If you have suffered a personal injury through no fault of your own, then you may be eligible for financial compensation. To ascertain your eligibility and get answers to all your claims-related questions, the best person to speak to is an experienced solicitor who specializes in your type of accident and injuries. This way, you will be afforded relevant advice, so that you can make an informed decision regarding whether or not to make an injury claim.
What makes a good solicitor?
A good solicitor is an experienced solicitor.
Ideally, you should opt for a solicitor who has plenty of experience processing claims that have similar circumstances to your own. So for example, if you have injured your back or shoulder at work, a solicitor specializing in workplace injuries will be best placed to process your personal injury claim. Or if you have been in a car crash, then a solicitor who specializes in road traffic accidents will be best placed to process your accident claim.
How do I find an experienced lawyer?
The most experienced lawyers can either be found within their own smaller practices or working for large, national law firms that have been in business for several years.
If you are the kind of person that likes to meet and greet, then you will probably get more from the claims process by opting to see a law firm local to you, providing that they specialize in personal injury law. For everybody else, however, the service offered by national law firms (where claims can be processed over the phone) is more convenient, and because the law firms in question are large, they invariably have access to the best accident lawyers too.
What credentials should a lawyer have?
First and foremost, all practicing lawyers for accidents in England and Wales must be admitted to the Solicitors Regulation Authority (SRA) Roll of Solicitors. This is a requirement under UK law for a solicitor to practice. You can check if your lawyer is on the roll by checking their SRA ID number and their name against the Roll’s database.
Once you have confirmed that your lawyer is a lawyer, we recommend asking them about their ‘success rate’. This is a percentage of the number of cases they have won. Anything over 80 percent is considered excellent – and especially if a lawyer specializes in taking on riskier or more complex cases. If your case is complex (such as if your liability will be difficult to ascertain), then we recommend asking to speak to a solicitor who has processed at least 10 or 20 complex cases before, to give your claim the very best chance of success.