Many of our cases are funded with a No Win No Fee agreement. This means that there’s no financial risk* to you when making a compensation claim.
At the start of your case, we'll discuss funding options with you, advising you which we think is most suitable. If you have legal expenses insurance (LEI), this may be best for you. Legal expenses insurance is included in many household or car insurance policies, so it’s always worth checking whether you’re already covered.
If we think you're best supported by a No Win No Fee* agreement, we'll explain the process clearly. You'll only have to pay anything if your claim is successful – your opponent will pay most of our fees, with the remaining costs coming out of your compensation settlement.
Please visit our No Win No Fee page for more information on how it works.
You’ve three years to make a claim, starting from the date you were injured. If you’re claiming through the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme, you’ve seven years from the date of the injury.
If you were under 18 years of age at the time of the accident, the time limit begins on your 18th birthday. This gives you until your 21st birthday to start a compensation claim.
Time limits don’t apply if you’re claiming on behalf of a loved one who can no longer make their own claim due to their injury. If you’re claiming for a loved one who lost their life, the time limit begins from the date of their death or the date you got the post mortem results.
Compensation amounts vary depending on the unique circumstances of your claim. For this reason, we’ll need to know more about what happened to you before we can give you an idea of how much compensation you’re entitled to.
We’ll calculate compensation based on your current and long-term needs, considering:
- Your injuries
- Modifications you need making to your home
- Specialist care or equipment you need, such as mobility aids
- Loss of earnings
- Loss of any civilian earnings
- Costs of retraining if you can’t return to your previous job
- Loss of pension
- Expenses, such as travel expenses to hospital appointments or for private medical treatment.
Get in touch with us to learn how much your claim could be worth. We’ll arrange a free initial consultation, where you can tell us about what happened to you. In this, we can discuss funding options and how much you could be eligible to claim in compensation.
The Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) is a government scheme that provides compensation for injury, illness and death caused by service on or after 6 April 2005.
If you make a military road traffic accident claim through the AFCS, you won’t need to prove someone else was to blame for the accident. Because of this, you may be able to claim compensation under the AFCS when there’s no legal claim.
However, when you make a claim via the AFCS, they won’t look at how your injuries will affect your life or your financial losses. It’s a tariff-based system, meaning you’re more likely to claim a higher amount of compensation if you make a claim through the courts.
You can make a military road traffic accident claim through the AFCS whether you’re a member of the regular or reserve forces. Both veterans and current military personnel can make a claim through the AFCS.
If you’re awarded compensation through the AFCS, it’ll be paid in a lump sum. The amounts range from a minimum of £1,200 to a maximum award of £570,000.
Making a claim for compensation against the MoD, whether it succeeds or not, can’t impact your career if you choose to stay in the armed forces. We understand this is a concern for many personnel, particularly if they wish to keep working in the military.
While military service comes with a higher level of risk than most professions, the MoD still has a duty of care to avoid putting personnel in avoidable danger. If you’re injured in a road traffic accident caused by negligence on the MoD’s part, they’ve failed in their duty of care, entitling you to claim compensation.
You can’t legally be discriminated against as a result of making a claim against the MoD. Any compensation you’re awarded won’t be taken from your unit’s budget.
How much compensation you receive after a military accident or illness will depend on a few factors related to your condition, its circumstances, and the support and rehabilitation you need.
When calculating your compensation, we'll take the following things into account:
- Your age, rank and specialism
- The pain and suffering caused by your injury or illness
- Loss of your service earnings caused by delayed promotion or medical discharge
- Loss of any civilian earnings
- Loss of pension contributions / resettlement grant
- Loss of a commitment bonus
- Loss of specialist pay and allowances
- Loss of service benefits including loss of subsidised quarters and Learning Credits
- Your care and support needs – both now and in the future
- Modifications to your home
- Mobility aids
Any settlement is paid by the Ministry of Defence, out of a specific budget set aside for these situations. It doesn't come out of your unit’s budget, and it doesn’t come out of the budget which pays for kit, equipment and other resources.
For more information, call us on 0800 022 3321 and we'll be happy to discuss your options in a free initial consultation
No. The MoD understands that they ask service personnel to do a difficult job in dangerous situations – and unfortunately accidents do happen. They recognise and respect the individual's right to bring a legal claim for injuries. Claiming won't affect your entitlement to a pension, either.
The Ministry of Defence should not discriminate against personnel who bring compensation claims after an injury. If you're planning on continuing your service career after your claim, then there are very strict rules about discriminating against someone on this basis.
We can take claims on a no win no fee basis. We offer a range of ways to fund your claim, and we’ll make sure you’re aware of all your options before we start working on your case.
While in some cases a different method of funding may be more suitable, many clients find no win no fee to be most beneficial. This is because you don’t pay any upfront fees and won’t be liable for any costs if your claim doesn’t succeed.
You’ll need a suitable insurance policy to make a no win no fee claim with us. If you haven’t got one already, we can take out a policy for you at no extra cost.
The Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) is a government scheme that provides compensation for injury, illness and death caused by service on or after 6 April 2005.
Unlike a legal claim, the AFCS does not require you to establish that anybody else was at fault. This means that you could be able to claim under the AFCS in circumstances where there is no legal claim.
However, the AFCS is a tariff based system – it does not look at the way your injury will affect you as an individual, or what financial losses you will actually incur. For this reason legal claims made through the courts will almost always result in significantly more compensation than claims made through the AFCS.
It's accepted that members of the armed forces have no choice where they're deployed, or in the activities they're required to undertake. This means that compensation could be paid from the scheme for injuries caused in a number of ways, including those that occur during:
- Operations
- Training
- Service-approved sports
- Exercise to maintain military fitness
Both regular and reserve forces can apply for compensation through the AFCS, whether you're still serving or a veteran.
Compensation is paid as a lump sum on a tariff-based system determined by the severity of your injuries, and can range from a minimum of £1,200 to a maximum award of £570,000. You could claim through the AFCS as well as claiming through the courts.
You can find out more about the AFCS here, or alternatively you can contact our solicitors on 0800 022 3321 for a free consultation if you have any specific questions.
Our military injury team have been helping service men and women claim against the MoD since 1987. The team includes several former military personnel, and includes:
- Simon Harrington, who has over 15 years of experience bringing claims against the MoD. Simon specialises in cold injury claims, having helped hundreds of service personnel to claim over £10 million in compensation for their injuries.
- Andrew Buckham, who served in the Army for seven years before joining Irwin Mitchell. Andrew specialises in claims relating to serious and fatal injuries. He is also a trustee for the Defence Medical Welfare Service
- Amanda Marsh, who has over 20 years experience acting for clients with serious personal injuries. Amanda has 'encyclopedic knowledge of the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme.' (Legal 500)
Meet our military injury team.
