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To structure, or not to structure? That is the question for the purpose of this entry in the Toronto Injury Lawyer Blog. Sometimes, whether to enter in to a structured settlement is not an option; rather a requirement. Other time, you may have a decision to structure or not.

WHAT IS A STRUCTURED SETTLEMENT?

A structured settlement is a negotiated financial arrangement whereby an injured accident victim agrees to accept a usually large lump sum of money in the form of a settlement from a personal injury claim. That lump sum is then placed in to an interest bearing financial instrument (called a structure) which gets paid out in periodic payments over a long period of time to the Plaintiff.

Instead of receiving one large lump sum at one time, the Plaintiff instead receives periodic payments (usually every month) set over a schedule which normally lasts a life time.

The monthly payments, administration and maintenance of the structure are not charged to the person receiving the structure, unless otherwise specified.

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Attendant care benefits.

What are they?

How do they work?

How do I get compensated? For how much and for how long?

These are all important and common questions after a serious car accident in Ontario.

The law surrounding attendant care benefits has changed significantly since they were conceived under the Statutory Accident Benefits Schedule (SABS) and Insurance Act. For whatever reason, insurers and the government like to tinker with attendant care benefits thereby changing the laws on what seems to be an annual basis.

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Car accident cases in Ontario should be simple.

The premise of one car, hitting another car by mistake or negligence; and thereby causing damages/injuries to another party ought to be basic tort law.

Unfortunately in Ontario, this couldn’t be further from the truth. The Ontario Government, at the behest of large insurers has created a system whereby the rights of people are not equal to the rights of large insurance companies. This system has become very complicated.

The law has been crafted in such a way as to minimize the exposure/risk for insurers to boost their profits, at the expense of everyday people like you and me.

I have never met an individual unaffiliated with car insurance industry (doctor, therapist, adjuster, lobbyist, lawyer, insurance company employee/agent) who has lobbied for changes to accident benefits or the Insurance Act. Yet, major changes to accident benefits and the Insurance Act happen on a near annual basis.

The election issue of lowering car insurance premiums was admitted by Premier Wynne to be a “stretch goal“. But reforms to the accident benefit system, and how tort claims proceed through the Courts was not a election issue. Yet these items are constantly being tinkered with at the expense of innocent accident victims to bolster insurer profits.

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If you are hearing a roar of applause, and perhaps laughter in delight, it’s coming from high atop the corporate head quarters and legal offices of auto insurers across Ontario.

Insurers won large in two recent Court of Appeal decisions which were released earlier this month:

El-Khodr v. Lackie, 2017 ONCA 716

Cobb v. Long Estate, 2017 ONCA 717

In the Cobb decision, a Jury verdict of $220,000 in favour of the injured accident victim plaintiff, was reduced by the Ontario Court of Appeal to just $22,136.60. After applying the statutory deductible for pain and suffering claims, that meant the case had no value whatsoever.

This case took 19 days to try before a Jury. Costs were awarded to the Plaintiff in the amount of $409,098.48. That cost award by the trial judge was completely eliminated by the Ontario Court of Appeal, who ruled that “in the circumstances, in my view, the fairest result to both sides is that each party bears its own costs“.

The Insurance Act and car accident legislation is intended to be consumer protection legislation. There are reasons that there are (and were) cost provisions against large insurers to ensure that the scales of justice were not tipped in their favour when it comes to the money required to litigate disputes.

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The Liberal Government of Ontario plans to introduce new tougher penalties to crack down on careless and distracted driving, this fall.

The Honourable Minister of Transportation Steven Del Duca, along with some other MPPs, announced the new measures today in Toronto.

The legislation, if passed, is supposed to protect pedestrians and cyclists and reduce the number of fatality claims involving people killed or injured by drunk, distracted, impaired and/or dangerous drivers.

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One of the most common questions which personal injury lawyers must answers is “how much is my case really worth“?

This question is never easy to answer. These questions are largely fact specific. Even the most serious analysis of the facts and evidence cannot predict the answer with pin point accuracy. The reason for this is that the majority of personal injury cases are heard by juries. Juries by their very nature are unpredictable. Judges can be unpredictable as well. If the Judge and Jury like the Plaintiff, then the award will likely be larger. If the Judge and Jury don’t like the Plaintiff, then the award will likely be smaller. In any event, predicting the outcome of a personal injury case, along with predicting the value is not an exact science.

