Personal injury - watch out for the name and shame

The number of personal injury claims in some parts of the UK has overtaken that in the USA, known across the world for its culture of crazy litigation.

No wonder today there’s a brewing row over who is responsible for the claims explosion, revealed yesterday in a report by the Institute and Faculty of Actuaries.

The lawyers and the Claims Standards Council blame the claims management councils, but also heavily castigate insurers for third-party capture.

The insurers, of course, say that they are only protecting their own backs with third-party capture. Meanwhile, they blame the ambulance-chasing mentality of solicitors and their sky-high fees.

So it’s difficult to know who’s to blame for the parlous state of the UK compensation culture.

But when insurers and personal lines brokers sell claims data up to three years old to marketing companies so that they can eke out a personal injury claim, it’s an exploitative practice.

The only people who are going to claim whiplash injury after three years are those with a pretty weak moral compass who are tempted by the lure of easy money.

Moreover, the telemarketing tricks leave customers feeling uneasy. The most basic technique is to blast out 20 calls all at once to old claimants and the first person to pick up gets to speak the marketers. The rest of the lines go dead.

Just Googling this practice reveals how customers are left feeling unnerved by creepy silent calls, sometimes several times a day. But to the telemarketeers it doesn’t really matter, because somewhere down the line the customer did or didn’t tick a box on a web page, meaning they’re fair game.

The bottom line is that the practice of mining that far back stinks. Insurers and personal lines brokers certainly had been offering claims as far back as three years, although it is unclear how many firms are contiuning with that level of history.

The day can’t come soon enough when insurers and personal lines brokers involved are publicly named and shamed.