The Law Society has stood their ground after the Association of British Insurers (ABI) called for them to withdraw their “Don’t Get Mugged By An Insurer” campaign, claiming that the insurance industry had a cheek criticising them for name calling after the ABI‘s own press conference referred to all lawyers as ‘ambulance chasers’.
The £300,000 ad campaign has caused quite a stir amongst head figures from within the insurance industry with ABI general director writing to the president of the Law Society, Nick Fluck earlier this week requesting that the campaign be pulled claiming that it was “little more than public name-calling”.
Mr Fluck has now responded to the letter saying: “We do not consider the campaign to be a gross error of judgement, but rather that it communicates the important ongoing message to consumers. I have no plans to abandon it.”
The campaign focuses around the revelation that often when a personal injury victim accepts an insurers offer without taking on legal representation they often receive three times less the amount than someone who took it through the courts.
In response the ABI have claimed that this data, which is based on the Financial Services Authority (FSA) research obtained via a Freedom of Information Act, was limited, which Mr Fluck has pointed out in his response that this was because of inconsistent and incomplete responses from the ABI members themselves.
Indeed the real reason that the FSA‘s research has been described as inconclusive is because of the poor level of co-operation of the insurance industry and Mr Fluck suggested to the ABI that a good way to solve the accuracy or inaccuracy of this debate was for new research to be carried out with the full co-operation of the insurance industry.
He wrote in his letter to the ABI: “The FSA determined there was a real risk in this instance despite the paucity of data provided by the insurance industry.
“I do not accept that the campaign is based on highly misleading and selective use of statistics. If anything, using the few other statistical findings from the review would only emphasise the point made in the campaign, for example, the finding that only 3-4% of consumers reject the first offer from an insurer, implying possible consumer detriment.
“It is important to note, as I am sure you will agree, that as insurers hold all the relevant data, the report is the only publicly available data capture there is.”
This makes for further interesting reading in regards to the lengths the insurance industry will go to in order to get their own way. This lack of co-operation in regards to important figures as well as the fact they themselves quoted nine year old figures in their evidence to the Transport Select Committee’s whiplash inquiry shows just how untrustworthy the evidence from the insurance industry really is.
Image source
1. Wikipedia; https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law_Society_of_England_and_Wales#/media/File:Law_Society_of_England_and_Wales.svg
