Road accident claims: Courts across the country have issued directives in order to ensure they comply with the lockdown announced by the office of the Presidency.
All civil trials which have been set down over this period have been postponed to after 20 April 2020. This means that if the matter was set down for a hearing for either a pre-trial conference meeting before a judge, in the Western Cape, alternatively a judicial management meeting in Pretoria and Johannesburg, these have also been postponed.
Where possible, attorneys are to continue to conduct meetings with each other either through teleconferencing / video conferencing, alternatively to communicate by correspondence.
The Road Accident Fund has suspended payments from 25 March 2020 to 17 April 2020. Its offices will be closed from 25 March 2020. However, the litigation process involves many steps along the way. Those independent steps of litigation will continue where practically possible and when not materially affected by the COVID-19 lockdown.
A significant aspect of the preparation of matters for trials particularly for determination of the value of any road accident claims includes physical assessments of our clients by medico legal practitioners, these are appointments arranged either by the Road Accident Fund or ourselves with the likes of orthopaedic surgeons, neurosurgeons, occupational therapists etc, again, and as a result of the lockdown, these assessments cannot continue and will be rescheduled to the first available dates once the lockdown is uplifted on 16 April 2020.
However, consultations with representatives of our offices can and will continue to take place. We will also continue to accept new instructions via video conferencing and teleconferencing.
