the changes in recoverable costs & role of solicitors in personal injury firms

1

THE CHANGES IN RECOVERABLE COSTS & ROLE OF SOLICITORS IN

PERSONAL INJURY FIRMS

By

[Author Name]

[Institute Name]

[Date]

Personal Injury Firms 2

Table of Contents

ABSTRACT................................................................................................................................................3

Chapter 1: Introduction.........................................................................................................................4

Rationale of the Study.............................................................................................................................6

Research Objective..................................................................................................................................8

Chapter Overview....................................................................................................................................8

Chapter 2: Literature Review................................................................................................................9

Chapter 3: Research Methodology......................................................................................................15

Research Design....................................................................................................................................15

Purpose and type of Investigation..........................................................................................................15

Methodology.........................................................................................................................................16

Data Challenges.....................................................................................................................................17

Chapter 4: Results & Analysis.............................................................................................................18

Chapter 5: Discussion..........................................................................................................................24

Conclusion.............................................................................................................................................25

Bibliography..............................................................................................................................................28


ABSTRACT

The comprehensive research project puts the focus on the changes in the recovering cost and role

of solicitors of personal injury firms. The personal injury laws basically provides ways for the

remedies and the defensing approach in the civil legislations against any kind of wrong doing,

unfair action and any harm caused for no reason to the person. These laws are often stated under

the tort, which itself means any harm, twist or unfair act done to someone. The research design

comprises of secondary research methodology i.e. using existing contents available to derive the

conclusion of the research. Thus the research will be conducted using exploratory and

Interpretivism approach, the content related to the personal injury will be gathered from different

law books and journals. And then proper analysis will be done by comprehensively interpreting

the qualitative data collected. The research will focus on exploring the views and insights given

in different papers. Overall conclusions will provide the highlights on the behavior of solicitors

for changes profound in recoverable cost. It is expected the way that open neglect to perceive

that the personal injury acts are ethically wrong and thus the solicitors work for overcoming this

unethical act from the societies. The cost of solicitors varies however they tend to provide the

maximum compensation to the clients by handling their cases and bringing the accused to

justice. On the whole, the research signifies that solicitors have significant role in providing

people security and protection against personal injury incidents. And if happened, they raise their

claims for the compensation of the loss and harm caused.


Chapter 1: Introduction

The research is focusing on the changes shown by recoverable cost for solicitors in Personal

Injury firms since the law changes in 2012. The reason for studying this topic is to analyze the

role of solicitors in PI firms that they play to provide justice to the victims. Basically, the

personal injury refers to any kind of injury caused to a human intentionally. In such cases, the

injured takes the case to court for justice and thus requires the assistance of a solicitor to help

him get the just. This is very much encouraging in order to reduce the vulnerability of victims

and to keep the offenders from causing such injuries to others. The research mainly emphasizes

on the changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors of PI firms (Bogdan, 2008)1. The

recoverable cost is analyzed to throw light on the amount that solicitors attain, retain and can

recover after the case is over. The personal injury solicitor is basically one who supports the

person claiming for injuries, psychological or physical harm and any other kind of wrong doing.

The PI solicitors help them get the justice and represent their legal claims over the harm caused.

These cases are raised due to the negligence of the person, public, organization, entity,

government or any other agency. This makes the personal injury lawyers to be very much

experienced and knowledgeable and aware of the current affairs in order to take the cases

rationally and to attain success. However, the solicitors demand fee for their proceedings in the

process of personal injuries cases. To evaluate the legal amount assigned as their charges and the

variations caused in their recoverable cost is focused in this research. This will utterly throw light

1 Bogdan, M. (2008). The Decision-Making Process of Funders, Attorneys, and Claimholders. The

Georgetown Law Journal.


on the dimensions of personal injury firms, solicitors and their recoverable costs in the light of

law (Kalish, 2004)2.

Personal injury firms are those considering the cases of personal injuries and helping the victims

in getting justice. These take the queries of the sufferers and then help them resolve it by handing

over their cases to the educated, experienced and competent solicitors. The solicitors work under

the legal criteria such as provided in the tort law which focuses on the harms caused to the

personal property of any person, causing civil wrongs to any person and damaging non-economic

or economic assets of anyone. The personal injury solicitors must have to have license and

adequate training for handling the cases in order to excel in their field. Their expertise not only

assists in the just of the victims but also the provisions to the offenders. The laws not only covers

the personal injuries but also put the clauses for the accidents caused, medical mistakes,

defective products, work injuries, automobile incidents and such other flaws that causes a human

to suffer (Morabitio, 2005)3.

