Personal Injuries Board

TheJackAttack

Does anyone here hold the view that the PIB is somewhat undemocratic?

A government regulated body who dictates whether or not a Claimant deserves any compensation for a injury.

I imagine the Irish government have colluded with insurance companies to keep compensation and fees to a minimum. The only beneficiary here is the insurance companies. (I've just googled Dermot Divilly and see his previous employer's are Aviva, Hibernian Plc - no surprise there) Conflict of interest surely? Acting in the best interest of client?

Are the representative's of the PIB are qualified to deal with these claims? Fair enough your simple RTA is straight forward, but more complex industrial disease aren't easy to deal with. (Quantum, Breach, medical reports etc)

Surely the independent advice of a qualified Solicitor is more appropriate under these circumstances? I think the whole thing is a farce, and not to sound too dramatic abit fascist.

Interesting to see what people's thoughts are on this. By the way, I'm no expert on the PIB so feel free to correct any inaccuracies.

Bepolite

Do you mean the PIAB?

They are there for first-instance assessments and there are indeed issues with the system but they are supposed to allow greater access. Either side can reject their decision and proceed to court if they wish.

I'm also open to correction.

Little CuChulainn

You can reject their settlement figure if you want and go to court instead.

Claw Hammer

TheJackAttack wrote: »

Does anyone here hold the view that the PIB is somewhat undemocratic?

A government regulated body who dictates whether or not a Claimant deserves any compensation for a injury.

.

Not true. They only deal with cases where the respondents accepts liability for the injury. Their only function is to make an assessment of the amount of compensation. Either side can refuse the amount and go to court. It is simply a filtering mechanism which keeps numerous cases, in which there is no dispute, out of the courts.

FreudianSlippers

Little CuChulainn wrote: »

You can reject their settlement figure if you want and go to court instead.

I'd say most reject actually.

Manach

So my understanding is the PIAB had as part of its foundational remit to avoid the highly contentious compensation culture as in the US. This would be as part of the state's legal oversight function as part of its role as being "Guardian of the public good". To link this is the word fascist would indicate George Orwell was right in “The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable".

TheJackAttack

I didn't release they only deal with claims where liability is admitted.

I take it 80% of the submissions are probably RTA's? Is there a penalty if you reject the board's assessment?

Does the Claimant fund the claim themselves if it goes post-PIAB or are there any legal insurance options?

Who is the biggest Claimant Solicitor in Dublin?

A Government body that's run by previous employee's of an insurance company sounds abit funny to me. There's definitely a conflict there.

Little CuChulainn

TheJackAttack wrote: »

I didn't release they only deal with claims where liability is admitted.

I take it 80% of the submissions are probably RTA's? Is there a penalty if you reject the board's assessment?

Does the Claimant fund the claim themselves if it goes post-PIAB or are there any legal insurance options?

Who is the biggest Claimant Solicitor in Dublin?

A Government body that's run by previous employee's of an insurance company sounds abit funny to me. There's definitely a conflict there.

I think if the court awards less than the PIAB offered and the claimant is the one who rejected it they are liable to a claim for legal fees.

TheJackAttack

I presume the Defendant Insurer can claim for their legal fees to be paid?(On the basis the claim is settled by trial)
Or, PIAB's legal fees?

What's the story with legal insurance or ATE policies?

Bepolite

TheJackAttack wrote: »

I presume the Defendant Insurer can claim for their legal fees to be paid?(On the basis the claim is settled by trial)
Or, PIAB's legal fees?

What's the story with legal insurance or ATE policies?

If you have a google and read the PIABs blurb all this is explained, I'm beginning to think we're spoon-feeding you your homework here.

Pat Mustard

I'd agree that the Injuries Board process is biased in favour of respondents/insurance companies, and against claimants.

First, after application is made to the IB, the respondent has 90 days to decide whether to agree to assessment. Even if the respondent remains silent, the matter proceeds to assessment anyway. At least one insurance company has a practise whereby if it wants assessment, it will simply wait out the 90 days. This causes a delay, which suits the insurance company at this point. Many applicants lose the will to go through with a protracted process of perhaps one year before they can even issue court proceedings, so many are willing to take an insurance company settlement or the IB assessment. Remember that the insurance company will not have to pay the claimant's costs if matters are resolved before completion of the IB process and issue of court proceedings. This is money out of the claimant's pocket and into the that of the insurance company.

