How we work

Keeping you up to date about your claim

This is your compensation claim.  The outcome greatly affects your quality of life and adequacy of income. We know this and we are here to help you make the best legal decisions possible, taking into account the nature of your injuries, how they occurred and your unique personal circumstances.

You can rest easy knowing that nothing happens without your approval, and you are kept fully informed and up to date about the status of your case.

We usually provide updates every four weeks at a minimum, and even more regularly at certain points of your claim. This is a practice Oszkar learnt when acting for insurance companies who always want to know where each claim is at every month. That means that with Denes Lawyers, the insurance company isn’t the first to know about the status of your claim.

We tell you how much your claim is worth: our Gold Standard legal advice

When we have obtained all of the medical evidence and other relevant factual and expert evidence we provide you with a detailed written advice.

This includes a breakdown of how we calculate your damages award. For example, we tell you how much compensation you should receive individually for lost wages (past and future), lost superannuation, pain and suffering, the cost of any future medical expenses, home care, interest and so on.

When a judge awards you damages, this is how they would calculate it; when the insurance company works out how much they are liable to compensate you, this is also how they would calculate it.  In cases where there is more than one insurance company involved, we calculate the proportionate amount they should each compensate you for.

We provide you with this Gold Standard detailed written advice in relation to your personal injury compensation claim in which we tell you how much we think your claim is worth based on all of the evidence. No other law firm promises this.

But what does this mean in practice?

This means that before the insurance company makes you an offer at the negotiation stage (e.g. at a compulsory conference, mediation, or even before trial) we will have already told you (in writing) how much we think your claim is worth, and why.

How does this benefit me? 

• Firstly, you know where you stand with your claim. You will know whether your claim is likely to be successful and any risks or issues that we will need to manage along the way.
• You will have a good idea whether the insurance company is making you a good or bad offer without having to worry about whether or not your lawyer is underselling your personal injury claim (as unfortunately this does happen at some law firms).
• When we advise you how much your claim is worth, we are saying, based upon our knowledge and experience, how much compensation we expect a judge would award you in compensation for your injuries at trial. This means if the insurance company offers you compensation that is less than what your claim is worth , you know that there are good prospects that you can get more compensation if you proceed further with your claim (and either extract a more suitable amount of compensation from the insurance company or from the Court).
• Because our advice is comprehensive, after reading it you know that we fully understand how the injury occurred, how it has affected you and how it will affect you in the future. You will be confident that we have properly considered your claim and the relevant legal issues. That is, you know that “we get it” and we are along for the journey with you.
• We provide you with our Gold Standard legal advice well in advance of any negotiations. This is to give you time to read it, speak to your spouse or partner about it, understand our advice and ask us any questions.
• We will never tell you how much we calculate your compensation claim to be worth without committing our advice to you in writing.
• We will never blindside you on the day of negotiations with how much we calculate your compensation claim to be worth so that you don’t have time to make a fully informed decision about whether or not to accept an offer of compensation.

Going to Court

You may have already heard that the majority of personal injury compensation claims do not proceed to trial. This is because the legislation requires the parties to comply with pre-Court steps and to negotiate prior to commencing legal proceedings.

However, unlike many firms, we actually go to Court (and often).  For example, the insurance company may take too long to progress your claim and cause undue delay. Or, they might not co-operate and refuse to give us documents or information relevant to your claim that we are entitled to see. In these types of situations, we get a Court order which compels the insurance company to comply with their obligations – and quickly.  This is how we can progress your claim as quickly and efficiently as possible.

Our approach is that we prepare every claim as if it went to trial. Why? Because if the defendant thinks we are not prepared to go all the way, they are never going to offer you fair compensation.

In the majority of cases, once a matter is well prepared, it is possible to reach a sensible out-of-Court settlement. We always advise you if it makes sense to settle or to continue your claim by beginning Court proceedings.

However, the simple truth is that some claims do need to proceed to trial. If this is necessary, we have the expertise and the resources to go to trial to achieve a successful outcome for you.