Carpenters’ Scully calls for claims portal review

On the third year anniversary of the Official Injury Claims Portal launch, the MIB congratulated themselves, posting about the so called achievements of the portal.

At Carpenters, we manage more claims via the portal than the next three organisations combined, and so we are well placed to provide an informed view on the reality of the portal’s performance.

We were the first (and remain one of the few) firms to fully integrate with the OICP. This required significant effort, time and cost that others could not match.

We should not be celebrating the third anniversary of the process.  Instead we need an urgent review and immediate reform.

The portal cost an eye watering £30m pre-launch, and millions more since. However, it has not delivered value for money to the industry. 

Without exception, the industry has experienced wide spread and persistent technical issues. In fact, contrary to its intent, consumers are now missing out on the compensation to which they are entitled.

Whiplash Reform Objectives

The objectives of the reforms were to reduce the frequency, cost and lifecycle of claims, and the Portal was designed to enable litigants in person to represent themselves.

The initial failings can to an extent be attributed to the reforms being rolled out in 2021 without adequate testing and sign-off. Unfortunately however the problems have been more serious than launch related issues lasting 12 to 18 months.

Whether the Whiplash Reforms have been successful, and whether the portal has achieved its aims, are two different questions.  The number of injury claims has certainly reduced, and the cost per injury claim has fallen, but these points are unrelated to the operation of the OICP which has had a detrimental impact on consumers:

• Lifecycles increase month on month, and are longer than an equivalent Claims Portal claim
• There is a backlog of claims to settle. Less than 30% of submitted claims have settled within the Portal
• Individuals are not running their own claims. The Ministry of Justice’s pre-go live estimate for Lip uptake was 30%. The official figure is 10%, but that includes third party capture, so the real figure is believed to be 3%, some 90% lower than the MOJ’s estimate.
• The process is confusing and overwhelming.
  • The protocol 150% longer than for the claims portal.
  • The Association of HM’s District Judges were critical in their submission to the Justice Select Committee, highlighting that the rules were overly complex and even District Judges were struggling to understand the system, resulting in considerably longer hearings than for MOJ portal stage three.
• Those Lips that do use it, cannot do so without support, with 85% of all calls into the OICP’s customer support centre coming from Lips.

The consumer experience is much worse on OICP than on the MOJ portal, where claims are resolved quickly, with fewer touch points and less friction. 

Design flaws and technical issues have led to 32 OICP releases, compared to only seven across 14 years on claims portal, with these costs picked up by claimant solicitors and compensators.

Procedural and technical challenges

Carpenters has registered, settled more OIC claims than any other firm.

Our market-leading performance has been achieved by the skill of our people, and through our sustained and substantial investment in technology.  

We were the first (and remain one of the few) firms to fully integrate with the OICP. This required significant effort, time and cost that others could not match. More than 50% of law firms have exited or are considering exiting the motor market, reducing consumer choice and access to justice.

Is anyone listening?

Carpenters has often been a lone voice in publicly highlighting the problems with the process. There appeared to be a reluctance in some parts of the sector to acknowledge the extent of tech problems being faced.

It was reassuring that following a call for evidence in February 2023, the Justice Select Committee expressed concerns that we’d been vocal about from the start, and called upon the MOJ to investigate and set out steps to address the following key points:

1. Low number of individuals using the portal.
2. Integration difficulties experienced by claimant representatives.
3. High volume of unresolved claims.
4. Time taken to resolve claims.

The MOJ’s November 2023 reply did not instil confidence, reporting the service is “working well” and presenting nothing substantive on how the identified issues would be resolved.

The roundtable sessions held at MIB’s offices in summer 2023 were thwarted by MOJ as they failed to listen to the experts, rejecting all proposed changes, save some minor technical changes.

Way forward

The OICP was purported to be frictionless and easy to navigate but we can attest that it is far from the case.  

That’s why we strongly advocate for streamlining the PAP to decrease friction and satellite litigation, which will reduce lifecycles.

So, if we had the power to make changes, what would we do?

Areas that need to be addressed urgently are:

• The need for a split trial when liability is disputed.
• The restriction on recoverable medical fees, which makes it difficult to pursue a claim for non-standard injuries.
• The inability to recover advocate’s fees at court, which gives compensators a huge advantage.

Carpenters call for prime minister Keir Starmer’s new government to create an independent governance board, as we see on the successful claims portal.

We call for the Lord Chancellor to urgently evaluate the previous Lord Chancellor’s statutory review on the fixed tariff. 

We have seen record inflation since the OICP’s inception and expect the review to recognise that within recommended uplifts.

For the good of the industry and the consumer, it’s time to listen and act or risk sliding even further into chaos, cost and inefficiency.