Making a claim

To succeed in a claim, you will need to show that the professional you are considering claiming against has assumed responsibility towards you.

A professional who takes responsibility to perform a service, and fails to do so with reasonable care, may be liable for loss suffered by the other person.

Duty of care should be easy to establish if you are engaged in a contract or have a retainer with the professional you are considering claiming against. Even if you don’t have a written agreement with the professional, there is a general duty to take care where there has been an assumed responsibility and a special relationship exists between the parties.

Once a duty of care has been shown, you must also show that the professional has breached their duty of care by falling below the standard of care expected from a competent professional in their field of expertise.

Once you have shown you had an agreement with the professional and the professional failed to perform to the proper standard, you then have to demonstrate that you have suffered loss and that the loss was caused by the professional’s breach of duty. This is called causation; in other words, the professional caused the loss.

In determining loss, the Court will decide, usually with expert assistance, what ‘good’ advice would have been. They will determine what position you would have been in had you received that ‘good’ advice, and the current position you are in following the negligent advice.

The difference between these two positions will determine the loss you have suffered, and the Court will aim to put you in the position you should have been in based on good quality advice.

If you think that you suffered a loss as a result of negligent advice, contact us as soon as you can on 01273 604123 or email enquire@bbc-law.co.uk.

Our first step will be to arrange a diagnostic meeting with a solicitor in our Dispute Resolution team. The meeting can be over the phone, in person, or over skype. You will discuss:

• Whether or not your case is likely to be in time or not.
• Your specific circumstances and the factors involved.
• The law around your case.
• Whether you can make a claim and how best to obtain it.
• How we can help in the most time and cost-effective way.