If you have been involved in a car accident and suffered an injury, such as a whiplash injury to your neck, how will your claim for compensation be valued? The first point to consider is that the accident cannot have been your fault (or your fault completely) for you to be able to make a claim for compensation.
Some other party must have driven in to you through no fault of your own for you to make a full claim for whiplash.
If you are able to make a claim for whiplash then your claim value will be assessed in certain ways.
1.
Losses and Expenses All losses and expenses that you have incurred as a result of the accident can be reclaimed from the other driver (usually through his insurance company).
Lost Earnings.
Usually the largest expense under your losses and expenses category is a claim for lost earnings.
If you had any time away from work due to the accident, or were unable to carry out overtime which you would normally have undertaken, you can reclaim this cost.
You will need to prove your loss by showing your wages prior to the accident and the reduction in them after the accident whilst you were unable to work at all or fully.
However, once you have done this, this will form a part of your claim for losses and expenses.
2.
Treatment and Medication.
If you have needed private physiotherapy or pain killers as a result of the whiplash injury, you will be able to include the cost of these items as part of your whiplash claim.
Once again, to prove these losses you will need to keep receipts and invoices.
3.
Miscellaneous Expenses.
In this category you will claim items such as travel expenses (appointments to physiotherapy or to collect your car etc), and any other expenses that you have incurred as a result of the accident.
Car Repairs.
If you wish to avoid affecting your no claims bonus you will claim the cost of repairs with your insurer.
In practice often insurers deal with this directly but if they do not you will need to obtain full details of the cost of your repairs and forward the receipts to your solicitor to pass to the other driver's insurance company.
You will need to watch carefully the cost of storage of your vehicle at the garage as some garages can charge high fees which the insurance company will refuse to pay.
You can also cover the cost of car hire if you are fit to drive and your vehicle is not driveable immediately after the accident or if it is being repaired.
4.
Pain and Suffering.
Often the most significant part of your claim for compensation relates to your pain and suffering.
Whiplash can be surprisingly debilitating immediately after the accident.
You might feel dizzy, groggy, suffer severe neck and shoulder pain and this can carry on for anything from only a few days or weeks to months.
In some cases this can be permanent.
Of course the duration of your pain and suffering and the severity of it leads to the amount of compensation you will receive.
The only way for this amount of your claim to be assessed is to obtain medical evidence from a General Practitioner or an Orthopaedic Surgeon.
They will examine your medical records to ensure that you have not been suffering with neck and back pain before the accident, and will carry out a full examination to assess the impact of the whiplash injury on your day-to-day activities.
They will send a report to your solicitor who will then be able to compare your injuries with those of people that have already suffered settled whiplash claims.
They will then be able to provide you with an accurate figure of the amount of compensation you should receive for your pain and suffering.
Summary.
There are many different parts to a whiplash claim but the above gives you an indication of how your claim is valued by your solicitor and the other driver's insurance company.