The times they are a changin'
Despite the title, this article is not concerned with the recent news that Bob Dylan is to become a Radio DJ! It is, however, about an important change to the time limits which govern whether you may bring, or be faced with, a claim for negligence.
The issue of time limits for bringing claims for professional negligence is seen as being so important that the House of Lords, the highest Court in the land, has been asked to consider the issue recently. The Court gave its decision in the case of Haward v Fawcetts (a firm) 2006.
It is well understood that the usual time limit for bringing or being on the receiving end of such claims is 6 years from the act in question. However, in some instances, Claimants have been able to argue that rather than the usual 6 years, they should have 3 years from a later “date of knowledge” to bring a claim. Such a provision is needed because a lay person may not know that the professional they have instructed has done anything wrong until much later and may indeed only find out there is a problem more than 6 years after the event. On the other hand, many professionals have often felt that the “date of knowledge” provision was unfair to them as it could lead to them facing claims arising from work carried out 10 or 15 years previously.
The House of Lords has now clarified that the relevant date for working out your “date of knowledge” is when you know enough to set about investigating the possibility that your professional adviser’s advice was defective.
This is a useful decision and should help clarify the law and also balance the interests of the lay person and the professional adviser.
If you suspect that the advice you have been given is inadequate then you should investigate as promptly as possible, although the law will give you some breathing space if you do not suspect a problem until some time later. Equally, the law will not allow the proverbial sword of Damocles to hang over professionals for as long as it has in the past.
Published 05/05/2006.