Secondly, the IB does not pay any legal costs whatsoever (except in minor cases). The rationale for this is that it is a supposedly simple process that is supposed to be manageable by a layman. However, if there are difficulties in tracking down the identity of a respondent, a layman may not be able to get the job done competently. If several companies are involved in a claim concerning an accident at work, a layman may have difficulty in establishing the correct legal identity of his employer. An example might be where work is outsourced.

Thirdly, before a claimant may issue proceedings to go to court, he/she must go through the IB process. At the end of the process, the IB will issue an authorization, which will allow the claimant to bring legal proceedings. If there is a situation with multiple parties, it could be that the claimant would need to have named several parties in the application to the IB. However, this may not be straightforward, and may require the assistance of a solicitor. If it is not done correctly, and if all of the relevant parties are not named, not all of the relevant authorizations will be got, and it could be that the mistakes will only be discovered by a solicitor when it is time to issue legal proceedings. Due to the Statute of Limitations, it could be that there may not be enough time to resolve the matter adequately, and the claimant may be precluded from bringing action against a relevant party or parties. That situation could be potentially disastrous for a claimant. As the IB does not pay legal costs, it is up to the claimant to hire a solicitor at the outset, which is an additional layer of cost, imposed by the process. The alternative is not to hire a solicitor and possibly make a complete mess of things.

Fourth, even if the respondent allows matters to proceed to assessment, it is free to reject any assessment made by the IB, and allow matters to proceed to court. It can enter a defence and contest matters, if it chooses to do so.

Fifth, liability may not be clear-cut at the beginning of a claim. In such circumstances, it may be appropriate or necessary to have an engineer inspect the locus of the accident at the outset, rather than postponing the hiring of an engineer until after the IB process. Evidence may not be available afterwards, and people's memories of events will not be anywhere near as fresh. However, the IB will not pay legal costs, and doesn't pay the costs of engineering inspections. The claimant will have to bear that cost unless he or she goes to court.

Sixth, if a claimant does not beat an assessment in court, legal costs will not be awarded to him and he may have to pay all or a portion of the respondent's costs. This is rendered more unfair by the fact that the costs of medical reports (and legal costs in minor cases) are counted towards the calculation of the assessment of damages in the IB, but those same items are not counted as damages in court, as they would amount to legal expenses in that forum. Therefore, a situation could arise where people who might otherwise beat an IB assessment of damages, could find themselves not beating the assessment and encountering a serious problem with not having their costs paid and possibly having to pay the insurance company's costs. I think that it would be reasonable to suppose that this situation could be challenged, but I have not heard that this had happened already. I am open to correction.

Seventh, the IB uses the same panel of doctors as the insurance companies for medical examinations of claimants. They could use any doctors they want, but they use the insurance doctors. I am not aware of any reasonable justification of this.

Grolschevik

Manach wrote: »

So my understanding is the PIAB had as part of its foundational remit to avoid the highly contentious compensation culture as in the US. This would be as part of the state's legal oversight function as part of its role as being "Guardian of the public good". To link this is the word fascist would indicate George Orwell was right in “The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies "something not desirable".

Eh... what?

Manach

Grolschevik wrote: »

Eh... what?

Non-big payouts : yes.
Misuse of terms : yes
If any simplier, I can use sock puppets?

FreudianSlippers

Manach wrote: »

Non-big payouts : yes.
Misuse of terms : yes
If any simplier, I can use sock puppets?

It's like you're speaking in some code where half the words are either missing or have been replaced by a random word from the dictionary.

TheJackAttack

Thanks the Mustard, exactly the response I was looking for.

There are monumental differences to the Irish and UK system. I would guess the US system doesn't run-off a state-owned body running claims in the interest of the insurers!

Claimants are entitled to a fair claim and clearly at present this is not the case.

The Mustard wrote: »

Seventh, the IB uses the same panel of doctors as the insurance companies for medical examinations of claimants. They could use any doctors they want, but they use the insurance doctors. I am not aware of any reasonable justification of this.

