Chasing Success
What can you do if you're unhappy with the final order?
So the final order's been made but it's not exactly what you wanted. So what can you do? Well, what you can do is you can appeal to the court within a certain period of time. And you can appeal on one of two grounds. The first is mistake of law, a fundamental mistake of law. And the other one is procedural difficulties, if anything procedurally has gone wrong. And you can already tell by the big words that I am using that you might well, if you're going down this appeal route, get some legal advice on board. But there are routes that you can go down to appeal against order if you are not happy with it entirely.
What happens if the case is won but the defendant can't pay?
We always said that one of the things you need to take into account when you are starting a claim or thinking about claim is, 'what is the likelihood the defendant be able to meet any claim make against him.' Will he be able to pay'. If he has no money he will certainly won't be able to. Now if your defendant cannot pay but does has some cash/assets. There are many roads you can go down but all will cause you money. You can apply to the courts. Remember the court won't be active here. You need to kick all the way along. So if you get your order and want to enforce, you need to talk to the court to get the appropriate order. There are ways for the defendant, you can file for bankruptcy, income stream you can tapped into and warrant of execution.
is there help If I can't afford my claim?
The wheels of justice are open to everybody - at least that's the theory. If you have no money, there are different categories that you can talk about. Let's talk about the expenses, first of all. There are expenses associated with taking legal action, and the first one's with the claim form. Then, if you go along and you have to have witnesses, medical reports, professional negligence cases, expert reports, and that kind of thing, if you have no money and you win your case, then the defendant may well be audited to pay your costs. That's all well and good, but there're no guarantees here - you might be stuck with those costs and compensation for the loss of work. You need to know that, if you have no money, that the justice system is open to you. The courts know this and there are rules which say that if you think that paying the expenses associated with the court proceedings would cause you undue hardship, then you won't need to pay them. In a nutshell, you won't have to pay them provided that you meet certain financial criteria. What we have in this country is a civil legal aid, and what that means is that you can, in certain circumstances, get some legal assistance. You won't have to pay for it and you can get legal assistance in terms of preparing for your claim, determining whether you've actually got a claim, and the strength of that claim. You can also get legal assistance for representation in court, should it go for hearing and should it go to trial. The way that you do that is that you need to fit into certain financial 'pots', which won't be available to you if you have an income of over 2,500 pounds a month, and it won't be available to you if you have savings or capital of over 8,000 pounds. If you come within those parameters, you might well be able to get some form of legal assistance, and your best route is to go to your local solicitors who will be able to advise you on that front.
Should i consider using a no win no fee comapny to avoid legal costs?
The only thing I want to say in addition to that, is it's all well and good with what we call a no win-no fee basis of dealing with cases. What that means is that solicitors basically say I'll act for you, and as the strength of your case is so strong, I'll act for you free of charge and when you win, I'll get my fees from the defendant'. This will however, include an element of a success fee, which will cut into the amount that you would have otherwise got. That's a way of getting around having no cash to have legal proceedings, and these no win-no fees arrangements are great. However these 'no win, no fee' arrangements are not for crime, family or criminal cases, but in certain circumstances they are fine. But what you mustn't forget is that they are great if you win. If you lose, the risk is that the defendant may well claim against you for your fees and you'll be hit with other expenses. There is a way around that and your solicitor can help you with this and that is to get after the fact insurance, after the event insurance and that will make sure that pretty much you've sort of tied up in terms of entering into your claim, not withstanding the fact that you don't have any cash. So there are ways that you can get around it.
