A CTP lawyer for Kariong, when your claim needs one

A NSW CTP claim can have two stages. The first is statutory benefits: weekly payments and treatment and care, which most injured people can claim regardless of fault. The second is a common law damages claim, a lump sum available only if another driver was at fault, you weren't mostly at fault and your injury is more than a threshold injury. In the first stage, a lawyer's work is usually about disputes. In the second, it's usually the whole claim.

Much of a lawyer's early work is reading. They go through the claim form, your Certificates of Fitness and every decision letter, then work out which rules fit your accident date and what, if anything, is worth challenging. Sometimes the honest advice is that the claim is on track and needs nothing more from them. That is a useful answer too, and a good lawyer will give it plainly.

If you were wholly or mostly at fault, there's generally no damages claim to make, and statutory benefits are generally limited to the first 52 weeks. Unless you dispute the fault finding, a lawyer may add little: the insurer pays what the scheme allows, and SIRA's free CTP Legal Advisory Service can answer statutory benefits questions. It's different if you think the fault decision is wrong, because that finding shapes everything else.

Two rules shape what a CTP lawyer can charge. First, the Motor Accident Injuries Regulation sets maximum costs for the stages of a claim, and those amounts are indexed every year. Second, in statutory benefits matters the insurer pays whatever costs the rules allow, and for some disputes nothing is recoverable. Ask any lawyer to explain in writing how their fees would be worked out for your matter.

Disputes aren't the only trigger; stakes matter as well. If your injuries are serious, if you can't return to your old work, or if someone close to you died in the crash, the difference between a well-prepared claim and a rushed one can be significant. Those are the claims where many people choose to talk to a lawyer early, even before anything has gone wrong.

SIRA pays for a free CTP Legal Advisory Service that answers statutory benefits questions about accidents since 1 December 2017, and CTP Assist on 1300 656 919 can put you through to it. It's a sensible first stop when you're unsure whether a decision about your benefits is right. Where its help stops is usually where an independent lawyer comes in, and our claim check can tell you whether you've reached that point.

Recovering from an injury is hard enough without travelling to meetings. CTP work suits remote contact well. Much of a claim happens on paper and by phone, from the first review request to negotiations with the insurer, so many people deal with the whole process without ever sitting in a lawyer's office.

If a decision has gone against you, the internal review window is generally 28 days from receiving it. That's the deadline people most often miss while they wait to see whether the insurer changes its mind. Outside 3 months for statutory benefits and still haven't claimed? Speak to a lawyer straight away, because late claims are accepted only in limited circumstances.