Faster system needed for personal injury claims

Officials from the Association of British Insurers have said that a faster system is needed for the processing of personal injury claims, adding that this could cut back hugely on the long periods it often takes to sort out this sort of claim. According to the ABI it can take over 700 days to sort out a car accident related personal injury claim, and three years for a work related one.

The government had already put proposals for a new system that could help to speed up the settlement of personal injury claims and the ABI now wants this system to be put into place. The system involves putting into place strict deadlines for both lawyers with regards to contacting insurance firms to let them know a claim may be filed, and for insurance firms with regards to deciding whether they would settle a claim or not.

One ABI official said: “What tends to happen is that a person who has been injured goes to a lawyer who does a vast amount of research, often unnecessarily in our opinion, before putting the claim anywhere near the insurer. There is then a process of negotiation over liability and settlement in a very adversarial system.”

According to the ABI if the new system is put into place it could help to cut the amount of time it takes to deal with personal injury claims by around three quarters in some cases.