Solicitor James McNally has recovered £125,000 in compensation for a delivery driver bitten by a dog.
The delivery driver lost the top half of her right middle finger as she posted a card through a customer’s letter box.
She was earning extra money to pay for IVF treatment by working for Yodel. On the day of the incident she went to deliver a parcel and knocked on the customer’s door. Getting no response, she posted a card through the door. As she did so, her finger was grabbed by a dog and bitten off.
Unfortunately her finger could not be reattached. As well as the physical injury, she also suffered psychologically. Her day job involved face to face meetings with clients and she felt unable to continue to do this given her lack of confidence following the loss of her finger. She changed to a lower paid job working in an office.
The dog owner’s insurers denied liability. They stated that the dog had no history of aggression and therefore they were not responsible.
We obtained evidence from a plastic surgeon, a psychiatrist, a canine behaviour expert, and a forensic accountant. We also arranged for a prosthetics expert to recommend a prosthetic finger.
The insurers continued to deny liability and therefore court proceedings were issued. They obtained their own canine behaviour expert report.
Just a month before trial the insurance company started making offers of settlement. Two weeks before trial they made an offer of £125,000 which was accepted.
Says James McNally:
“The Defendant’s denied liability throughout this claim. I have no doubt that other solicitors without our specialist knowledge of the Animals Act and Dog bite compensation claims might have been scared off by that and told the client not to proceed. It was our view that the Defendant solicitor was wrong in their understanding of the law and we were happy to support our client all the way to trial to prove that if required. We had on board not just our experts but also a specialist personal injury barrister with knowledge of dog bites and with that team behind her our client got the compensation she deserved for what she had been through.”
We regularly deal with claims on behalf of delivery drivers and you can read about some of our other successes, here and here.