A diagnosis of mesothelioma or other disease caused by exposure to asbestos can be life changing. As well as dealing with your illness, it can have a serious financial impact on both you and your loved ones.
At Ashtons Legal, we can represent you in a claim for damages to ensure that you are compensated for what you are going through as well as provided for in the future.
Our personal injury compensation team includes specialist asbestos-related disease solicitors Sylvia Phillips and Andrew Wilson. They have extensive experience of representing clients for asbestos claims in Ipswich and beyond and an excellent track record of success in obtaining substantial compensation payments for diseases including mesothelioma, asbestosis and pleural thickening.
Martyn and Andrew are part of a personal injury team that has been recognised and highly ranked by leading legal directories The Legal 500 and Chambers & Partners for over 20 years. The Law Society has also given the team accreditation for their expertise in personal injury law.
We know that cost is often a concern for our clients. We believe that the law should be accessible to everyone and for this reason, we offer ‘no win, no fee’ type arrangements so that there is no up-front cost to you in commencing an asbestos compensation claim as well as no financial risk should your claim not be successful.*
*Subject to entering into a conditional fee agreement in conjunction with a suitable insurance policy to cover any unrecovered disbursements and complying with your responsibilities under the terms of both.
Book a free no-obligation chat about starting your mesothelioma or other asbestos-related disease claims
We know that you and your loved ones will probably have many questions that you would like to ask about bringing a claim for compensation for asbestosis or other asbestos-related illness. These could include:
- Do I have enough grounds to make a claim for asbestos compensation?
- How much compensation will I receive for asbestosis or mesothelioma?
- How to bring a mesothelioma claim?
- What will happen if we cannot trace the business, organisation or individual responsible for my exposure to asbestos?
- How long will my claim take?
- Is it possible to have an interim compensation payment to help pay for my treatment or rehabilitation while my claim is ongoing?
- Can I make a claim if my asbestos-related disease was caused by contact with my partner, for example, washing their dust-covered overalls, rather than being in direct contact with the workplace myself?
- Can I make a claim after the death of my spouse/partner from mesothelioma or other asbestos-related disease?
To answer these questions and any others you may have, we offer a free initial consultation with one of our specialist mesothelioma claims solicitors in Ipswich. We can generally come and meet you in your home if it is easier for you.
We have offices in Norfolk, Suffolk and Cambridgeshire but, as acknowledged experts in the field, we also regularly act for individuals in other locations where there has been widespread asbestos exposure in the past including Hertfordshire, Bedfordshire, Essex and Leicestershire.
If you prefer, we can offer you an initial consultation virtually via Microsoft Teams or other digital platform of your choice. We can also meet you in our offices in Cambridge, Bury St Edmunds, Norwich or Ipswich.
To arrange a free initial consultation with one of our specialist asbestos solicitors, please contact our Ipswich office.
Our mesothelioma and asbestos-related disease claims expertise
Our team have an excellent track record of success in bringing claims in respect of the following:
- Mesothelioma
- Asbestosis
- Respiratory injury
- Pleural thickening
- Lung cancer caused by asbestos
Our personal injury solicitors also have extensive expertise in various other types of industrial diseases and workplace injuries.
How we can help you to claim asbestos and mesothelioma compensation
Working out if you can bring a claim and who is responsible
If you ask us to represent you in bringing a claim for compensation for an asbestos-related illness, we will start by collecting together and reviewing all of the available evidence. We will speak to you about what happened and the working conditions that you experienced as well as talking to your colleagues and former colleagues where appropriate.
If you have worked in several different places, this will often involve putting together a timeline of your different employments that could have exposed you to asbestos. Tradespeople such as carpenters, joiners, plumbers, painters and decorators, construction workers, electricians, shopfitters and building surveyors will have worked across many different premises over the years where they could have been exposed to asbestos dust.
In establishing a case on your behalf, we will look at the following:
- Duty of care – what did your employer do to protect you and what should they have done?
- Statutory duty – what did the law say they should have done at the time you were exposed to asbestos?
- Did your employer breach their duty of care to you or did they break the law?
- How did your exposure to asbestos or other substance occur?
