Shipowners’ P&I Services LTD, our correspondents on Jamaica, has provided us with the following information.
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It has come to our attention that Stevedores and related employees have recently started making injury claims against Ships, Terminals and Shipping Agencies. Some claims have been successful, bringing in large sums of compensation, and obviously others are trying to jump on the bandwagon. We have discussed this with a number of the shipping agencies who have noticed this recent increase in such claims. They intend to inform us of any accidents reported on any of their vessels.
But it would behove the Clubs to warn the Owners of this trend and advise the Owners to instruct their Shipmasters that if an accident occurs on board their ship they should call us immediately to attend on board so that we can investigate the circumstances and take statements from witnessing crew members etc. in order to protect the Owners’ interests before the claim is made and a court case is instigated by the Stevedores’ Insurers or Lawyers.
Failure to protect yourselves immediately could lead to high expenditure as the Owners will have to employ Lawyers to fight the claim in court with very thin evidence with which to work. Please take this warning very seriously as Doctors’, Psychiatrists’ and other professionals’ bills get loaded into the claims inflating the final figure to tremendous sums of money.
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Member Alert is published by The Swedish Club as a service to members. While the information is believed correct, the Club cannot assume responsibility for completeness or accuracy.