Published in the Coffs Coast Advocate on 11 July 2015 by Jack Blaxland.
James was driving his motor vehicle on a Saturday morning and was stationary at a set of traffic lights when a motor vehicle collided with the rear of his vehicle at a fairly high speed causing his vehicle to catapult forward. Immediately after the accident James felt pain in his neck.
The police and ambulance attended the scene of the accident. As James was experiencing significant pain in his neck he was given a neck brace and taken to the hospital where x-rays and scans were undertaken which fortunately showed there was no fracture but he was advised that he had a whiplash injury to his neck.
James consulted a solicitor the week after his accident and he was informed by his solicitor that he should file an accident notification form within 28 days to entitle him to treatment expenses and lost earnings up to $5,000 and that he would need to file a full claim form within 6 months from the date of the accident. James solicitor advises him that as the police attended the scene and prepared a report it would not be necessary for James to contact the police to report the accident.
Unfortunately James was not able to attend to his work as a builder because of his neck injury for many months and as a consequence he suffered a significant loss.
A claim form was lodged by the solicitor within the 6 month limitation period.
James was advised by his solicitor that his claim would be made up of a number of different components relating to damages including economic loss being his loss of income as a result of his inability to work but also including what is called non-economic loss (pain and suffering and loss of enjoyment of life) but only if his level of impairment exceeds 10% whole person impairment.
Fortunately for James his neck injury did substantially improve over a period of 12 to 18 months and he was able to settle his claim for damages relating to loss of income and his treatment expenses together with an amount for costs in accordance with the prescribed costs.