The personal injury solicitors are assigned a number of responsibilities in order to serve their

clients. The clients require their case to be resolved in the best way without any wastage of time

or unnecessary waste. All the responsibilities comprises of the professional expertise and the

ethical approach used during handling the cases. The solicitors are expected to follow all the

codes of conduct and not only this but also provide the knowledge of such incidences to all the

clients. The solicitors are licensed to perform with all the ethics and conduct to handle the cases

of the clients under the legal requirements and lawful criteria. The personal injury solicitors are

more adhere to the strict legal clauses and ethical approaches to deal with the case. The most

2Kalish, s. E. (2004). The English costs war, 2000–2003, and a moment of repose. Nebraska law review.

3Morabito, v. (2005). Federal class actions, contingency fees, and the rules governing litigation costs. Monash university law review.


important thing to consider is the variation in the cases. All the cases are not the same and every

case is different in nature and context (Rose, 2013)4. Thus the personal injury cases have so

many different dimensions to handle with. Therefore following the codes of conduct is most

significant to follow in case of the client cases. The clients should also be educated about the

clauses of law and frame of rules so that they may not ask anything that is against the laws.

Another major focus of the research is on the legal clauses that must be officially followed while

handling the cases. The laws officially makes the victim authorized enough to take action against

the harms caused to them. These are updated according to the intensity of the problems incurred

in such situations (Hayes, 2013)5.

Rationale of the Study

The primary aim of the research is to evaluate the changes in the recoverable cost of solicitors of

personal injury firms. The motive behind exploring this dimension of personal injury firms is

that the victims of personal injury incidents may get themselves protected or compensated for the

harm caused to them for no responsible reason. Thus the victims of personal injury incidents

have one way to get them noticed and compensated and that is by approaching the personal

injury firms. These firms comprise of competent and experienced solicitors that help victims get

their rights back. These are basically private firms which work under the laws of tort to facilitate

mankind and to protect and safeguard people from any kind wrong doing. However, since these

are private firms therefore, they charge an amount as fee for their services rendered. While

considering the personal injury attacks, it must be noticed that the personal injury incidents are

not always intentional. Sometimes, they happen accidentally where no one is at wrong however,

4Rose, N. (2013). Cost Of Acquiring Pi Cases Is £700 – And The Referral Fee Ban Will Have No Effect. Rta Portal.

5Hayes, J. (2013). Personal Injury Portal and Fixed Recoverable Costs.


a person is harmed who looks for compensation. Therefore the law have highlighted needs of

people who face personal injuries under different circumstances so that everyone gets justice of

their chunk. On the same grounds, the solicitors spend amounts for giving their clients their

rights and for providing them compensation for what they have lost. In this the amount spent by

the solicitors is their cost for handling the case. Here, this research project primarily focuses on

the cost that recoverable for the solicitors of personal injury firms. The cost spent by the

solicitors is recoverable as they get it recovered by making the assailant to pay for the harm

caused and also by charging the defendant for the services rendered. In this way the solicitors get

their cost recovered. The recoverable cost is basically once which is incurred initially but could

be gathered back on the basis of a certain condition. For instance, in this case, the cost is

recovered when the defendant is proved vulnerable and the opponent is made feel guilty. This is

how the guilty person pays compensation for the wrong doing and the defendant gets it right

back, and the cost of solicitors gets recovered by default6. This study will help creating

awareness about the opportunities that the sufferers of personal injury can avail from the market.

The research not only describes about the presence of personal injury firms but also highlights

the factors that the victim should consider while approaching a personal injury firm. Therefore,

this research will provide intense information about the personal injury incidents and how the

victims could get rid of them. Most importantly, the research will focus on the changes in the

recoverable cost of solicitors of personal injury firms. On the whole, this research project will

throw light on personal injury firms to educate people about the ways by which they can have

their voice in the society and also the ways by which they can protect themselves from the

wrongdoings.

6 Morabito, V. (2005). Federal Class Actions, Contingency Fees, and the Rules Governing Litigation Costs. Monash University Law Review.


Research Objective

The research aims at researching the changes in recoverable costs for solicitors in personal

injuries firms.

Chapter Overview

The research project consists of five chapters in which the very first chapter is about the

introduction of the topic. This chapter introduces the topic and provides the rationale of study

along with hypotheses that needs to be tested in further chapters. Thus chapter one provides an

overall picture of what is going to be studies in the research. The second chapter is of literature

review in which different papers are reviewed to enhance the feasibility of study. The third

chapter is about research methodology in which the entire research design and structure is

framed out. Next is chapter four in which the data collected is collated using statistical tool. Then

pre-defined statistical techniques and tests are applied on the data to reach the actual results. The

last chapter i.e. chapter 5 is about the final conclusions and discussions of the results. The results

interpreted in the previous chapter are discussed and compared with the literature.


