Claim Insurance accident claim company charges

steampowered

It sounds like your friend may have been dishonest. If he/she was dishonest, I think he/she will find that he/she is liable to pay the firm's fees.

If he/she was simply careless (but not dishonest), in the first instance I would contact the claims company to express surprise at having received an invoice and to ask them which specific part of the Terms & Conditions they believe allows them to issue an invoice. On a brief look through I couldn't actually see anything specific about a situation where another solicitor is already involved with the case.

I would also engage the firm's complaints policy, in line with the procedure set out in their terms of business, so that this gets looked at properly - and so that your friend is able to escalate matters to The Legal Ombudsman if that becomes necessary and worthwhile.

It sounds like your friend does not have any real grip on what is actually happening with the case. I suggest that he needs to try a bit harder to follow up with the first claims company if he wants to find out - not just sit back ignoring it. I suspect you may well find that the first claims company has been in touch and he/she has forgotten.

Your friend needs to understand that he/she has signed up to an obligation to properly engage with the process. After all, someone has done work for him/her for free. If your friend does not follow up on this he/she should not be surprised to receive another invoice for more than £2k from the first claims company.

Cpu2007

steampowered wrote: »

It sounds like your friend may have been dishonest. If he/she was dishonest, I think he/she will find that he/she is liable to pay the firm's fees.

If he/she was simply careless (but not dishonest), in the first instance I would contact the claims company to express surprise at having received an invoice and to ask them which specific part of the Terms & Conditions they believe allows them to issue an invoice. On a brief look through I couldn't actually see anything specific about a situation where another solicitor is already involved with the case.

I would also engage the firm's complaints policy, in line with the procedure set out in their terms of business, so that this gets looked at properly - and so that your friend is able to escalate matters to The Legal Ombudsman if that becomes necessary and worthwhile.

It sounds like your friend does not have any real grip on what is actually happening with the case. I suggest that he needs to try a bit harder to follow up with the first claims company if he wants to find out - not just sit back ignoring it. I suspect you may well find that the first claims company has been in touch and he/she has forgotten.

Your friend needs to understand that he/she has signed up to an obligation to properly engage with the process. After all, someone has done work for him/her for free. If your friend does not follow up on this he/she should not be surprised to receive another invoice for more than £2k from the first claims company.

I have looked at the emails he sent to the first company over the year and those have not received any response. He also mentioned contacting them by phone but being ignored.

As I said earlier, when he received a cold call from the second company (january 2018) he had not spoken to the first company for almost a year(march 2017 being the last correspondence from the company and then any email sent to the company or call made to them was ignored since then)
So I can understand why he said no one is handling his case when he got asked if someone else is looking at his case.

I don't think he was being dishonest but rather naive. My attempt is not expect he comes out of it unscarred, after all he made a mistake and there's a contract that proves it, but to understand whether these solicitors are allowed to charge so much for a case that they are not even handling.

He received a letter today that has a bit more details on the Bill
£1400 their cost
£300 medical
£300 VAT
The above are estimate figures, but it all adds up to roughly 2k

I feel like they are over charging him and having information about what exactly they've done. correspondence, when they asked for the medical, when they found out that someone else was handling his case etc. will give us an idea of what's going on but to have a details break down it's gonna cost £800, it's like they don't want him to see it.

pinkshoes

Cpu2007 wrote: »

I have looked at the emails he sent to the first company over the year and those have not received any response. He also mentioned contacting them by phone but being ignored.

As I said earlier, when he received a cold call from the second company (january 2018) he had not spoken to the first company for almost a year(march 2017 being the last correspondence from the company and then any email sent to the company or call made to them was ignored since then)
So I can understand why he said no one is handling his case when he got asked if someone else is looking at his case.

I don't think he was being dishonest but rather naive. My attempt is not expect he comes out of it unscarred, after all he made a mistake and there's a contract that proves it, but to understand whether these solicitors are allowed to charge so much for a case that they are not even handling.

He received a letter today that has a bit more details on the Bill
£1400 their cost
£300 medical
£300 VAT
The above are estimate figures, but it all adds up to roughly 2k

I feel like they are over charging him and having information about what exactly they've done. correspondence, when they asked for the medical, when they found out that someone else was handling his case etc. will give us an idea of what's going on but to have a details break down it's gonna cost £800, it's like they don't want him to see it.

The charges seem fair given their solicitor is £250/hour.

If he had mentioned another company had looked into it but he had not heard from them in over a year, then the second company would have run a mile.

