There are four possible ways of funding your claim with us, whether it be for personal injury or any other dispute:
Private Funding
You may fund your case using your own private funds and paying monies out as the claim proceeds.
If
you are successful with your case, then you should recover monies from your opponent. If you are unsuccessful in your case,
you will not recover monies spent unless you have after the event
insurance and have as part of that cover for your own costs (see below under 'No Win No Fee').
Legal Expenses Insurance
You may have legal expenses insurance which is often attached to a home or motor insurance policy.
Legal
expenses insurance can be attached to buildings insurance which can
cover current tenants of property and can also be found with some credit
cards.
We ask if you could kindly bring in any insurance
documents in order for us to check whether you are have access to legal
expenses insurance.
If your policy does extend to legal expenses
insurance, and covers the claim you wish to bring, then if you are
unsuccessful in your case, the policy should pay your costs.
Trade Union Funding
If you are a member of a trade union, you may be entitled to funding
through your trade union. Please let us have details of your membership
and entitlement to costs (if applicable) so that we can advise you as to
whether you are entitled to trade union funding.
'No Win No Fee'
A 'No Win No Fee' Agreement is another name for a Conditional Fee Agreement (CFA).
One
of the most important features of a 'No Win No Fee' Agreement is
that if you do not succeed in your claim, then you will not be liable to
this firm for our fees.
Do I have to pay my opponent's fees if I lose?
Although
you might not have to pay our firm’s fees if you lose, you would be
personally responsible for payment of your opponent’s costs and
expenses. For this reason we always try to offer the 'No Win No Fee' Agreement in conjunction
with an insurance policy so that you will not incur personal liability
for your opponent’s costs should the claim fail. This means that you
will not have to pay any fees if you lose and you will therefore be able
to pursue your claim with a considerable degree of security.
This
insurance policy is known as after the event insurance. If you win, the
insurance premium should be paid by your opponent. If you lose, the
insurance policy may be self-funding and may pay for itself. We can
assist with arrangements for this type of insurance and advise you on
how much cover it provides you against your opponent’s costs.
The circumstances in which you may have to pay our fees
There are instances where you may be responsible for our fees. For example:
In
the unlikely event that you should wish to end the 'No Win No Fee' Agreement, you will
have an obligation to pay our basic costs, unless we agree to await the
outcome of your claim.
You
may also be responsible for some of our fees if you win. This situation
may arise if we cannot recover all of our costs from the opponent.
However, in the event of a successful outcome, we would hope you will recover most
if not all of our costs from your opponent.
Our costs are made up of basic costs and a success fee.
This
success fee is charged as a percentage of our firm’s basic costs and
reflects a number of factors, principally, the degree of risk that we
have undertaken in entering into this 'No Win No Fee' Agreement. For some types of case,
such as road traffic accidents, the success fee is fixed; for most
others, the solicitor must calculate it (although this is subject to
possible amendment by a Judge).
No success fee is payable in the event of an unsuccessful outcome.
If
your claim falls within the fixed fee or predictable cost schemes and
it is successful, then your minimum responsibility for our fees will be
the amount of costs payable by the losing party under those schemes.
Will I have to pay out any monies before the conclusion of the claim?
We
may ask you to pay for disbursements as your claim proceeds. In a claim
for personal injuries, disbursements are likely to include but are not
limited to the following expenses:
GP and Hospital Records
Experts Medical Report
Counsel's fees
Court fees
These
expenses should be recovered from the opponent in the event of a
successful outcome of the claim. In the event of an unsuccessful
outcome, these disbursements may be covered by the insurance policy
taken out in your name.
If you are unable to provide monies for these disbursements, we may be able to make alternative arrangements.
Funding
