Leading defendant law firm, Kennedy’s, has claimed that there are signs that claimant solicitors are making deliberate errors to ensure that employment and public liability cases, drop out of the claims portal.
The accusations come on the back of the revelation that the number of cases staying in the electronic portal is increasing. with the amount of EL/PL claims being submitted via the process increasing to 60,000 since July 2013.
Figures released by Kennedys show a month-on-month increase in the number of claims entering the EL/PL portal, which they have put down to legal firms beginning to become familiar with the process. However, there are still concerns, as 50% of EL, 41% of PL and 35% of EL disease claims, are still dropping out of the process.
Talking about their findings, Kennedy’s said: “We are seeing certain behaviours emerge, which suggest a deliberate attempt to remove claims from the portal and no doubt seek to enjoy enhanced fixed recoverable costs.
“This includes, for example, submission of CNF‘s without completion of mandatory fields, such as national insurance details.”
Kennedys’ findings also showed that as many as 70,000 new claims were now entering the road traffic accident claims portal each month. This is recognised as a notable increase and indicates that the initial problems with the revised process, have now been overcome.