Personal Injury FAQs

Nothing up front. We handle personal injury claims on a contingency fee, which means our fee is a percentage of what we recover for you and is paid out of the settlement or judgment at the end. If we recover nothing, you owe no legal fee. The initial consultation is free.

Our maximum contingency fee percentage is 33% of the amount recovered. The exact percentage for your file, and how it is calculated, is set out in the Law Society of Ontario standard form contingency fee agreement, which every Ontario lawyer must use. We go through it with you line by line before you sign, and you receive the Law Society's consumer guide to contingency fees at the same time.

Yes. Running a claim involves disbursements: the cost of medical records, expert reports, court filing fees, and similar expenses. These are separate from the legal fee. We generally advance them while the claim is ongoing and they are repaid from the recovery. How disbursements are handled is written into the fee agreement so there are no surprises.

No legal fee is payable if there is no recovery. The agreement will explain how disbursements are treated in that situation, and we will explain it to you before you sign anything.

In most cases, two years from the day you were injured or the day you reasonably discovered that you had a claim. That is the general limitation period and it applies to car accidents, falls, dog attacks, and medical negligence. Some claims have much shorter notice requirements on top of that, described below. Missing a deadline can end a claim regardless of how strong it is, so contact us early.

Several. If you fall on a municipal sidewalk or road, the municipality must receive written notice within days. If you slip on snow or ice on private property, the occupier must receive written notice within a matter of weeks. After a car accident, your own insurer must be notified within days and the accident benefits application follows shortly after, and the at-fault driver must receive written notice of your intention to sue within a few months. Disability benefit denials carry appeal deadlines measured in weeks. We take on all of these from the first meeting.

Contact us anyway. Some deadlines have exceptions, for example where there was a reasonable excuse for late notice and the other side was not prejudiced, and the discovery rule can move the start date of the limitation period. We will tell you plainly whether anything can still be done.

Ontario has a no-fault accident benefits system. Regardless of who caused the crash, you can claim benefits from your own auto insurer, including medical and rehabilitation costs, income replacement, and attendant care. If you have no policy of your own, benefits may come from the insurer of the vehicle you were in or from a provincial fund. Anything those benefits do not cover, such as pain and suffering and future losses, is claimed against the at-fault driver.

Usually, yes, if the other driver was at fault. Ontario law sets a higher bar than most people expect: to recover for pain and suffering, your injury generally has to meet a threshold of permanent and serious impairment, and a deductible is applied to the award unless it exceeds a set amount. These figures change regularly. Whether your injury clears the threshold is one of the first things we assess.

You may still have a claim under your own policy's uninsured and underinsured coverage, or through the Motor Vehicle Accident Claims Fund if no insurance is available at all. These claims have their own notice requirements.

Ontario's accident benefits system sorts injuries into categories, and the "minor injury" category caps the medical and rehabilitation benefits available. Insurers place many injured people in that category by default. If your injuries are more serious than the label suggests, the classification can be challenged, and doing so can make a large difference to the treatment you can access.

Not necessarily. Whoever controls a property has a legal duty to take reasonable care to keep visitors safe. If they did not, they are responsible even if you could also have been more careful. Where a court finds you partly responsible, your compensation is reduced by that share rather than eliminated.

Get medical attention. Photograph the hazard, your footwear, and your injuries before anything changes. Report the fall to the property owner or manager and ask for a copy of any incident report. Get the names of witnesses. Then contact us, because surveillance footage is often overwritten within days and some notice deadlines are very short.

No. Under Ontario's Dog Owners' Liability Act, the owner is responsible for a bite or attack whether or not they were negligent and whether or not the dog had ever bitten before. Compensation usually comes from the owner's home or tenant insurance.

You can ask the insurer to reconsider through its internal appeal process, or you can sue. Internal appeals rarely change the outcome and do not stop the limitation clock, which generally gives you two years from the denial to start a lawsuit. We recommend getting advice as soon as the denial letter arrives, because the medical evidence that decides these claims is easier to build early.

Yes. Both have their own appeal routes, first a reconsideration or internal review and then a tribunal hearing, and each stage has a short deadline. LTD insurers often require you to apply for CPP Disability, so the claims frequently run together and we handle them together.

It depends on the severity and permanence of your injuries, the effect on your work and daily life, the cost of future care, and how responsibility is shared. We do not put a number on a claim before we understand the medical picture, and we are wary of anyone who does. What we can promise is that the insurer's first offer will not be mistaken for the last.

Straightforward claims can resolve within a year or two. Serious injury claims, and medical malpractice claims in particular, often take several years because the full extent of the injury has to be known before a fair value can be assessed. We will give you an honest estimate once we have seen your file, and we will keep you informed as it moves.

Most personal injury claims settle without a trial, often at mediation. We prepare every file as if it will go to trial, which is usually what produces a fair settlement offer. If the insurer will not pay a fair amount, we are ready to take it to a judge.

Report the accident, but be careful about giving a recorded statement or signing anything before you have had advice. Adjusters work for the insurer, and early statements are often used later to minimise the claim. Once you retain us, the insurers deal with us.