Workers Compensation claims are a huge part of our business…especially the FRAUDULENT ones.
For whatever reasons, people like to test the system. Unfortunately, people often win when it comes to WorkCover and Insurance claims. The main reason for this is that business owners either do not think to utilise our service or leave it too late. The best time for surveillance is immediately after the claim has been placed. We have found that people will continue to go about their daily lives and will enjoy the immediate freedom of not having to attend a workplace everyday. They usually have not been advised by a lawyer yet that surveillance may occur.
We receive multiple enquiries each week from employers asking how we can assist with a dishonest claim that has been placed, which will directly affect their business. Usually the owner of the business has been informed by another staff member, that “such and such” were seen surfing or partying on the weekend. This then gets the business owners blood boiling, and they calls us as they do not want to have a common law claim placed against their business. Not to mention that their WorkCover or Insurance premiums will rise the following renewal if the claim is successful.
Our immediate reaction is to guide the often angry and upset owner to a place of calm logical thinking. We need to get all the information we can from them, and then we can put a plan in place for surveillance. We reassure the owner that when the Claimant does something contradicting to the claim where possible we obtain irrefutable video evidence of the event. All video evidence we obtain is done so within the law and our license requirements making the evidence admissible in court.
From the feedback we have received, business owners are incredibly thankful for the results we achieve in a timely, and very cost effective manner.
Example: Last year we received instruction from a national employer that they had received a common law claim from an ex-employee in the amount of $600,000. The worker was claiming they had injured themselves and aggravated a previous injury while travelling for the business. The workers injury occurred in an unsupervised environment, and there were no witnesses. The legal advice the employer received was that this unfortunately benefitted the claimant. We put a plan in place and were instructed to commence immediate surveillance on the individual. As the claim was not urgent and the lawyers were still going back and forth with the Claimant’s lawyers, we monitored the Claimant for several months. During this time we managed to obtain 5.5 hours of very compromising video demonstrating the Claimant’s movement was normal, and the injuries were incredibly exaggerated. Our client went on to win this matter, and for 5% of the original lawsuit. Our client was over the moon with the result and agreed money well spent.