no win no fee clinical negligence

No Win No Fee Clinical Negligence: Fund The Legal Cost Of Making Your Medical Negligence Claim

Find out the different elements that can form part of your solicitors’ costs in making a clinical negligence claim; how a no win no fee agreement can meet your solicitors’ legal fees; others forms of funding -including legal protection insurance and legal aid. Discover how the law for funding solicitors differs in the various countries that make up the UK.

Table of Contents

The legal costs of making a claim for clinical negligence include:

Solicitors’ Professional Fees

This is simply the charge for the time spent by your medical negligence solicitor in dealing with your claim. It is calculated from your solicitor’s hourly charge rate, which you should be notified in writing of at the beginning of your claim.

Disbursements

Sums of money that your clinical negligence lawyer makes no profit on and pays on your behalf. In a clinical negligence claim – some of the first steps are to obtain your GP and hospital notes and have a medical expert look at them to decide if there has been negligence.

The cost of obtaining the GP notes, hospital notes and a medical report are good examples of disbursements.

Can a no win no fee agreement be used to make a clinical negligence claim?

“Yes” – a no win no fee agreement can be used to make a claim for clinical negligence.

In a no win no fee agreement – your medical negligence solicitors agree not to charge you for their professional fees should your claim be lost.

Watch out – read your no win no fee agreement carefully. If you have behave fraudulently or you do not provide proper instruction – your solicitor may require you to pay some legal costs.

If your claim is won, your solicitor will claim the majority of your legal costs from the medical authority as part of your claim.

Watch out – the medical authority will invariably not have to pay all of your solicitors’ costs, which may therefore result in a potential deduction of up to 25% of your compensation for unrecovered legal fees.

Are there other ways of funding your medical negligence claim?

“Yes” – there are a number of other types of funding agreement that could meet your solicitors’ costs in helping you pursue compensation for clinical negligence.

Before instructing a medical negligence solicitor – you should check if you have a policy of insurance in place which will fund your legal costs to make a claim for compensation.

This insurance is known as “legal protection or legal expenses cover”.

For example – if you own or rent your home, you will typically have some form of household contents insurance, which will often have an additional add on legal protection insurance.

Subject to a small excess – legal expenses cover will often meet the legal costs in pursuing a claim for personal injury compensation following an accident or in the event of medical negligence claims.

Watch out – you may not be aware you have “legal protection cover” on your contents insurance policy or that all household members can benefit from it. So, if in doubt – check it out.

no win no fee hospital negligence
No Win No Fee Hospital Negligence

“Legal aid” is a means of funding your claim from public money.

In England and Wales – legal aid is not available for personal injury matters in general. Legal aid is still available for clinical negligence claims, but only in very limited exceptional circumstances.

A medical negligence solicitor may make an application for legal aid on your behalf.

Your solicitor will listen to what you have to say about why you believe you have a claim and look at any evidence you have. If your solicitor is satisfied that there may be a claim and the circumstances are exceptional – an application for legal aid could be made on your behalf.

Preliminary Investigation

A lawyer alone cannot determine if you have a claim for medical negligence. Your full medical records must be examined and a medical expert contacted to produce a report based upon those notes as to whether it is likely negligence has occurred.

This is an expensive process – medical reports cost several hundred pounds, so legal aid can be granted to take this step.

Full Investigation

If the medical report produced supports your claim your solicitor can extend the legal aid certificate to cover the expense of further investigation of your claim so that it can be prepared to take your claim to court if need be.

“No,” the rules for funding of medical negligence claims vary across the UK depending upon where the injury occurred.

The law in England and Wales is the same. Northern Ireland and Scotland have some significant differences

Be aware – this article is written for the law in England and Wales. Should a claim for clinical negligence originate elsewhere in the UK – we will often be able to locate an appropriate clinical negligence lawyer to help your with your claim

Summary Of No Win No Fee Clinical Negligence Claims

You now know the cheapest ways to fund your legal costs, including no win no fee agreements, to make a claim for clinical negligence.

We recommend you use our medical negligence claims process article – to see how to make a clinical negligence claim.

We offer free online legal help and telephone assistance if you suspect you may have been victim to clinical negligence – at a hospital or by a GP.

You can ask a question or speak to our solicitors direct.