The accident
A carer contacted our specialist team of personal injury lawyers following a severe dog bite injury.
As he left the house of the lady who he had been to see, a dog ran out from the open door of the next-door property. It turned out that the door had been left open because a guest had recently arrived.
The dog bite injury
The dog ran towards our client and bit him on the arm, leaving him with cuts and puncture wounds. He had to go straight to the hospital to have the wounds cleaned, treated and dressed and he was also given a tetanus injection. He was left with permanent scarring.
As a result of the injuries, our client was unable to work for two weeks and his pay was reduced.
How we helped claim compensation
We sent a detailed letter of claim to the owner of the dog, explaining what had happened and why we considered him to be responsible for the dog attack. The claim was then passed to his insurers who investigated the claim but denied fault for the injury on the basis that they considered our client was the author of his own misfortune, the dog apparently never having done anything like this before.
Using our significant experience of claiming compensation for other victims of dog bite attacks, we presented further arguments to the insurers as to why we considered the owner of the dog was responsible for our client injuries./They finally backed down and admitted fault on behalf of the dog owner.
As part of our specialist injury compensation service, we arranged for our client to be examined by a consultant plastic surgeon. The medical expert produced a report detailing the injuries suffered and providing an opinion as to what the future had in store for the residual scarring. We also worked with our client’s employer to obtain the information necessary to calculate and prove his loss of earnings.
We collated details of all financial losses suffered by our client and sent them to the insurers along with the medical evidence and a series of photographs he had taken during the course of the claim, documenting the course of recovery of the wounds and development of the scars.
The insurers made an initial offer of £2,650 to settle the claim. We considered the various aspects of the claim and advised our client that the offer was much lower than he could expect to be awarded at court. We recommended that he reject it, which he did.
We continued negotiating with the dog owner’s insurers. After a series of small increments in their opening offer, we achieved a significantly improved figure of £7,000 compensation for the dog bite claim, which our client was extremely pleased with.