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We acted for a client who had suffered an injury due to clinical negligence. He instructed solicitors to issue proceedings against a hospital trust. The solicitors prevaricated as they did not consider that the client had a strong case but in so doing, missed the limitation date so that the client lost the chance to sue the hospital.
The solicitors had little option but to admit liability, but the argument was the level of damages. They said that the client had only ever had a 25% chance of recovering against the hospital. We successfully argued that the solicitors had lost the client even that change and so he recovered 25% of the damages he might have received from the hospital had the case gone ahead in a timely fashion.
Our clients were unable to sell their house because of their solicitor’s alleged failure to carry out the correct searches when buying the property. In particular, they had not considered the earlier planning applications, and which showed that the mains drains had been built over. However, the clients had not had a building survey completed as recommended. They recognised this weakness in their case, but their losses were considerable as the house’s value was severely compromised.
After reviewing the core documents from the previous solicitor’s file, we were able to advise fairly quickly that although we could bring a claim against the solicitors for the clients, there were considerable risks of doing so which we outlined in detail. In this case, the most significant risk was that they had not obtained a proper pre-purchase survey as advised at the time. We advised that it was going to be an expensive case to pursue and if they failed in whole or in part and therefore could not recover their costs, they risked losing more than they might gain.
The clients then had a clear picture of their options and could make a commercial decision on whether to take the matter further. With our help, the clients decided not to take the matter further on an economical basis. Instructing us early in the process and so only expending modest sums on legal costs meant that the clients could use their available funds to put the house right.
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