Their question was clear. Had anyone investigated this claim? Yes, they had. By saying no, the company started putting the hours in on then case until they discovered that someone had got there first. The company wasn't asking if someone was currently investigating. They asked if anyone ever had.

He chose to lie, so he needs to pay. Naive - certainly! But he made a conscious decision to lie.

MB69

I am sorry to say this, but it is because of people like this that OUR insurance premiums keep going up and up.

I get a same cold call at least once a month. and I always tell them to go and f*** themselves!

IF your friend did have a serious accident and he needed that sort of compensation, then his insurance company would have covered that. There would have been no need to get a claims company involved!

Let it be a hard lesson to your friend on why it is good to be honest in life and not try to cash in on something that didn't happen!

Cpu2007

MB69 wrote: »

I am sorry to say this, but it is because of people like this that OUR insurance premiums keep going up and up.

I get a same cold call at least once a month. and I always tell them to go and f*** themselves!

IF your friend did have a serious accident and he needed that sort of compensation, then his insurance company would have covered that. There would have been no need to get a claims company involved!

Let it be a hard lesson to your friend on why it is good to be honest in life and not try to cash in on something that didn't happen!

How did you come up to the conclusion that he tried to cash on something that didn't happen?

MB69

I didn't say it didn't happen. I said it didn't happen so much that he needed to get a compensation team involved.

Example: Someone drives to the back of your car when you are stopped at traffic lights. You then try and claim for whiplash and taking time off work as you couldn't work and ...

Hence why you have been charged for medical. My guess is that the £300 for medical has come from your friend having been invited to go and see one of the claim companies DOCTORS!

Would your friend be kind enough to let us know what exactly had happened in this accident ? If his claim was genuine, he would have heard from the first claims company!

Cpu2007

MB69 wrote: »

I didn't say it didn't happen. I said it didn't happen so much that he needed to get a compensation team involved.

Example: Someone drives to the back of your car when you are stopped at traffic lights. You then try and claim for whiplash and taking time off work as you couldn't work and ...

Hence why you have been charged for medical. My guess is that the £300 for medical has come from your friend having been invited to go and see one of the claim companies DOCTORS!

Would your friend be kind enough to let us know what exactly had happened in this accident ? If his claim was genuine, he would have heard from the first claims company!

Read again, that's exactly what you said.

I don't know the details of the accident, all I know is that both party didn't admit fault and he didn't know how things work as this is the first time he had an accident so he fall victim of one of these accident claim companies.

steampowered

Cpu2007 wrote: »

I have looked at the emails he sent to the first company over the year and those have not received any response. He also mentioned contacting them by phone but being ignored.

If your friend genuinely can't get an answer from the first firm, I think it is time to make a formal complaint and/or contact The Legal Ombudsman.

He received a letter today that has a bit more details on the Bill
£1400 their cost
£300 medical
£300 VAT
The above are estimate figures, but it all adds up to roughly 2k

I feel like they are over charging him and having information about what exactly they've done. correspondence, when they asked for the medical, when they found out that someone else was handling his case etc. will give us an idea of what's going on but to have a details break down it's gonna cost £800, it's like they don't want him to see it.

Personally, I would engage the complaints policy and get them to justify why they have terminated the solicitor-client relationship.

I do still feel like a lot of the details of your friend's story are missing. There must have been more to the correspondence from the second firm pre-dating this bill.

Cpu2007

@steampowered there has been correspondence from the firm before the bill but I didn't think it was relevant. I can ask him how many correspondence he received from the second firm and the content of it. I remember him saying that he received an email/call a month before when they mentioned him for the first time that they found out his case was being handled by someone else(first company)
that means he received the bill email end of july and the notification prior to that was end of june.
I'll see if I can find something but I'll try to push the route of legal ombdusman for the first firm and see where it goes
Thanks

Cpu2007

1. I have received all the emails that were exhcnaged between my friend and the second company.
2. From January 2018 most correspondence dealt with contracts and medical appointments
3. February 2018 he agrees with the information in the medical
4. Afterwards it was really about him chasing the second company for updates, and they kept responding that they are wating for a response to their part 36 offer.
5. This went on until end of May when the second company says that because they haven't received any response from the other side, they would like to consider court proceeding if he agrees.
6. At the beginning of June the insurers replies to the second company stating that they have already paid his claim via a different solicitor, this is reported back to my friend by the second company(not the insurance or first company)
7. He replies that he has not received any money
8. End of 25th of June they send an email to him saying that the insurer confirmed having settled the claim with another firm and that they're closing the case

A month after this he receives the bill