Chapter 2: Literature Review

The personal injury laws basically provides ways for the remedies and the defensing approach in

the civil legislations against any kind of wrong doing, unfair action and any harm caused for no

reason to the person. These laws are often stated under the tort, which itself means any harm,

twist or unfair act done to someone. Tort is basically derived from a Latin word that focuses on

the harms caused to one person. Therefore in the laws under tort the remedies for such harmful

acts are provided in a legislative way. However, tort law is not same as that of criminal law.

These are resolved by the involvement of the government but rather the private law institutes are

approach for justice and compensation. This is why the recoverable cost of the solicitors

becomes an essential part of this scenario (Hellinger, 2005)7.

The expense of getting personal injury cases, regardless of the referral charge boycott, is around

£700 – £200 more than the legislature is proposing for routine street activity cases even before

the lawful work is figured in, as per new research. Legal Consulting likewise recommended that

the changing protection business implies it may bode well for insurance agencies to bring the

lawful work around cases in-house. The report – dispatched by the Association of Personal

Injury Lawyers – tried to inspect the contention that the referral charge boycott in April implies

the settled recoverable expenses paid to specialists can be generously diminished, with the

Ministry of Justice recommending that the charge for a low-esteem street movement case

experiencing the RTA entryway ought to tumble from £1,200 to £500. It presumed that "unless

firms have the capacity to cross-finance, they will never again have the capacity to do this work

productively". It proceeded with: "It may be conceivable to charge customers a sum

7Hellinger, F. J. (2005). Health Plan Liability and Erisa: The Expanding Scope of State Legislation. American Public Health Association, 217–223.


notwithstanding their "recoverable" expense; in any case, customers may be unwilling to pay

this. The outcome will be that casualties of mischances won't be spoken to and numerous

organizations will be compelled to close." (Nurse & Peysner, 2011)8

Mr. Otterburn contended that the term 'referral expense' has been connected generally to grasp

"promoting use which is all around acknowledged as typical over the span of any business", and

paying for particular cases. The boycott is focused at the recent practice. He took a gander at a

scope of firms that acquire work in a wide assortment of routes – from a conventional firm with

only a charge worker and secretary in its own harm (PI) office that spends nothing on advertising

to a corner PI rehearse with 300 individuals and a promoting spend of £3.2m, scarcely any of

which is for purchasing in work. Obtaining expenses arrived at the midpoint of out at about

£700, from £200 at the base to £900 at the top. The firm that spent nothing on promoting wants

to close the office this year on the grounds that work levels are so low. It is for the most part

acknowledged that routine RTA entryway cases require around 10 hours of work. "All

organizations attempt showcasing and there is an expense in obtaining every single new client,

and much of the time it is significant," the report said.

Mr. Otterburn said exploration from 2011 showed that an insurance agency may be paying as

much as 51% of the premium in obtaining expenses, with a general normal of 27%. He

proceeded with: "It is vital to put the examinations encompassing referral expenses in the more

extensive connection of these difficulties confronting the protection business. The exploration

demonstrates the Lower gainfulness of business created by means of correlation sites, and

specifically the issue of falling maintenance rates and insurance agency brand dedication. It

8Nurse, D. A., & Peysner, P. J. (2011). Excessive & Disproportionate Costs in Litigation. Health, Life and Social Sciences.


brings up significant issues about the capacity of safety net providers to keep up their current

monetary model despite this test to their businesses. It may well be enticing for some of these

organizations, no more permitted to offer the points of interest of their policyholders included in

mishaps, rather essentially to exchange the leads, for no referral expense, to an in-house lawful

supplier. The key point of interest the protection business would have is that their procurement

expenditure (Nurse & Peysner, 2011)9.

The literature reviews shows that how the need of laws for the protection of personal injury was

determined and addressed. In the same way the amendments were made by the time to enhance

the proficiency of these laws. All laws and acts discussed above are designed in order to achieve

the prevention of personal harm or any damage that affects the human mind, body or

psychology. In the similar way, new ways to protect personal injuries were identified when the

laws were implemented. Thus this required the need of amendments in the laws designed for the

protection of intellectual property. These laws included the use of latest technology like RFID to

track the property of organizations. In the same context, such numerous systems were introduced

in order maintain the security of assets associated with the humans. The issuance of laws made it

convenient for the people to keep themselves safe from any kind of personal harm. The

amendments also eliminated the issues caused by the previous acts’ clauses thus the Act of 2012

intends to provide clauses which will lead to ultimate protection of people and their belongings.

