Welcome to our guide providing top tips for making a knee injury compensation claim. If you’ve suffered a knee injury in an accident at work, on the road or in a public place because of someone else’s negligence, we explain when it’s possible to seek compensation.
Read on to discover what evidence will help your personal injury claim and how a compensation settlement can address financial losses as well as pain and suffering. Furthermore, we cover need-to-know time limit information for a compensation claim.
Finally, find out about how an expert personal injury solicitor from our panel could represent you on a No Win No Fee basis.
You can get even more guidance beyond this article by getting in touch with our dedicated team of advisors. They can answer your questions and evaluate your potential claim, all at no charge.
Come and speak to us today through any of these avenues:
- Call 020 8050 2736.
- Contact us through our web form.
- Use the live chat option on this page.
Jump To A Section
- When Are You Eligible To Make A Knee Injury Claim?
- Top Tips For Knee Injury Compensation Claims
- How Much Knee Injury Claim Compensation Could You Receive?
- How Long Do You Have To Claim Knee Injury Compensation?
- Use No Win No Fee Solicitors To Claim Knee Injury Compensation
- More Resources About Claiming Compensation For A Knee Injury
When Are You Eligible To Make A Knee Injury Claim?
If you’re at work, using the road or visiting a public place, a third party owes you a duty of care. This section will discuss who owes such a duty in each place. If you are hurt in an accident in any of those spaces because a third party failed to meet their duty of care, you could sue them for knee injury compensation.
The eligibility criteria for a personal injury can be summarised as follows:
- A third party owed you a duty of care.
- They breached this duty.
- It led to an accident where you suffered physical and/or psychological harm.
Our panel’s expert personal injury solicitors are experienced in helping knee injury claims succeed. You can learn more and ask about claiming when you call the number above.
Accidents At Work
An employer’s legal duty of care is handed down to them by Section 2 of the Health and Safety at Work etc. Act 1974. They are required to take reasonable and practicable steps that keep employees safe while working. An employee might make an accident at work claim if they suffered a knee injury because an employer didn’t uphold their duty. For example:
- An employee was asked to operate a forklift truck despite knowing that they had not been trained. The employee sustained serious injuries in a forklift accident caused by losing control of the vehicle, including permanent knee damage.
- A workplace failed to carry out a risk assessment of a manual handling task. The assessment would have identified that one employee could not handle the load by themselves, but the task was still given to that employee. They suffered a significant knee injury caused by the excessive strain of attempting to carry their cargo.
Road Traffic Accidents
Knee injury compensation could also be claimed in the event of a road traffic accident. Road users have a duty to keep each other safe while using the roads, which they can achieve by following the guidance and laws outlined in the Road Traffic Act 1988 and the Highway Code.
If an accident occurred and caused you harm because of a fellow road user’s breach of duty, you could make a knee injury compensation claim. Here are a couple of examples:
- A car accident caused by a drunk driver exceeding the speed limit and hitting a turning car in a head-on collision left a passenger with significant pain and ligament damage in their knee.
- A pedestrian crossing the road was struck by a driver who was looking at their phone while driving. Among their various leg injuries were permanent damage to knee ligaments and a shattered knee cap that meant they needed knee replacement surgery.
Accidents In A Public Place
In some cases, it is possible to make a compensation claim for a knee injury caused by a public accident. Occupiers of public spaces, which can include businesses, local councils or even individuals, must adhere to the Occupiers’ Liability Act 1957. As such, they need to take any measures that keep visitors to their premises reasonably safe.
Not taking such measures could lead to an accident the occupier is liable for, such as in these illustrative cases:
- Staff in a supermarket were made aware of a spill in one of the aisles but did not clean it up or signpost the spillage. A customer who slips, trips and falls on the wet floor was later diagnosed with a torn cartilage and damage to their knee joint.
- A theme park failed to regularly check and maintain rides, missing a fault with the safety bar of one ride. A customer’s leg was trapped under the faulty bar and they suffered severe knee injuries, including permanent ligament injuries.
Whether your claim is for a workplace injury, a road traffic accident or a public place incident caused by occupier negligence, we can help. Just call today to learn if you can claim knee injury compensation with the professional guidance of one of our panel’s personal injury claim solicitors.
Top Tips For Knee Injury Compensation Claims
The most important thing to remember about knee injury compensation claims is that they require evidence. You’ll need to prove that an accident occurred and that a third party was at fault, as well as showing the extent of the pain and suffering that resulted from it.
With that in mind, our top tip is to collect as many of the below forms of evidence as possible:
- Footage from CCTV or a personal device; for example, a dashcam. Ideally, the video will capture the accident and its cause.
- Photos of the accident scene.
- Medical records. You can request a copy of your medical treatment history, which can be used to show the extent of your injuries.
- An official record, such as a police report or workplace accident book entry.
- Witness contact information.
If you work with a personal injury solicitor, they can be instructed to help you gather and present proof. They can also arrange for you to have an independent medical assessment, the outcome of which will be added to your evidence.
You can learn more about what evidence is needed and how a solicitor can help throughout the knee injury claims process by calling the number above. An advisor can also tell you whether you have a valid claim that can be taken on by an expert solicitor from our panel.