In some cases, people suffering from an asbestos-related disease cannot pinpoint where their exposure came from. In some instances, it may be that they have received secondary exposure, breathing in dust from their partner’s clothes or living near industrial premises where asbestos dust was circulating and escaping.
Why asbestos-related disease claims are different to other injury claims
For most people who develop mesothelioma, asbestosis or another asbestos-related disease, this happens decades after the exposure occurred. This can mean that they do not always immediately remember where they might have encountered asbestos. Our solicitors are experts in the area of asbestos-related claims and are used to these difficulties.
We know the questions to ask to help you identify what happened and we will work with you to put together a strong case on your behalf setting out all the available evidence.
Valuing your asbestos compensation claim
We will calculate the likely amount of compensation that you could be entitled to receive based on an assessment of the effects on your health of your illness, the impact on your financial position and your prognosis.
The amount of compensation paid for asbestos claims varies widely depending on the severity of the disease, the age at which you become ill and your financial position.
To give you an idea of the sums that are paid out to those who have brought successful asbestos claims and industrial injury claims, these are some of the settlements we have achieved for our clients:
- Six figure settlement secured for mesothelioma sufferer’s family – Ashtons Legal
- £50,000 obtained for former Norfolk carpenter – Ashtons Legal Solicitors
- Six-figure sum obtained for family of mesothelioma sufferer – Ashtons Legal
- Substantial settlement for a Norfolk man diagnosed with Mesothelioma (ashtonslegal.co.uk)
- Rapid £50,000 initial payment obtained for Suffolk mesothelioma sufferer – Ashtons Legal
- £175,000 obtained for family of Cambridgeshire mesothelioma sufferer – Ashtons Legal
- Five figure sum obtained for family of Norfolk metal worker – Ashtons Legal
- Over £100,000 obtained for family of mesothelioma sufferer – Ashtons Legal
- £40,000 obtained for family of asbestos-related lung cancer sufferer – Ashtons Legal
Obtaining interim payments for asbestos-related disease claims
It is almost always the case that we will endeavour to obtain an interim payment for you. This is a payment made to you early on in the claims process before the final assessment is made and the amount of compensation agreed upon or awarded by the court.
An interim payment can pay for private treatment, be used to replace lost income or to help you maximise the quality of your life for the remainder of your life if your condition is terminal. It will also ensure that you and your loved ones do not suffer financial hardship while your claim is being dealt with.
The process of an asbestos disease claim
Most personal injury claims are settled without the need to go to court. This includes compensation for mesothelioma and other asbestos-related diseases. Our solicitors are expert negotiators and will work to obtain the best possible offer from the organisation responsible for your exposure to asbestos, usually via their insurance company or solicitors.
This means that you will not need to attend court and that your claim will be dealt with more quickly than it might otherwise have been. If your case does go to court, you can rest assured that we will put together a strong case on your behalf and provide you with robust representation.
We will stay by your side throughout to ensure that you have the support and guidance that you need. We will also make sure that during your whole time with us we are available to speak to you as needed to discuss your case and to answer any questions you may have.
Occasionally, it is not possible to track down exactly where the asbestos exposure occurred or who was responsible. In this case, if you have been diagnosed with mesothelioma, we can help you to bring a claim for compensation under the Diffuse Mesothelioma Payment Scheme.
Claiming for an asbestos-related disease when someone has died
Sadly, some people who have mesothelioma or another asbestos-related disease may not be diagnosed until the illness is at an advanced stage. This means that they may die before they have a chance to make a claim for compensation or before their claim is concluded. We have frequently brought successful claims for the families of those who have died from an asbestos-related disease.
For those needing palliative care, we are fortunate enough to have many excellent services available throughout East Anglia and beyond. The costs of any hospice care will always form part of our personal injury claim and on conclusion, we will provide a separate cheque payable to the hospice for your family to present to them.
Book your free initial consultation with our specialist asbestos claims solicitors in Ipswich
If you have questions about bringing mesothelioma claims in Ipswich and you would like an initial consultation, please get in touch.
You can contact our Ipswich office or use our online enquiry form to request a call back and we will be happy to arrange a meeting for you with one of our expert asbestos claims lawyers.