And it will protect them and keep them safe from getting harmed. Therefore, it is clearly

demonstrated in the literature reviewed that the act of 2012 is the recent law amongst all that

incorporates all the amendments and essential clauses for the implementation of protection of

people by establishing firms of personal injury that addresses such issues. The changes made in

9Nurse, D. A., & Peysner, P. J. (2011). Excessive & Disproportionate Costs in Litigation. Health, Life and Social Sciences.


the Act of 2012 to several previous acts strengthen the rights of owners of property, reduce the

stances of theft, improve the overall performance of institutions working for the protection of

human rights and eliminate the ambiguities found in the previous versions of laws presented for

the control on human rights. These are the major implications of the act of 2012 which not only

improved the previous versions of laws and acts but also provides with applicable and effective

clauses that will significantly reduce the criminalization and personal injury experiences. The

control over the criminalization of such cases is the main and major focus of the acts and thus the

research elaborates the amendments more vigorously because they reflect the most recent picture

of PI laws. For this purpose, the act that has provided an overall structure for the improvement of

these laws is presented in the Act of 2012. This act comprises of mere amendments made in the

previous legislation and provided a whole structure of law to be implemented for the

improvement. The acts aim at providing minor corrections to the flaws and oversights present in

the previous acts. For instance, the technical issues in the patent rights law have been resolved in

this act which is now applicable to all the institutions working for the protection of such rights.

The administrative amendments in the nature of design act have also been addressed in the law,

which revises the requirement of retention of unnecessary documents. This is to improve the

safety measures by leveraging the process of gathering security for the property rights

(Sugarman, 2013)10. The act has also governed the improvements in the attorney regime for the

New Zealand and Australia. This has been additionally added in the Act of 2012 to eliminate the

ambiguities. Also, the act of Act of 2012 has suggested for extending the authority of the former

federal circuit court and federal magistrate so that they may include the authorities of taking

plant breed matters into account for comprehensive understanding of the detailed issues. The

10Sugarman, S. D. (2013). Personal Injury Law Reform: A Proposed First Step. Berkeley Law Scholarship Repository.


other major change is in the recoverable cost for the solicitors which is amended in the laws. The

reaction of the solictors for the changes in the recoverable cost is analyzed further in this

research.The research is focusing on the changes shown by recoverable cost for solicitors in

Personal Injury firms since the law changes in 2012. The reason for studying this topic is to

analyze the role of solicitors in PI firms that they play to provide justice to the victims. Basically,

the personal injury refers to any kind of injury caused to a human intentionally. In such cases, the

injured takes the case to court for justice and thus requires the assistance of a solicitor to help

him get the just (Sugarman, 2013)11. This is very much encouraging in order to reduce the

vulnerability of victims and to keep the offenders from causing such injuries to others. The

research mainly emphasizes on the changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors of PI firms.

The recoverable cost is analyzed to throw light on the amount that solicitors attain, retain and can

recover after the case is over. The personal injury solicitor is basically one who supports the

person claiming for injuries, psychological or physical harm and any other kind of wrong doing.

The PI solicitors help them get the justice and represent their legal claims over the harm caused.

These cases are raised due to the negligence of the person, public, organization, entity,

government or any other agency. This makes the personal injury lawyers to be very much

experienced and knowledgeable and aware of the current affairs in order to take the cases

rationally and to attain success. However, the solicitors demand fee for their proceedings in the

process of personal injuries cases. To evaluate the legal amount assigned as their charges and the

variations caused in their recoverable cost is focused in this research. This will utterly throw light

on the dimensions of personal injury firms, solicitors and their recoverable costs in the light of

law.



Chapter 3: Research Methodology

This section deals with elaborating the research methodology used for collecting and collating

the data for making analysis. The detailed research design is discussed along with the ways of

analyzing the data gathered.

Research Design

The research design comprises of secondary research methodology i.e. using existing contents

available to derive the conclusion of the research. Thus the research will be conducted using

exploratory and Interpretivism approach, the content related to the personal injury will be

gathered from different law books and journals. And then proper analysis will be done by

comprehensively interpreting the qualitative data collected. The research will focus on exploring

the views and insights given in different papers. The overall study will explore the views of

solicitors of personal injuries firms regarding the changes incurred in the recoverable cost.

Purpose and type of Investigation

The purpose of research is to explore the changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors in the

personal injury firms. This would be done by using the secondary research analysis. The

secondary research will be conducted by reviewing the literature on the core concept being

studied in the research. The objective of the study is to assemble the entire description of the

topic under consideration i.e. changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors of Personal Injuries

firms. Overall conclusions will provide the highlights on the behavior of solicitors for changes

profound in recoverable cost. The unit of analysis is designed to be the articles and papers that

provide information regarding the topic under consideration. Thus the papers will be reviewed to


know the approach regarding the changes in their recoverable cost of solicitors. Thus on the basis

of the nature and design of research, the unit of analysis is selected to be the literature available

on the changes in the recoverable cost of solicitors of personal injury firms.