There are certainly guidelines and parameters which personal injury lawyers use to predict the range of damages for a case. Precedent case law is certainly the most accurate tool for that. The general public can look up old cases FOR FREE on a great website called Canlii.

Free to use. Easy to navigate. With relatively good case updates, although not a comprehensive list of cases; Canlii is certainly an excellent resource even for the non-lawyer.

Some easier predictors for case valuation are long term disability cases. The reason being is that we are fighting over benefits which can mathematically be quantified and are payable over a fixed period of time pursuant to the Long Term Disability policy in place.

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Our personal injury lawyers constantly field questions from prospective clients regarding the basic steps of what to do after they’ve been involved in a car accident in Ontario.

We must admit, the laws surrounding car accidents in Ontario are confusing. They certainly aren’t straight forward by any means. It comes as no surprise to our lawyers that people have questions, and LOTS of them!

This is why our law firm has put forward this easy to understand claims guide in order to assist you after you or a loved one has been involved in a car accident, motorcycle accident, or have been hit by a car as a pedestrian.

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Our law firm has written many articles on how to complete the OCF-3 Disability Certificate in previous editions of the Toronto Injury Lawyer Blog.

Your can read these previous articles here, here, or here.

Don’t get me wrong. Those articles are great and contain valuable information for accident victims, their loved ones, doctors, therapists, even insurance adjusters.

But those articles are dated. Accident benefit and car insurance law is ever changing!!!

The standard OCF claim forms are constantly being updated. We have no reasonable explanation as to why the OCF forms get changed around so often aside from the government is constantly changing car accident law to keep lawyers and insurers on their toes. These changes generally seem to favour large insurers, but that’s another story all together.

The end result is that injured accident victims, doctors, therapists and rehab clinics may be using old forms which won’t be accepted by the insurer when submitted.

In fact, we’ve had experience with more than one adjuster who has submitted the wrong/dated OCF form to our clients by mistake. Our lawyers don’t blame them. The system and the constant tweeks/updates to accident benefit and car insurance law has made an already complex system even more complex and burdensome to accident victims, service providers and insurers alike.

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In Ontario, if you win your case, a judge cannot award you a victory medal, a ticker tape celebratory parade, or a key to the City in your honour. The Judge also cannot order that the at fault party experience the same pain and suffering which you endure.

The only thing the Judge can do is award you compensation in the form of MONEY.  What you do with that money is up to you. So, if you want to take that money from your personal injury case and use it to get a permit and then have a celebratory parade, go right ahead.

It’s nothing personal, it’s busiess

The reality is that personal injury litigation is a serious business. It’s a business because there is money at stake.

That money doesn’t come from a small local charity or a mom and pop’s store/restaurant. In most cases, that money comes from a large, multi national insurance company with offices across Canada and other parts of the world. Most of these insurers trade publicly on stock exchanges world wide. They exist to earn a profit. The more money these insurers pay out in awards, the less money they get to report in profit for their share holders. Continue reading →

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Not many people know this, but my family used to own a farm in Brockville, ON. Brockville is east of Kingston, near the Ontario/Quebec border. My grandparents owned a large farm with hundreds of cows, some chickens and large vegetable garden. I still have memories of the farm. On occasion, my grandfather would threaten me if I didn’t listen by saying he would take my toys away and give them to the cows. I sure listened after that.

As Goldfinger legend has it, the farm house burned down on account of a spontaneous hey fire. The only things that were saved were the  family photo albums. And if you ask around, there are a few epic shots of yours truly hanging out with the cows we had.

The reason I’m bringing up Brockville is because it reminds me of a special client our law firm worked with. This client was involved in a single car motor vehicle accident just outside of Brockville. Years went by and this person never thought of retaining a lawyer. She was at fault for the single car accident, so there was nobody to sue (you can’t sue yourself for your own negligence). The person was scared to consult with a lawyer for these reasons. S/he didn’t know where to turn, what to do, or how the system worked. She was lost, and just went along with whatever the insurer suggested.

The person sustained multiple orthopaedic injuries and a brain injury in the car accident. This was by no means a minor collision, and the injuries were significant. I’ll talk more about the significance of those injuries later on in this Toronto Injury Lawyer Blog Post.

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