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This series of articles considers a selection of the clauses in a fairly standard UK motor insurance policy. At this time it's the "Emergency Treatment" clause and it deals with who pays for any medical treatment needed following a motoring incident. Under current UK legislation, you must pay treatment costs to the first medical practitioner to treat you following an accident. This is part of the Road Traffic Act. People have been known to refer to this as a charge for an ambulance. In actual fact this is not true but in reality it is usually the ambulance men that provide the care and the account comes to you from the National Health Service hospital that sent the ambulance and its crew. YOU MUST PAY THIS BY LAW no matter who was to blame for the accident. Your insurer will always pay the bill under this section. Just send the paperwork into them and they will pay it directly to the N H S trust. Alternatively you can pay it out of your own pocket and get your insurer to repay you. Sometimes in a busy insurance environment, the claims staff can overlook the invoice if you have sent it in amongst other paperwork. It's possible that you could receive a reminder from the N H S trust that the invoice is still outstanding. Tell the hospital who your insurance company are and telephone the claims office. Be firm but please don't lose your temper. The insurer paying this account will not in fact affect your no claims bonus. It is not regarded as a claim. So, in the very unlikely event that your insurance company were to pay the medical treatment invoice and nothing else your bonus would remain intact. In reality, in a road traffic accident where a person is hurt, it is unlikely there will be no other claims to be met. Technically, if someone else is to blame for the accident you can send the invoice on to their insurance company but you are just inviting unnecessary complications. My advice is, don't bother. It doesn't make any difference to you either way. Owing to recent changes in the law, hospitals now also charge the insurance companies for treatment given to third party accident victims, with certain limitations applied. These are claimed by the hospital in cases where they have judged you to have been negligent and someone else has had treatment for an injury that you caused. This change in the law has definitely contributed to the increase in motor insurance premiums. Some insurance professionals consider this to be a further case of increasing taxation by stealth by the Government.
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This article on treatment costs following a road traffic accident was written by Terry Cod. He has several years of experience working as a claims adjuster with a number of UK car insurance companies. His website www.instant-online-insurance.co.uk offers Direct Line online car insurance with online quotes and secure online payment.
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