The strategy applied for the collection of data from the web sources is according to the feasibility

of the researcher. The collection of data is done by the researcher, who acquires one week for the

research of authentic research papers and literature on the law of personal injury firms. The

analysis and interpretation requires way more time than the collection of literature because the

useful material regarding the core topic is extracted by reviewing long length papers.

Methodology

The variables selected in the research constitute the recoverable cost of the solicitors of personal

injuries firm. The literature will be acquired on the nature of solicitors regarding the changes in

the recoverable cost. The target population of this study includes all the solicitors of personal

injuries firms currently operating in the United Kingdom. Thus the study focuses on providing

information regarding changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors of personal injuries firms

after the law of 2012 in order to remove the ambiguities and to enhance the individual

knowledge regarding this topic.

The researcher collects the data; the nature of the allotment and collections of the data is not

similar at specific locations and time. The time period of 7 days is requiredfor the gathering of

research material. Data for this research will also be gathered using the prior researchers that

have already been done in this regard. A strong theoretical framework will be developed that will

help collecting the clauses of legislative claims against changes in the recoverable cost of the

solicitors of PI firms.


Data Challenges

The data collection has been challenging because an immense number of sources are available

for the data collection regarding the laws. However, the challenge here was considering the

credibility of the sources. Therefore with the persistent assistance of supervisors and research

analysts, the data collection was made possible. Also aggregating different laws and acts of

personal injuries was also a challenge (Hellinger, 2005). This is because every bit of every law

seems so important that it took a lot of time reducing the entire text according to the need of the

topic of research. In case of primary research, approaching solicitors and then waiting for the

appointments was very much challenging. An easier approach was opted to collect data using the

online platforms but it was also challenging as the timely responses were not received.

The behavior of solicitors regarding the changes in the recoverable cost is analyzed but the

challenge was that sometimes Contradicting responses were gathered. Thus the papers were

analyzed thoroughly and the set of interpretations were derived considering the majority

analysis. The data often reflect the solicitors approach less and the clients approach more which

made it ambiguous to derive to any solid conclusions. However, the lawsuits were highly

preferred in this research to make the interpretation that reflects truthfulness and authenticity of

the core topic.


Chapter 4: Results & Analysis

The aftereffects of past studies found on the effect of changes in recoverable expense of the

solicitors of personal injury firms have been much alike the result previous studies. The literature

on the personal injury firms and their solicitors is reviewed in this research in order to evaluate

the changes of recoverable cost of solicitors of personal injury firms. According to the literature

and published sources, the recoverable cost for the solicitors seems to variable according to the

scenario and extent of vulnerability caused to the person complaining. The outcomes found in

literature additionally conclude that the solicitors have a significant in providing the victims of

personal injury incidents a proper chunk of compensation and protection for future cases. The

law suggests a number of ways to protect people from personal injury incidents; also the law

suggests few prior actions that can be taken to secure the people from any harmful act. These

protection measures include having security and safety guards, having proper protection

measures across the home boundaries, to avail insurance policies in order to get compensation

against any harm or loss of personal property etc. there a lot many cases that reflect how a person

can himself or herself from the harmful acts that may take place unknowing at any time.

Therefore the law suggests protection measures as well as compensation measures (Bogdan,

2008)12. However, if any of the measure is not taken before time and person suffers from any

personal injury incident, then he can avail the opportunity of protecting himself by approaching

the personal injury firms. These firms work for providing justice to the people through allotting

them a competent and experienced solicitor. The solicitor is aimed at listening to the details of

the harms caused to the victim, to enquire about the circumstances under which the entire

incident took place, to understand the situation and to deeply analyze the extent of loss the 12 Bogdan, M. (2008). The Decisionmaking Process of Funders, Attorneys, and Claimholders. The Georgetown Law Journal.


person has suffered. After making a detailed analysis the solicitors works for the victim to

provide him compensation against the harm that has been done to him. For all these services the

solicitor charges an amount that is to be paid to him for the services rendered. The services of the

solicitor include providing the victim justice, protection, compensation and prevention from such

acts for future concerns. For all such services the solicitors incur some cost (Hellinger, 2005)13.

