RTE finally calls out compo culture

Costs (solicitor fees) usually 'follow the event' which means that the losing side pays the other sides legal bills. Sometimes there is no 'loser' as it were, and there might be 'no order as to costs'.......family law and custody battles typically would fall into this category.

A 'stay' on costs means (I think) that the judge has held off on awarding costs, usually because there are further matters to come before the court or because the full case hasn't been heard yet. I'm open to correction, but that's my impression.

jammiedodgers

In May 2013, he was held up in a bookies at gunpoint and got €5,000 compensation.

Probably his cousin that was robbing it

El Gato De Negocios

Pronto63 wrote: »

The judge refused to put a stay on the award of costs - what does that mean?

Assume its that the claimants are liable to pay them immediately.

Good luck with getting anything out of them.

I hope the solicitor concerned put a huge amount of man hours into the case and now has a bloody nose as a result of it losing, might make them think twice about representing certain individuals in the future though i very much doubt it.

Glurrl

He must have thought the baked beans was a good one, he got 2 bad tins

The_Kew_Tour

2,000 for everytime claiming bit of bad food.

I would be a Millionaire by now if I did:(:pac:

lawrencesummers

BattleCorp wrote: »

The main losers here are the insurance company and the solicitors representing the travellers. The only people coming out of this not out of pocket are the insurance company's legal team (and probably the travellers if they don't pay their bills).

The travellers' solicitors pretty much have zero chance of being paid for this case and even though the insurance company were awarded their costs there's no chance they will get that money so they'll have to pay their own legal team too.

And the travellers, well, fingers crossed that their unlucky spell doesn't continue.

You can be sure the solicitor operated no win no fee because they know the chances of getting paid from the client is pretty small and operating no win no fee is a license to charge higher fees.

Skyrimaddict

To be honest all, without the Boss bashing, its a culture of today that courts wont run these cases or insurance companies wont take to court.

One of my staff was in a crash two years ago. 45 euro worth of car damage, yes, seriously, and the lady who was hit is up to asking for I belive 65K in court. Apparently, a crash at 4 MPH where the damage was such the mechanics could only push out a dent and replace a bulb means this lady cant now have kids.

batman_oh

angel eyes 2012 wrote: »

Not forgetting the two occasions he successfully sued for food poisoning due to a tin of baked beans.

I actually blame the solicitor firms taking on this waster as their client, they have absolutely no professional ethics or morals. The mind boggles.

This - the legal system in this country is to blame for this and also the skum walking around with 500 convictions. If you show them that they can do this kind of thing without any fear of repercussion then why wouldn't they?

El Gato De Negocios

Skyrimaddict wrote: »

To be honest all, without the Boss bashing, its a culture of today that courts wont run these cases or insurance companies wont take to court.

One of my staff was in a crash two years ago. 45 euro worth of car damage, yes, seriously, and the lady who was hit is up to asking for I belive 65K in court. Apparently, a crash at 4 MPH where the damage was such the mechanics could only push out a dent and replace a bulb means this lady cant now have kids.

Absolutely 100%. Its easy to throw mud at travellers, non nationals, any other minority group but the reality is they are far from the biggest issues with false and exaggerated claims, many otherwise "upstanding" members of society are as likely to exaggerate their symptoms for a bigger payout. Anecdotally, i would be confident that alot of coaching goes on from the legal section when it comes to maximising potential claims.

silver2020

El Gato De Negocios wrote: »

I hope the solicitor concerned put a huge amount of man hours into the case and now has a bloody nose as a result of it losing, might make them think twice about representing certain individuals in the future though i very much doubt it.

This is what is wrong with the system. A solicitor will take 100 cases, they will hope to win 65%.

That 65% in reality pay the costs of the losing 35%.

It like playing a golden guaranteed win slot machine - you will lose on some pulls, but when you win, you win big.

And the law society will do nothing

lawrencesummers

silver2020 wrote: »

This is what is wrong with the system. A solicitor will take 100 cases, they will hope to win 65%.

That 65% in reality pay the costs of the losing 35%.

It like playing a golden guaranteed win slot machine - you will lose on some pulls, but when you win, you win big.

And the law society will do nothing

Another example of why self regulation is no regulation.

