Injury claim referral fees to be banned

Referral fees being discussed at accident scene

At last the government is going to clean up the matter of so-called referral fees. From insurance companies to those who pick up the cars from accidents, the whole aspect of car crashes is infected with spivs and those on the make. Solicitor spivs, police spivs, insurance spivs, there is no part of this that hasn't got a finger in this pie.

Legitimate claims should be handled by insurance companies. Everyone else should only be involved if they have a proper reason to be. Justice Minister Jonathan Djanogly has said that honest motorists were seeing their premiums hiked as insurers covered the costs of ever more compensation claims. "It's certainly a racket. It's a sick culture that we have to turn round."

If we are to get back to honest business we need to root out the spivs once and for all. I find it very hard to understand why the police, legal profession and insurance companies have been quite happy to be involved in the racket for so long. It just goes to show how far a racket culture goes.

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Corruption in Britain - Personal injury insurance racket

Jack Straw says he has only recently come across this immoral sideline of the insurance industry and agencies associated with aspects of motor insurance. Basically the racket, or dirty secret as it has been called, is for insurance companies to sell information to ambulance chasing lawyers, injury claims companies and other such organisations. The practice of passing on information is called referral fees because the claims guys pay for the information. This is so some call centre operative can phone a person who has had an accident and suggest they claim bigtime for whiplash or any other "injury". A stiff neck will do. Some are encouraged to claim even if no injury occurred. Mr. Straw was on the Today programme. "It's become a huge racket," he said. "The insurance companies are complicit in this. They should and could have said this is outrageous." Of course they didn't and they won't. A weasel wordsmith, with the name of Nick Starling, gave a limp response. He basically said that unless the practice was banned his members would carry on. Whether it was immoral, amoral or any other moral negative, he saw no reason to stop it until the law said no. And who would necessarily believe that his lot would stop then.

The whole practice stinks. There is now a whole set of people leaching off others so that a nefarious income can be made. Mr.Starling should live up to his name and peck at this grubby practice right now. I hope the government outlaws these rackeetering spivs, who help to increase insurance claims. Proper compensation for proper accidents is something nobody can gainsay. But bordering on criminal activity? That's something completely different.

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