Personal injury news roundup: 7 days ended 13 Jan 2015:
When it comes to personal injury compensation claims fraud, sometimes all you need to do to find some is to just ride the bus.
Yes I know I’m not making any sense yet, but bear with me: a massive crash for cash accident claims fraud ring has been uncovered in Chester spanning hundreds of claimants. The ring was organised by a John Smith who ran a claims management company known as Swift Accident Solutions, and it involved a whole cadre of bus drivers and passengers that were all in on the action.
Yes, you read that right: even the bloody bus drivers were involved. Can you imagine that? You’re just minding your own business, riding public transport because the doors fell off your Vauxhall Corsa or something similar and your bus ends up in a rear-end shunt that leaves countless passengers clutching the backs of their necks. The words on everyone’s lips are now “whiplash claim,” and it seems a bit suspect to you considering you’re fine but apparently the rest of the passengers have the weakest necks in Britain.
Unbelievable, isn’t it? This Smith decided he had figured out a way to make a killing in the personal injury claims sector by gaming the system and generating staged accidents. Thankfully something like this couldn’t happen as easily today; the incident stems from several years ago, well before the referral fee ban was put into place, and referring possible “claimants” to personal injury solicitors was the main source of Smith’s income.
So yes, thankfully it’s much harder to pull off massive criminal schemes like this in the current regulatory landscape, but that’s not to say there aren’t other enterprising fraudsters and criminals out there trying to scam someone or another out of their hard-earned money. It’s typical of human nature I suppose: you offer someone the normal path to affluence – hard work, et cetera – and hold that up against an easy way to make some cash that could end them up in jail or worse, and altogether too many idiots will take what looks like the “easy” way to fortune. Selfish prigs the lot of them!