The same as the alcohol industry, gambling industry etc etc

cruizer101

While nice to see some reporting on this until someone is actually jailed for this kind of fraud it will continue.
Most honest people would be ashamed to have their name appear in the paper like this, these criminals probably wear it as a badge of honor.
Fees were awarded against them but apart from that, no real consequences, all they will do is find somewhere to fall over to make another claim to cover the fees.
It is a f**king disgrace and boils my blood, they are robbing from ever honest citizen paying inflated insurance premiums and even just increased costs on everyday items as businesses have to cover themselves for greedy arseholes like these.
I'm ****ing livid sitting here now.

Eggs For Dinner

El Gato De Negocios wrote: »

Absolutely 100%. Its easy to throw mud at travellers, non nationals, any other minority group but the reality is they are far from the biggest issues with false and exaggerated claims, many otherwise "upstanding" members of society are as likely to exaggerate their symptoms for a bigger payout. Anecdotally, i would be confident that alot of coaching goes on from the legal section when it comes to maximising potential claims.

Exactly, in my experience, it is every class creed and colour involved in insurance fraud. Examples range from the likes of "would you ever put a couple of new tyres on the car and build it in to the repair estimate" all the way to staged accidents

Getting big wins like this are important and it can help to keep a lid on fraud, but risk/reward is too high in Ireland. Even when an insurer is awarded costs, there is little chance of every recovering them. So, the money spent in securing a great result hits the bottom line and is passed on to the other policyholders

suicide_circus

Will they be persude for fraud?

Canterelle

Just curious, how do posters know that these scammers are travellers?

Eggs For Dinner

silver2020 wrote: »

This is what is wrong with the system. A solicitor will take 100 cases, they will hope to win 65%.

That 65% in reality pay the costs of the losing 35%.

It like playing a golden guaranteed win slot machine - you will lose on some pulls, but when you win, you win big.

And the law society will do nothing

The legal profession will never accept their part in this. Insurers are no angels, but they are left with no option but to tot up all the outgoings, add operational costs and reasonable profit and divide by the number of policyholders. That's your premium.

All the insurers who operate in Ireland use the same formula Worldwide and premiums are reasonable nearly everywhere else. To the conspiracy theorists out there, you should ask yourselves why have multi-billion international corporations picked the tiny Irish market to gouge customers and not more populated jurisdictions???? Cost of claims. (awards, legal fees, repair costs, fraud and economies of scale from operating in a small market)

freshpopcorn

I know somebody who had a minor scrap/tip with somebody a few years ago.( I was in the car at the time) Honestly it felt like the mirror being pushed in.
Woman and unrestrained kid in the car.
We knew fairly fast who we were dealing with. Within minutes her husband was on the scene to pick up the damaged car in his pick up.

They wanted us to go to the bank and give them a few €1000’s.
Firstly we didn’t have the money and we wouldn’t have.
So, we said we’d sort them out with the repair bill.
She had our details and insurance details.
We contacted the insurance company to report the incident.
After a minute or two the fella said ‘’ Were these people travellers?’’

Monday lunch time rolls on the person checks their phone. They had about twenty missed calls from an angry woman shouting abuse saying she was being ignored. She had the contact details of the insurance company. She wanted cash in hand tough. She was firmly told to deal with the insurance company. She was also blown away with the fact somebody could be at work/college and couldn’t answer their phone.

Her kid ended up being withdrawn and she had anxiety and injuries. The kid had to rushed A&E that evening. She spoke to a nurse but they had no record of it.

When the insurance company looked at the cars. They found her car had being involved in about seven other minor collisions. I guess the others paid up. She also had a stream of bad luck in accdeints.

Meeoow

BattleCorp wrote: »

The main losers here are the insurance company and the solicitors representing the travellers. The only people coming out of this not out of pocket are the insurance company's legal team (and probably the travellers if they don't pay their bills).

The main losers are ourselves who pay insurance premiums. Insurance is a big pot we all pay into, then when there's a claim, it is paid out of that pot. Insurance companies put all premiums up to reflect claims. Their profits are not affected.

