Case Update

Low-value online portal does apply to accidents at sea



By Gemma Pearce, partner, and David Matcham, solicitor, BLM


A recent case for a vessel fleet organisation has highlighted the way accidents at sea fit into the online low-value portal. These cases are often assumed to be excluded from the online portal by claimant solicitors, but providing the incident occurred within “England and Wales” (defined below) low-value accidents at sea (under £25,000) should generally be submitted via the portal from the outset, with very other limited exemptions.