Protecting Your Future: Holistic Support for Injury Clients

The Client Support and Rehabilitation Service (CSRS) is a dedicated in-house team at Ashtons Legal which supports clients following injury or illness to maximise their recovery and access the services they may need in the community.

As part of the service offering, CSRS can also assist clients with setting up a Personal Injury Trust (PI Trust). A PI trust helps to ‘ring fence’ the funds which have been received in personal injury compensation, keeping the compensation separate from assets that would be considered as part of a ‘means’ test.

A means test is a process carried out by the Department for Work and Pensions and local authorities to determine the welfare benefits, disability benefits, or community funding to which a person may be entitled, taking into account the assets the person owns. A PI trust protects a person’s personal injury compensation from being taken into consideration as part of that assessment, and so can be a vital tool in ensuring vulnerable clients are properly protected.

Michael Wangermann, Head of the Injury Services Group at Ashtons Legal and a personal injury solicitor was instructed by Client C following a road traffic accident (RTA) where the client sustained serious lifechanging injuries, including a complete spinal cord injury which left Client C with no function in his lower limbs and very little upper body function, including limited hand movements.

CSRS were instructed at the point at which Client C was safely transferred home with a community-funded care package in place.

CSRS conducted a detailed assessment of needs for Client C and assisted with advice on some of the community funding the client was accessing, including his care package and applying for disability and welfare benefits.

Settlement of the client’s negligence case was imminent, and so CSRS were instructed to assist the client with setting up a PI Trust to ringfence his settlement and enable the client to continue to claim his community funding.

This can be particularly important, especially where 100% liability is not accepted by the negligent party’s insurer following an RTA, for example, and so the client does not receive a settlement for all their needs throughout their lifetime.

CSRS advised Client C as to the processes involved with setting up a PI Trust, and Ashtons Legal was able to help with the following:

• Create the trust document for the trust
• Set up a separate trust bank account, which is required
• Decide on trustees or whether to use Ashtons Legal Trust Corporation (ALTC) to administer the trust
• Source a financial advisor to assist with investments of the funds in the trust
• Set up a Will should Client C pass away.

With the one-stop shop from which clients of Ashtons Legal may benefit, and with Client C’s consent, CSRS assisted with coordinating Ashtons Lifetime Planning (LTP) and Tax & Trusts (T&T) teams with all steps in the process.

CSRS maintained regular contact throughout the process with both Client C and each of Ashtons Legal’s staff members to ensure the processes were completed at a pace suitable for the client.

An LTP professional visited Client C at home to gather information for drafting the trust document and to determine who would act as trustees. As Client C had mental capacity, he and his wife were named as trustees for the trust.

T&T was able to offer Client C financial advice on how to manage the settlement. When Client C experienced problems with setting up a personal injury trust bank account (as he was unable to provide the ID document the bank needed), the T&T professional, upon consultation with CSRS, and when provided with written consent, was able to contact the bank on the client’s behalf and assist with this process also.

Once the settlement monies were safely transferred to the trust bank account and when Client C was ready, CSRS were able to give LTP the go-ahead to assist the client with drafting a will and deciding on beneficiaries.

At the same time, and as the amount of compensation held in the trust permitted, Client C also decided to instruct the Ashtons residential conveyancing team to assist him with a house purchase using trust funds.

With his solicitor Michael Wangermann having successfully obtained the level of compensation to which Client C was entitled, CSRS was able to add to the support Ashtons Legal can offer, by helping Client C to put in place the necessary protection for that money, as well as coordinating other services within the business to provide the all-round support Client C needed, on their legal and financial journey.

Contact our Client Support and Rehabilitation Service today

If any of the above sounds like we are talking about you or your situation, please get in contact with us on 0330 404 0777 or complete our online enquiry form.

Our experienced team of lawyers will be able to offer advice and guide you through every step of the claims process, and our client support and rehabilitation service can help to support you through your recovery.