This is unbelievable. The IB, who's director is a prior employee of an insurance company and who the Claimant will probably have to fund gets to instruct a pro-insurance medical expert?! Where's the partiality in that?! In the UK the Claimant submits a number of experts to the Defendant Insurer/Solicitor to raise objections to. The claim is for the Claimant to prove!

The Claimant clearly has no knowledge of the law, the costs or the process of the Injuries Board - this massively prejudicial to the Claimant. David v Goliath is what springs to mind.

The IB, medical experts and insurer's collectively appear as the Defendant whereas the Claimant is on his own without any support. The IB and medical experts clearly have a vested interest on behalf of the insurers.

Is it correct to say it was Michael McDowell under Bertie's FF'ers who came up with this idea? I'd love to see the minutes of the discussion how this came to statute.

The system is broke in my opinion.

Pat Mustard

TheJackAttack wrote: »

The Claimant clearly has no knowledge of the law, the costs or the process of the Injuries Board - this massively prejudicial to the Claimant. David v Goliath is what springs to mind.

Agree 100%

TheJackAttack wrote: »

The IB, medical experts and insurer's collectively appear as the Defendant whereas the Claimant is on his own without any support. The IB and medical experts clearly have a vested interest on behalf of the insurers.

I think that the Injuries Board itself should have the benefit of the doubt, apart from use of insurance company doctors. The process is weighted in favour of insurance companies, and the insurance company doctors produce medical reports that seem to produce optimistic prognoses. Broke your back? Be grand.

TheJackAttack wrote: »

Is it correct to say it was Michael McDowell under Bertie's FF'ers who came up with this idea? I'd love to see the minutes of the discussion how this came to statute.

I can't recall. All I know that it is a different beast to the one described in explanatory memorandum of the Bill, before it was ever enacted into law. The Dáil/Seanad debates are searchable online.

Bepolite

TheJackAttack wrote: »

Thanks the Mustard, exactly the response I was looking for.

There are monumental differences to the Irish and UK system. I would guess the US system doesn't run-off a state-owned body running claims in the interest of the insurers!

Claimants are entitled to a fair claim and clearly at present this is not the case.

I'm only relaying what I've been told but I'd be fairly sure the source knew what he was talking about (he has very good hair).

Insurers wanted jury's gone from civil cases expecting payouts to be be smaller and the number of cases going their way to be higher. The exact opposite happened.

I, personally, don't have an understanding of the Irish civil jury system to talk about it intelligently; but the US system is a total farce in relation to some of the crazy payouts.

As for the PIAB - there are critics and those criticisms are valid however you have the option to go to court which have shown themselves, more often than not, to fall squarely on the side of the plaintiff. In addition the plaintiff generally has the balance of power on their side in PI claims in relation to settlements.

I don't really get your point OP.

TheJackAttack wrote: »

This is unbelievable. The IB, who's director is a prior employee of an insurance company and who the Claimant will probably have to fund gets to instruct a pro-insurance medical expert?! Where's the partiality in that?! In the UK the Claimant submits a number of experts to the Defendant Insurer/Solicitor to raise objections to. The claim is for the Claimant to prove!

The Claimant clearly has no knowledge of the law, the costs or the process of the Injuries Board - this massively prejudicial to the Claimant. David v Goliath is what springs to mind.

In England and Wales there are many more firms operating on a no foal no fee basis (tbh full no win no fee). The PIAB is designed so that the plaintiff does not have to engage full legal support at a massive cost to themselves. Are there better options, yes of course there are, better provision of legal aid, proper no win, no fee representation but that's not the lines the country has chosen to go down. People already think we're over litigious (although they're incorrect on that point).

TheJackAttack wrote: »

The IB, medical experts and insurer's collectively appear as the Defendant whereas the Claimant is on his own without any support. The IB and medical experts clearly have a vested interest on behalf of the insurers.

Is it correct to say it was Michael McDowell under Bertie's FF'ers who came up with this idea? I'd love to see the minutes of the discussion how this came to statute.

The system is broke in my opinion.

Again I'm not sure where you're going here - it's an adversarial system, slightly biased towards to plaintiff. In many cases it's a 1:1 expert ratio it's not as if they're able to throw money at the problem to make the case go their way - you either slipped over or you didn't. I agree that there are a number of cases where this isn't the case, but surely if it's a complicated and contentious case you hire representation from the start and that makes the PIAB a formality and simply the first stop on settling the case.