can anyone explain this

reeree

we were in a car accident about 3 months ago in which we all suffered whiplash and minor back injuries, the other party admitted liability and her insurance offered us £1400 each, our insurance company advised us to turn it down which we did.

lve just had a letter from our insurance company saying that the claim papers have now been filed at court for formal proceedings to be issued in this matter, my question is l thought that her insurance company would just come back at us with another offer, why does it have to go before a judge? thanks for any help

MX5huggy

What actuall loss have you suffered that makes you think £1300 is not enough? you have chosen the judge not them.

atrixblue.-MFR-.

because the insurance company declined to make another offer to your insurers, your insurers now have to take this before a judge with your med report, expenses and insurers costs, to get a accurate award the third party insurers will be there and will try and justify the award offered initially, this could swing three ways, if the judge deems the initial award offered was under valued he may increase it if he deems it was fair he may keep it the same, or if he deems it was overvalued then he may reduce the amount (very rarely).

sit back this can take a while to complete if it goes before a judge as courts are back logged.

atrixblue.-MFR-.

MX5huggy wrote: »

What actuall loss have you suffered that makes you think £1300 is not enough? you have chosen the judge not them.

if the legal adviser at the OP insurers deems this not enough by comparission to other claims they will instruct the OP to ask for another offer sometimes the third party insurers come back with a higher offer to prevent getting into court, some insurers will defend the initiial offer.

i think £1300-1500 is the lower end of the scale for whiplash and back injuries, when you add legal costs, expenses, out of pocket expenses.

colino

Be aware of the back-lash against whip-lash! While the insurers in their cosy club have given out this. almost standard, comp. for ages - it is after all not their money, they get it from premiums - they are becoming aware of the political back lash against it and look forward to more of these claims being disputed.

Also be very aware that in personal injury and other legal actions, while you may take advice from your insurer, you instruct them whether to accept or reject, it is your feelings or injury that are being compensated for, not theirs.

TrickyWicky

reeree wrote: »

l thought that her insurance company would just come back at us with another offer, why does it have to go before a judge? thanks for any help

So did lots of other people and most of who were making false claims for whiplash.

Now mind me asking why you're asking about this? - Your question makes you sound a bit panicky.

You weren't thinking of contributing my insurance premium rise were you? :mad:

Hoof_Hearted

"Whiplash" -- has anybody ever had a car accident where they didn't suffer whiplash? A stiff neck for a few days at worst and £1400 is not enough? How many days did you lose from work?

reeree

TrickyWicky wrote: »

So did lots of other people and most of who were making false claims for whiplash.

Now mind me asking why you're asking about this? - Your question makes you sound a bit panicky.

You weren't thinking of contributing my insurance premium rise were you? :mad:

we are not making a false claim and lm not panicking either, oh is starting chemotherapy for cancer and the thoughts of having to go to court and leaving him to it were far more worrying than anything else you could think of but thanks to atrixblue has put my mind at ease that we dont have to attend,

fivetide

Judge could award you more but will also ask you to take the stand as a witness. the other driver will also be called as a witness. You'll all need a day off work and The judge could decide, on the evidence, that you were partly to blame (possibly not in a simple rear end shunt but that's what happens).

In that case the judge will award you say £2000 but reduce it by the amount they think you were to blame so they could say "primary liability with the defendent but other driver contributed to accident so amoutn reduced by 50%" leaving you with a grand.

Be prepared to get up and swear you are telling the truth and that at least £2800 (as there was clearly more than one of you in the car all offered the same amount) wasn't enough to cover it..

5t.

edit to add: atrix is making the case you won't need to go if the other party don't fight it. If they do then all the above applies.

Lawyers will take much more than you will.