What can I claim for?
General Damages
Most people think of personal injury compensation in terms of a cash award for pain and suffering. This type of compensation is referred to by lawyers as "general damages".
General damages are not capable of precise mathematical calculation. There is no minimum or maximum award. A personal injury solicitor will be able to give you an indication of the likely value of your general damages claim by making reference to awards ordered by trial judges when cases have been taken to court for a similar accident and injury.
Placing a value on your claim is not an exact science. There are a number of factors which your solicitor will consider when assessing this aspect of your claim. These include, amongst other things, the severity of your injury, your sex and age.
There are a number of heads to a general damages claim, not simply compensation for the pain from your injury. Broadly speaking these other heads of damage concentrate upon how your injury will impact upon your daily life. A non-exhaustive list of examples under this head of damages includes:
- Loss of enjoyment/quality of life
- Psychological injury
- Handicap in the open labour market (This particular head is designed to compensate a claimant for the potential difficulty he may suffer obtaining another job if he were to lose his current job).
- Future loss of earnings.
- Future costs of care/specialist equipment.
- Loss of job satisfaction (This particular head of damage, may be appropriate if as a result of your injury you cannot continue in the line of work you were employed in prior to your accident).
- Loss of pension
- Loss of use of vehicle.
- Special Damages
- Items of specific loss
- Loss of earnings to the date of trial
- Medical Expenses prior to trial
- Cost of living with the disability
- Cost of care to trial
- CRU Repayments
Special Damages are these that can be calculated precisely and represent financial loss to the date of trial. The main types of special damages are discussed below:
Included in this category are things such as costs of repair to a motor vehicle, excess paid on your insurance policy, hire care charges, bus fares, taxis fares, prescription charges, cost of replacing damaged clothing and possessions. This list of items is none exhaustive, if you are able to provide receipts for the expenses that have been rendered necessary my reason of the accident, you can make a claim under this head of damage.
You can claim your net loss of earning to trial. The net loss is based upon the figure you would have earned after, tax and national insurance. The figure claimed is generally worked out using a division from 13 weeks wages prior to the accident.
Also under this head you can claim for the loss of any regular overtime, bonus payments, commission that would have been earned whilst working.
You can make a claim for the costs of medical treatment and expenses.
It may be that you have needed to undergo physiotherapy or massage treatment as a result of the injury. As a claimant you have a positive duty to mitigate your losses and therefore if it can be shown that the treatment you have undertaken was to help improve your condition you may be able to recover the costs of treatment.
In serious cases, the personal injury you have experienced may leave you with a permanent disability. It may be that your disability impacts upon your mobility and as such your home or vehicle has to be modified to suit your needs. Such expense is provided for under this head.
A claim can be made for care services which are rendered necessary by reason of the accident. For example, if a husband is injured in a car accident and following the accident his wife is required to stay at home and tend to him, the husband may be able to make a claim for the value of the services his wife has provided.
If as part of your compensation payment you are made an award for loss of earnings, costs of care or loss of mobility and prior to trial you been receiving a "recoverable benefit", then at the end of the case some of the award will have to be refunded to the Compensation Recovery Unit.
Examples of "recoverable benefits" include incapacity benefit, attendance allowance and mobility allowance.
If you wish to speak to one of our specialist personal injury solicitors, please contact us on freephone 0808 155 4870. We have offices in London, Manchester & Birmingham and operate nationally.