The overarching aim of the whiplash reforms was stated to be to reduce fraudulent and exaggerated claims and to control claims costs without compromising access to justice. The person on the Clapham Omnibus could bring their own claim for injury compensation without the need for legal or other representation, thus saving on legal fees and overall expenses.
A cornerstone of the reforms is the personal injury small claims limit, but an unintended consequence of the reforms has been the proliferation of mixed injury claims presented for compensation on the OIC portal. To date there have been low numbers of injured people bringing their own compensation claims and high mixed injury claims profiles presented by those who are legally represented.
Both consequences lead us to ask: is the limit working effectively?
Although there has never been an official target, OIC portal claims registered in Q2 of 2026 show that just 12.6% were by unrepresented claimants – well below initial market expectations. It looks even worse when insurer direct capture claimants are removed, leaving around 4%-5% of genuinely unrepresented claimants registering claims. However, on a positive note, our data sources show that since the beginning of the reforms only 31% of medical reports for unrepresented claimants included one or more non-whiplash injuries compared to 60% for represented claimants. The inevitable conclusion is that represented claimants are twice as likely to present injury profiles for more than just a whiplash claim.
What does this have to do with the effectiveness of the personal injury small claims limit?
The answer is that injury severity in the represented claims space is directly impacting the limit, even though official OIC portal data for Q2 2026 shows that average settled spend values for tariff and non-tariff injuries of £748 and £1,073 respectively are well below the limit. Despite this, inflationary factors will influence these spend values throughout the rest of this year and into 2027. Those factors include the application of JCG 18th edition valuations (an average increase of 8.3%) for non-tariff injuries and the uprated whiplash tariffs (15%) for accidents from 31 May 2025. Before we know it, the JCG 19th edition will be at the door driving severity further upwards as well as a probable further increase in the whiplash tariffs.
Another factor involves the developing position of claims displacement by which claims exit the OIC portal, demonstrating a belief that the value of the injury claim will exceed the limit of £5,000. Our data sources record this presentation risk as being relatively low in Q2 of this year at around just 4% of settled OIC portal claims. Should this position uptick, driven by the inflationary factors discussed above, then the intention of the limit to control legal costs may be compromised.
So why future-proof the personal injury small claims limit now?
If we go back to the unintended consequences of the whiplash reforms driving up mixed injury tariff and non-tariff presentation rates, can we not conclude that the cost of increased injury severity will eventually affect the efficacy of the limit? The intention of future proofing is to ensure that a product or limit remains effective as new trends and needs emerge. The Official Injury Claim data shows that from Q2 2025 to Q2 2026 the average value of a settled non-tariff injury rose by just 1.6%, but if post court pack spend values (which also account for court outcomes) are included the inflation uprating is around 7% to 8% and possibly higher for the rest of this year and into next year. Should this trend continue, then the limit may be vulnerable to erosion, as such it needs to be future-proofed.
An increase to the limit now may lead to further adjustment of market share with greater consolidation and exits by claimant law firms. It may also mean a greater take up by unrepresented claimants fulfilling the initial intentions of the whiplash reforms. And it may assist in controlling the financial impact of injury severity with a higher proportion of mixed injury claims profiles being captured by the limit – or to put it another, way fewer of these claims will be displaced into the MOJ portal or other civil protocols.
Although the current OIC portal spend data does not point to any vulnerability today there remains a case to future-proof it now by increasing the limit to avoid unwanted erosion. Any increase could be a one-off amount or linked to CPI inflation. Either way, future proofing the limit sooner rather than later will continue to control legal and overall claims costs and sustain the proportion of claims presented in the OIC portal for a number of years to come.
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