CLAIMS RECORDS
CENTRAL COMPUTER SYSTEMS
RESPONSIBILITY
Q What can I get into people’s heads to improve our claims record, now that the insurance renewal is coming round?
A Let’s just focus on one area. Let’s think about time limits, which are one of the riskiest aspects of all.
Q Why, what’s so important about them?
A For a start, there are so many of them. One of the major professional indemnity insurers recently reported that over half of their personal injury related claims result from problems over time limits, and it wasn’t very far behind in other fields, such as contentious employment.
Q What makes them so dangerous?
A So often they are questions of black and white. Just as you can’t be almost unique, so you can’t nearly have made a time limit. You either have, or have not. In a recent case, Beasley v National Grid [2008] EWCA Civ 742, the Court of Appeal decided that a complaint of unfair dismissal presented 88 seconds late was out of time. Lord Justice Tuckey accepted that this imposed a harsh regime, but added “So