This cost is divided into two categories; one being the irrecoverable and other is recoverable. The

irrecoverable cost is one which cannot be recovered once spent on something. This can be cost

for fuel etc. that solicitors spend during the detail analysis of the entire case of personal injury

incident. However, the cost spent for providing compensation to the victim is often considered as

recoverable as this is the cost that can be recovered from the offender. The person who avails the

service of solicitors has to pay the fee of solicitors. This is because without availing the services

of solicitors from the personal injury firms, the person cannot get his right back. This is why the

firms charge an amount as the fee for providing the legislative services. Another major reason for

the charging the fee is that the personal injury firms works under the private sector and not the

government sector due to which they often demand the fee for solicitors. Anyhow, the point to be

considered is that the services provided by solicitors are under the private sector but they are

totally synchronized with the legislative requirements (Stugel, 2001)14.

Since the law of 2012 for personal injuries incidents, there are seen some changes in the

recoverable cost of the solicitors of PI firms. The changes were set aside a few minutes to

upgrade the capability of these laws. All laws and acts talked about are outlined with a specific

end goal to accomplish the aversion of individual mischief or any harm that influences the

13 Hellinger, F. J. (2005). Health Plan Liability and ERISA: The Expanding Scope of State Legislation. Americal Public Health Association, 217–223.14Stugel, B. (2001). The Ethics for Conditional Fee Arrangements. The Society for Advances Legal Studies.


human personality, body or brain research. In the comparative way, better approaches to secure

individual wounds were recognized when the laws were actualized. Along these lines this

obliged the need of corrections in the laws intended for the compensation of all the harm caused

to others for no responsible reason. In the same context, a number of various frameworks were

presented all together to keep up the security of personal property, health and intangible assets of

people. The issuance of laws made it advantageous for the individuals to keep themselves safe

from any sort of individual mischief. The Act of 2012 plans to give provisions which will be

suggesting extreme protection and prevention of individuals and their assets against the

unnecessary and illegal harm. Also, it will shield them and keep them safe from getting hurt

(Sugarman, 2013)15.

The recoverable cost for the solicitors is highly dependent on the nature of the causality

however; the law has given flexible rates considering the type of personal injury caused (Rose,

2013)16.

The fixed recoverable cost is one which is fixed for all and under every circumstance; therefore

every client has to bear this cost in any case as it fixed by the laws in 2013. Following is the

chart showing the flow of cost by distinguishing the RTA claims and EL/PL claims.

Claims of £1k-£10k Claims of £10k-£25k

Stage 1 Stage 2 Total Stage 1 Stage 2 Total

RTA claims £200 £300 £500 £200 £600 £800

EL/PL claims £300 £600 £900 £300 £1,300 £1,600

Stage 3 Fixed Costs


16Rose, N. (2013). Cost Of Acquiring Pi Cases Is £700 – And The Referral Fee Ban Will Have No Effect. Rta Portal.


The fixed cost in the stage 3 is divided into three types considering the nature of the case being

handled.

Stage 3 Fixed Costs

Type A Type B Type C

The fixed costs of the solicitor

or the legal representative for

a hearing in the RTA/EL/PL

portals are £250.00 plus VAT.

The supplementary or

additional costs of advocate

for undertaking a Stage 3

hearing are also £250 for

RTA/EL/PL portals, so a total

fee of £500 for an oral Stage 3

hearing in all portals.

The fixed costs for advice on

the amount of damages where

the claimant is a child – £150

plus VAT.

*All fixed costs at all stages are exclusive of VAT*

This is the cost structure with the RTA, PL and EL. For the cases which do not include the RTA,

EL PL will have the cost structures slightly different as from 31 July 2013, protocols follows a

new Fixed Costs scheme(Kalish, 2004)17.

There are cases of personal injury such as Industrial Disease which has abolished the need of

portal will now be handled under a standard cost structure. The scheme separates the costs for

RTA, PL and EL matters and the costs are also fixed for each stage of the claim starting from pre

issue right through to trial:

17Kalish, S. E. (2004). The English Costs War, 2000–2003, And a Moment of Repose. Nebraska Law Review.


Fixed Cost Structure

Pre

issue

£1,000-

£5,000

Pre Issue

£5,001-£10,000

Pre

Issue

£10,001

-

£25,000

Issued –

Post

issue Pre

Allocati

on

Issued –

Post

allocatio

n pre

listing

Issued

–Post

listing

pre

trial

Trial

– Advocacy

Fee

Case

Settles

pre-

Issue

Case Settles pre-

Issue

Case

Settles

pre-

Issue

Road Traffic Accident

Fixed

Costs

Greater

of £550

or

£100+

20% of

Damage

s

£1,100+15% of

Damages over

£5k

£1,930+

10% of

Damage

s over

£10k

£1,160+

20% of

Damage

s

£1,880+

20% of

Damage

s

£2,655

+ 20%

of

Damag

es

£500 (to

£3,000)£710

(£3-

10,000)£1,0

70 (£10-

15,000)£1,7

05

(£15,000+)

