suspect you'd need a different (and almost certainly more expensive) policy for business rather than personal.