Eric Cartman

El Gato De Negocios wrote: »

Absolutely 100%. Its easy to throw mud at travellers, non nationals, any other minority group but the reality is they are far from the biggest issues with false and exaggerated claims, many otherwise "upstanding" members of society are as likely to exaggerate their symptoms for a bigger payout. Anecdotally, i would be confident that alot of coaching goes on from the legal section when it comes to maximising potential claims.

Its a lottery for the poor, its why theres so many personal injury solicitors in bad areas. An inusrance underwriter remarked to me before that somebody in dublin 22 is 55x more likely to have a personal injury claim than somebody living in dublin 4.

The travellers and immigrants are a minority of it because theyre a minority of the population, the welfare class are the majority of it as means testing doesnt go against comp awards

Insurers would like good old servicable cars on their books like a Ford Focus from 2002. They cost them next to nothing to write off as uneconomical write-offs when there is an accident but they can't insure these type cars for new prospective Customers because these are precisely the type of cars which are being used for insurance fraud. The insurance industry are forgoing business because it isn't profitable.
Notwithstanding that they do pool their loses from Insurance Fraud and the rest of society pays for Fraudulent claims.

BattleCorp

BattleCorp wrote: »

..........

The travellers' solicitors pretty much have zero chance of being paid for this case........

That might encourage them not to take on bullsh1t cases going forward.

BattleCorp

silver2020 wrote: »

This is what is wrong with the system. A solicitor will take 100 cases, they will hope to win 65%.

That 65% in reality pay the costs of the losing 35%.

It like playing a golden guaranteed win slot machine - you will lose on some pulls, but when you win, you win big.

And the law society will do nothing

Before I say this, I'm totally against the compo culture etc. but how is a solicitor to know 100% if their client is acting the boll1x?

In many instances, the claimant won't tell their solicitor the full facts and some of these dodgy claims are only exposed as dodgy when inside the court.

Initially all that a solicitor has to go on is their client's word.

Eric Cartman

[Deleted User] wrote: »

Insurers would like good old servicable cars on their books like a Ford Focus from 2002. They cost them next to nothing to write off as uneconomical write-offs when there is an accident but they can't insure these type cars for new prospective Customers because these are precisely the type of cars which are being used for insurance fraud. The insurance industry are forgoing business because it isn't profitable.
Notwithstanding that they do pool their loses from Insurance Fraud and the rest of society pays for Fraudulent claims.

Sadly thats it, cars with a market value under 2.5k are ripe for profiting on compo claims. Most insurers are willing to take older luxury cars as they are usually outside the price reach of the types of people who commit these frauds.

Its another unfortunate case of the poor ruining things for other poor people pricing them out of car ownership by their own selfishness

Cluedo Monopoly

2 Fine Gael TDs tried to do it during the last government. It sets an example. 1 got away with it.

atr2002

Money doesn't make pain go away.
If you're in a crash, the medial bills should get paid from a central fund and the fund gets replenished from the insurance pay out.

Wages should be paid by the employer and the employer gets paid directly from fund, which gets replinished by insurance pay out.

pgj2015

if I try to defraud someone out of 60,000 euro, what will happen? might I go to prison? if so, then why aren't these scumbags facing that? The last thing Irish businsses need now if c**ts like these making false claims against them. We have to start putting these low lifes in prison.

boombang

Canterelle wrote: »

Just curious, how do posters know that these scammers are travellers?

A. I believe Stokes is a traveller name.

B. The photos of the men in the media.

C. Every single detail of the story as reported.

freshpopcorn

I often wonder do insurance companies pay out these claims just so they can have an easy life and not have to deal with these people.

Gatling

Imagine claiming a car rolled over on its roof and there is zero damage to the car or occupants ,
It was like another case where a car involving a similar family had crashed into a stone bridge ,car wrote off injuries to all occupants ,
Only for expert's to point out the tyres were flat and had moss and grass growing on them,they also found evidence the car was towed to the location and pushed into position to make it look like it hit the bridge ,

Former Former Former

The thread title is weird.

RTE aren't "calling out" compo culture, they're reporting on a court case as they always do. They don't even mention the ethnicity or otherwise of the people involved, others have made that assumption.

But RTE have called out compo culture in the past, they did a Prime Time Investigates on it a couple of years ago that was very good, so I don't think the "finally" applies either.

Of all the things wrong with compensation claims in Ireland, RTE are pretty low down the list of issues.