Despite safer cars, better roads, and recent decreases in road traffic accidents, there has been a 42% increase in bodily injury claims against insurers since 2001.

Personal injury claims costs have rocketed to almost 50% of all claims costs, and this has not gone unnoticed by the government. In a new report, Personal Injury Claims Market in the UK, Celent looks at the state of the UK motor market and at the possible impact of the Lord Jackson review, which has tabled wide-reaching and extensive regulation changes to make this system fairer and more transparent for all parties. Several of these proposals, including abolishing success fees, were accepted by the government last month.

The report also considers the role of personal injury estimating solutions, which can used by an insurance company’s desk adjusters and sometimes by its legal department and representatives. These solutions can perform some or all of five functions: indicating whether a reported injury is credible, given the circumstances of an accident; to what degree medical and rehabilitative treatment is appropriate; an assessment of comparative fault; a range for a general damages (pain and suffering) settlement; and support for negotiations with the injured third party and its legal representatives.

“One primary reason cited by insurers to use such estimation tools is to achieve higher levels of consistency in evaluating general damages payments for personal injury claims.” says Catherine Stagg-Macey, Senior Vice President with Celent’s Insurance group and author of the report.

This report takes a look at the state of the UK motor market, and underlying issues of profitability. It summarizes key points of the Lord Jackson review and reviews and discusses the role of personal injury claims estimation tools.

This 18-page report contains three figures and three tables.