Bad Service from Solicitor

Apologies for taking this thread off on a slight tangent, but the whole PIAB publicity machine interests me (as a practising solicitor) as an example of lawyer-bashing PR succeeding on a massive scale. Can I also say, by way of perhaps lessening the strength of my comments, that personal injuries litigation was undoubtedly highly profitable for the legal profession. However, I don't practice in this area, and I genuinely won't feel much (if any) direct impact from the arrival of PIAB, so this is not a "sour grapes" bash.

From the PIAB website:

1. "We deliver compensation without the legal costs and experts fees that add more than 46% on average to the cost of a claim"


2. "It is significant that PIAB as a new state body will be self-funding and not reliant on any Exchequer funding. PIAB aims to achieve this objective by year end-2005. The funding of PIAB operations is met primarily by levying fees on Respondents (those who pay the compensation) and by running a flexible organisation. The way we manage our caseload ensures our expenditure is proportionate to claims activity."


People need to bear in mind that the 46% "legal costs and experts fees" figure referred to in quote 1 above includes costs incurred by Defendants (i.e. insurance companies). I don't know whether the 46% figure was based on good research, but assuming it was, I think it would be fair to assume that at least 15% related to costs incurred by Insurance Companies, leaving a max of 31% attributable to claimants.

Insurance companies will still have claims departments, and will undoubtedly still use their own advisers and independent experts where they need to, just as they always did. The difference now is that a claimant will now find it harder to do so.

In relation to PIAB becoming "self financing", I want to say this now - I do not believe that PIAB will significantly reduce the cost of the personal injuries compensation process. I would love to re-visit this topic in, say, two years to see whether I am proved wrong. And, of course, the devil is in the detail. I will be keen at that time to see that the cost figures bandied about by PIAB include all of its establishment costs, future staff pension costs and so on, rather than just the annual operating cost.

Taxing you outlays costs money and can mostly be a futile exercise as Taxing ads another cost to the total outlays , unless the prof fees are way over the top, then can you truly make use of this process. My point is that a job half done, is not done at all Vanilla and in my experience the Law Society did agree with me , but until the LS came into play you have to deal with a system set up by the legal profession that states otherwise.



Representation is essential for any claim, however we are into the whole PIAB independent argument versus the totally client bias process of the solicitor. I feel that Legal Representation is only one cog in the wheel and that pumping up or inflating a claim by some firms has certainly tarred the majority of PI law firms.

But essentially it is the Barristers and the Judge that have set precedent here and the Insurance companies but I aint getting into that rant, I feel all settlements should be ruled after mediation and that is what they are currently aiming for.