People involved in a road accident could undergo a lot of financial stress, due to the various medical and legal expenses that have incurred due to the mishap. Therefore in order to cover all these unexpected expenses, it is imperative that adequate compensation is received from the party that was responsible for the accident. In order to ensure that your claim has been properly represented, it is essential to select an effective road accident claim company, insurers advised. One of the major considerations when selecting an accident claims company is the fee charged by them. The higher the fee charged by a claims company, the lower the net compensation amount you would receive. The next major consideration should be the professional history of the company. You should ensure that the company has a team of experts who have successfully dealt with road accident claims in the past. By selecting the right road accident claims company, you would ensure that you receive appropriate compensation for the loss suffered by you. Army captain in car crash An army captain, who had recently returned to the UK from Iraq, suffered serious injuries after his car crashed into another vehicle. The accident happened in 2005, when a soldier, who was appointed to drive the captain back to the barracks, fell asleep behind the wheels while driving. This caused the vehicle to collide with a HGV that was also traveling in the same direction. The impact of the accident was such that the car had to be cut in order to take the captain out. Due to the accident, the captain suffered serious injuries to his left leg, lost the use of his little finger in the left hand and suffers from a numb right leg. Furthermore, deep vein thrombosis, back pains and the chest pains became a regular problem for him. Even though the captain is working hard to regain his fitness, the severity of his injuries threatens to cut short his career in the armed forces. According to the captain, “My injuries have potentially limited what I will be able to achieve both in the military and post discharge as a civilian. It is sometimes difficult to accept that I survived a posting in Iraq unscathed but managed to be seriously injured within a matter hours of arriving back to the UK,” he said. After he contacted a road accident specialist and initiated a legal process against the Ministry of Defense, the MOD admitted liability and the captain was awarded compensation of £150,000. Since the 1987, army personnel who have been injured other than in war or conflicts, can claim compensation under the AFCS by proving that the armed forces were liable for the accident. A spokesman from a leading law firm, noted that soldiers can gain compensation access from other means: “It is not necessarily true, and is one of the major misunderstandings among armed forces personnel, that the AFCS represents their only form of redress. Claims can be made under the AFCS and under the civil law. The civil payout can often be very much higher than the statutory payout under the AFCS claim.” He added: “Injuries may be seen as a hazard of the job by members of the armed forces but even in places like Afghanistan they may have absolutely nothing to do with the conflict. Independent specialist legal advice will make clear if there is a civil claim to be made.”