Yesterday, I got knocked off my bike.
A silver 57-plate Mercedes mvoed over to the left straight into where I was which sent my front-wheel sideways and me over the handlebars.
I’ve got a few injuries: cut and bruised fingers, grazed elbow, grazed side, bruised ribs and a shoulder I can’t move (meaning I can’t even dress myself properly).
The bike seems to be pretty OK, needs some adjustment to put things back in their place, but haven’t had it checked over properly yet…
Now I have a real dilemma. Do I go down the ambulance-chasing insurance-threatening normally-scamful compensation route?
Yes I’ve had a couple of days of pain (so far), I don’t want to get back on my bike and I have had to work from home, but does the other guy deserve to have his insurance go up, which has a knock-on effect to everyone else with car insurance.
One view is that he wasn’t paying enough attention and does deserve the extra premiums, but on the other hand it will likely cost him for years and the insurance companies will be the overall winners. I already regret how much I have to pay for my insurance, so anything that leads to an insurance claim for me looks painful, but I can see the macro effect of everyone doing this.
The other side of me thinks “well if everyone else is doing it, why not me?” I mean if my premiums are going to go up anyway, why shouldn’t I get some cash out of the back of it?
And the funny thing is I think most people when involved in an accident think of view number 2. Nothing about the actual pain or loss of earnings, just how much can they get. This is why the term “whipcash” has come about – medically it is very hard to prove or disprove whiplash so people just have to “put it on” for a bit and they get free money (or more – see the link below). And this is where my position becomes clearer – I’m not just after a quick bit of cash (although it would be useful, my fence blew over in the wind yesterday), I would rather receive fair compensation based on real injuries and problems than inflate some claim.
HM Solicitors iPad offer
For this reason, I won’t be visiting any claim lawyers until after I am fully better (if I do at all) as I don’t want to have any injuries exagerated. I am keeping a record of how I feel and what I can do, with accompanying photos, which I can use as evidence if necessary.
My ideal scenario would be that I am fully better tomorrow, and the driver would be willing to help me get my fence fixed as a measure of good will.
Let’s see what happens.