Escap

e

+ 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% na

Employers Liability

Fixed

Costs

£950+

17.5%

£1,855+12.5

% of

£2,500+

10% of

£2,630+ 20% £3,350+

25% of

£4,280+

30% of

£500 (to

£3,000)£710


Fixed Cost Structure

of

Damag

es

Damages

over £5k

Damages

over

£10k

of Damages Damage

s

Damage

s

(£3-

10,000)£1,0

70 (£10-

15,000)£1,7

05

(£15,000+)

Escap

e

+ 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% na

Public Liability

Fixed

Costs

£950+

17.5%

of

Damag

es

£1,855+10%

of Damages

over £5k

£2.370+

10% of

Damages

over

£10k

£2,450+

17.5% of

Damages

£3,065+

22.5%

of

Damage

s

£3,790+

27.5%

of

Damage

s

£500 (to

£3,000)£710

(£3-

10,000)£1,0

70 (£10-

15,000)£1,7

05

(£15,000+)

Escap

e

+ 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% + 20% na

Notes: Base fees – in all cases increased by 12.5% where London firm as per CPR 45 (Hayes,

2013)18.

18 Hayes, J. (2013). Personal Injury Portal and Fixed Recoverable Costs.


The escape clause is there to compliment the portion of fixed cost as recoverable by applying to

a situation in which the case lies outside the RTA/EL/PL protocols. However, the Claimant could

expect to recover at least 20% more than the fixed costs by taking the advantage of this. There

has been a parallel system in dwelling under the previous Predictive costs regime, however those

systems were rarely effective and were merely utilized under a limited number of circumstances.

Therefore it seems to be attracting fixed cost from the vast majority of claims (Morabito, 2005)19.

19Morabito, V. (2005). Federal Class Actions, Contingency Fees, and the Rules Governing Litigation Costs. Monash University Law Review.


Chapter 5: Discussion

The results of previous studies found on the impact of changes in recoverable cost of the

solicitors of personal injury firms have been very much similar to the outcome of this research.

To evaluate this the previous published papers and literature is reviewed is analyzed to get to the

results. It is reviewed from the “literature review” that variables have strong significant

relationship with the changes in the recoverable cost of solicitors of personal injuries of firm.

The literature reviews shows that how the need of laws for the protection of personal injury was

determined and addressed. In the same way the amendments were made by the time to enhance

the proficiency of these laws. All laws and acts discussed above are designed in order to achieve

the prevention of personal harm or any damage that affects the human mind, body or

psychology. In the similar way, new ways to protect personal injuries were identified when the

laws were implemented. Thus this required the need of amendments in the laws designed for the

protection of intellectual property. In the same context, such numerous systems were introduced

in order maintain the security of assets associated with the humans. The issuance of laws made it

convenient for the people to keep themselves safe from any kind of personal harm. The

amendments also eliminated the issues caused by the previous acts’ clauses thus the Act of 2012

intends to provide clauses which will lead to ultimate protection of people and their belongings.

And it will protect them and keep them safe from getting harmed. Therefore, it is clearly

demonstrated in the literature review that recent law amongst all that incorporates all the

amendments and essential clauses for the implementation of protection of people by establishing

firms of personal injury that addresses such issues. The changes made in the Act of 2012 to

several previous acts strengthen the rights of owners of property, reduce the stances of theft,

improve the overall performance of institutions working for the protection of human rights and


eliminate the ambiguities found in the previous versions of laws presented for the control on

human rights. These are the major implications of the act of 2012 which not only improved the

previous versions of laws and acts but also provides with applicable and effective clauses that

will significantly reduce the criminalization and personal injury experiences. The control over

the criminalization of such cases is the main and major focus of the acts and thus the research

elaborates the amendments more vigorously because they reflect the most recent picture of PI

laws. For this purpose, the act that has provided an overall structure for the improvement of these

laws is presented in the Act of 2012. This act comprises of mere amendments made in the

previous legislation and provided a whole structure of law to be implemented for the

improvement. The acts aim at providing minor corrections to the flaws and oversights present in

the previous acts. Overall, the research signifies that the changes in the recoverable cost effects

the solicitors approach for handling the cases of the clients. The research concludes that there

exists a strong significant impact of changes in the recoverable costs of the solicitors of personal

injuries firms on the solicitors’ responsiveness.

