Will redundancies lead to increase in Claims?
It has been warned that the recent amount of redundancies could lead to personal injury claim numbers increasing. People have speculated that history may repeat itself after claims rose a lot during the last economic crisis.
Many large companies have decided to make cutbacks and redundancies to help survive the current climate. So how will this affect compensation claims, well Kieran Jones from Weightmans’ disease unit has noted that during the late 1990s some very large garment and textile manufacturing factories had to be closed down in Nottingham and Derbyshire. This lead to very large numbers of redundancies adding to this a campaign was set up including newspapers and leaflets that discussed free hearing tests and compensation that could be obtained from various companies including these textile firms. Subsequently thousands of claims were made against the three main textile employers in the area and their insurance companies. Even though a lot of these claims were made about conditions that were perfectly legal and held no weight, it didn’t stop the number of claims.
Employers should help avoid situations like this by making sure that they have relevant documentation that will cover them incase any claims will be made against them. One of the biggest problems is that when some factories are closed down, the building will be demolished meaning that the working environment cannot be inspected if a claim is made.
It is in the best interest of both the insurers and the company itself both keep records of all relevant information and documentation to help defend themselves if another large number of accident compensation claims are brought against them. Other wise they could be in big trouble.
It should also be noted that the government overhauled the laws and rules for injury claims last year. These changes have made the process much quicker and cuts costs for both the businesses and claimers. The processes have been streamlined to try and avoid settlements that have taken months and even years in the past.