How Much Knee Injury Claim Compensation Could You Receive?
You will receive a settlement if your knee injury compensation claim is successful. At least part of that payout will feature compensation for physical pain and emotional harm brought on by injuries. This falls under the general damages head of claim.
Those responsible for calculating the value of your knee injuries, as well as any other physical or psychological injuries you include in the claim, may refer to medical evidence. They might also use compensation brackets provided by a document called the Judicial College Guidelines (JCG) as a guideline.
The table you see below uses JCG figures to give illustrative examples of compensation guidance for common knee injuries at different severity levels.
Compensation Table
This table’s top entry is not from the JCG, but the rest all are. Please note that this is only a guide and is not a guarantee of how much compensation you would receive in a personal injury claim.
| KNEE INJURY | COMPENSATION | NOTES |
|---|---|---|
| Multiple Severe Injuries And Financial Losses | Up to £500,000+ | Numerous very serious injuries, plus financial expenses such as a loss of earnings, care costs and rehabilitation fees. |
| (i) Severe | £69,730 to £96,210 | A serious knee injury that disrupts the joint and brings on issues like osteoarthritis and considerable pain. |
| (ii) Severe | £52,120 to £69,730 | Leg fractures extending into the knee joint and causing constant, permanent pain. |
| (iii) Severe | £26,190 to £43,460 | Remedial surgery might be needed because of knee cap damage, ligamentous or meniscal injury, or muscular wasting. |
| (i) Moderate | £14,840 to £26,190 | Injuries including knee dislocation, a torn cartilage or torn meniscus. It also covers injuries accelerating symptoms from a pre-existing condition for a prolonged time. |
| (ii) Moderate | Up to £13,740 | Cases similar to the higher bracket of moderate injuries, but that are less serious and have a shorter period of exacerbation or acceleration of symptoms. |
| Severe Leg Injuries (iv) | £27,760 to £39,200 | Knee instability is one of the factors affecting the award. The bracket includes multiple or complicated fractures, or severe crush injuries. |
Special Damages Compensation For A Knee Injury
A severe knee injury, or even a minor knee injury, can have a knock-on effect on someone’s life. Such injuries could lead to unexpected financial expenses. If you suffer monetary losses because of your injuries, you could apply to receive special damages compensation alongside general damages.
This could include claiming for:
- Lost income
- Travel costs.
- Medical expenses.
- Domestic care bills.
- Home adaptations
Another useful tip is to keep hold of any receipts, payslips or bank statements that show these losses. This is because they’ll be required if you seek special damages compensation in your knee injury claim.
Please call if you have any questions about knee injury compensation amounts and what you could include in your claim.
How Long Do You Have To Claim Knee Injury Compensation?
Generally, because of a time limit set out by The Limitation Act 1980, you have three years from the accident date to start a personal injury claim.
However, an exception could be made in certain scenarios. Minors are unable to pursue a claim for themselves, so they must wait until their 18th birthday. From that point, they have until they turn 21 to get started. However, a responsible adult can be appointed as their litigation friend while they are a minor and handle the case for them.
The claim period is paused indefinitely for someone lacking sufficient mental capacity as they may not be equipped to take legal action. Again, a suitable litigation friend can apply to act in their stead. If this doesn’t happen and the injured person regains the necessary mental capacity, the normal time limit starts from their recovery date.
Please call today if you’d like to know how long you have to begin your knee injury compensation claim.
Use No Win No Fee Solicitors To Claim Knee Injury Compensation
Claiming knee injury compensation could go much more smoothly with the professional guidance of a specialist personal injury solicitor from our panel. Our panel’s personal injury solicitors take on cases under a Conditional Fee Agreement. This is a form of No Win No Fee arrangement that means no upfront or running payment for the solicitor’s work. There will be no fees at all if the case fails.
Should your solicitor help you achieve a settlement, they will receive a success fee. This will only be a small percentage of what you get because The Conditional Fee Agreements Order 2013 applies a strict legal ceiling to a solicitor’s entitlement.
If you have any questions about personal injury claims, just give our helpful advisors a call today. They’ll even check if you have a valid knee injury claim and forward your case to one of our panel’s specialist solicitors if you do.
Contact Us To See If You Could Make A Knee Injury Compensation Claim
There’s no charge and no obligation to commit to a claim, so chat with us today through one of these routes:
- Call 020 8050 2736.
- Contact us online.
- Send a message through the live chat tab.
More Resources About Claiming Compensation For A Knee Injury
Here are some further guides to do with personal injury claims:
- A guide to how slips, trips and falls can form the basis of compensation claims.
- Get more details on what to do if you were in a road traffic accident caused by an uninsured driver here.
- We explain pavement accident claims and when you can seek compensation for a trip on a public road.
These resources may also help:
- Workplace accident statistics from the Health and Safety Executive, Britain’s workplace health and safety regulator.
- NHS guidance on knee pain and how to deal with it.
- Information on requesting CCTV footage, provided through the government website.
Thank you for reading our guide to claiming knee injury compensation. If you have any questions about knee injury claims or want to get your case started, please reach out any time for swift support.