Conclusion

The comprehensive research project puts the focus on the changes in the recovering cost of

solicitors of personal injury firms. The personal injury laws basically provides ways for the

remedies and the defensing approach in the civil legislations against any kind of wrong doing,

unfair action and any harm caused for no reason to the person. These laws are often stated under

the tort, which itself means any harm, twist or unfair act done to someone. Tort is basically

derived from a Latin word that focuses on the harms caused to one person. Therefore in the laws

under tort the remedies for such harmful acts are provided in a legislative way. However, tort law

is not same as that of criminal law. These are resolved by the involvement of the government but


rather the private law institutes are approach for justice and compensation. This is why the

recoverable cost of the solicitors becomes an essential part of this. The research design

comprises of secondary research methodology i.e. using existing contents available to derive the

conclusion of the research. Thus the research will be conducted using exploratory and

Interpretivism approach, the content related to the personal injury will be gathered from different

law books and journals. And then proper analysis will be done by comprehensively interpreting

the qualitative data collected. The research will focus on exploring the views and insights given

in different papers. The overall study will explore the views of solicitors of personal injuries

firms regarding the changes incurred in the recoverable cost. The purpose of research is to

explore the changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors in the personal injury firms. The

secondary research is conducted by reviewing the literature on the core concept being studied in

the research. The objective of the study is to assemble the entire description of the topic under

consideration i.e. changes in the recoverable cost of the solicitors of Personal Injuries firms.

Overall conclusions will provide the highlights on the behavior of solicitors for changes

profound in recoverable cost. The unit of analysis is designed to be the articles and papers that

provide information regarding the topic under consideration. Thus the papers will be reviewed to

know the approach regarding the changes in their recoverable cost of solicitors. Thus on the basis

of the nature and design of research, the unit of analysis is selected to be the literature available

on the changes in the recoverable cost of solicitors of personal injury firms. The strategy applied

for the collection of data from the web sources is according to the feasibility of the researcher.

The collection of data is done by the researcher, who acquires one week for the research of

authentic research papers and literature on the law of personal injury firms. The analysis and

interpretation requires way more time than the collection of literature because the useful material


regarding the core topic is extracted by reviewing long length papers. The literature will be

acquired on the nature of solicitors regarding the changes in the recoverable cost. The target

population of this study includes all the solicitors of personal injuries firms currently operating in

the United Kingdom. Thus the study focuses on providing information regarding changes in the

recoverable cost of the solicitors of personal injuries firms after the law of 2012 in order to

remove the ambiguities and to enhance the individual knowledge regarding this topic. Data for

this research will also be gathered using the prior researchers that have already been done in this

regard. Some legal researchers have recommended that the disappointment of the conventional

cures as a strategy to prevent personally injuries is executed in law. It is expected the way that

open neglect to perceive that the personal injury acts are ethically wrong and thus the solicitors

work for overcoming this unethical act from the societies. The cost of solicitors varies however

they tend to provide the maximum compensation to the clients by handling their cases and

bringing the accused to justice.

SuggestionsThe solicitors may charge high amounts for the cases that include high efforts but they must also

consider the point that the cost is recoverable in nature. The solicitors of personal injury firms

are advised to maintain a documented system for handling the cost structures while considering

the clients’ cases. The rates must be decided in the first place so that no confusion may occur

later when the case has been finally instigated with the hearing process. The reason is that the

purpose of the personal injury firms is to comfort the client with their services and not to

discomfort them by offering services on high rates. According to the law, the services of the

solicitors must be given at flexible rates so that all could afford and also to minimize the

occurrence of personal injury incidents in the society. The first and foremost consideration is to

sustain a documented system so that the records for the rates charged from the clients could be


maintained. The reason behind documenting is that for every client there should be proper

justifications, followed by the laws and acts of personal injury protection, for the amount

charged. The illustration for this statement is the difference in the nature of the harm caused to a

person and the intensity of the harm caused. For instance in case of accident which has caused

intense harm to the victim of personal injury incident then the case would be handled more

crucially as its nature is much crucial. The reason is that this causality could have caused the

death of a living being for no responsible reason rather due to the carelessness of the causer. This

is how the rates are decided when it comes to solicitor to provide its services. contrary to the

above mentioned example, the other case could be of product damage or wastage which does not

include any harm to human health. In this case, the causality could be handled a little

conveniently because it includes no damage or harm to the human health. Similarly, the cases

regarding industrial injuries, brain injuries, physical injuries, property liabilities etc. are all

different in nature and intensity. It is thus dependent on the situations to decide the charges for

the services provided. The solicitors may show some flexibility in regard to severe cases, as the

client is already under a lot of stress. The charges not only depend on the nature of harm but also

on the intensity. The recoverable cost of the solicitors could be handled with a lot of logical and

rationale reasoning because this not only includes the services of the solicitors but also the corner

to a person who has been harmed


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the changes in recoverable costs & role of solicitors in personal injury firms

Documents

cost of solicitors

personal injury laws

personal injury solicitor

personal injury firms13

personal injury incidents

personal injury acts

kind of injury

solicitors work