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Could you be eligible for NHS continuing healthcare?

Our Nursing Care department is one of the leading national experts in the recovery of wrongly paid care home fees; our specialist nursing care team have successfully recovered over £200 million for our clients since the department was set up in 2006.

If an individual is in a nursing or care home because of physical or mental health needs, the cost of their care should be covered by the NHS Continuing Healthcare funding scheme, regardless of the individual’s wealth. However, with around 40% of Britain’s 440,000 care home residents self-funding their care, thousands of families in England and Wales could be wrongly paying care fees.

The NHS CHC (Continuing Healthcare) is a healthcare care package for adults in the UK aged over 18 or more. It is arranged and funded solely by the NHS.

The NHS pays the full cost of an individual’s care fees regardless of their wealth and if it is awarded retrospectively the full cost paid is refunded. Eligibility, however, is typically rewarded for part of the period in care and not for the entire duration.

If you need any help with CHC funding or advice around Retrospective Continuing Healthcare Claims, then you’ve certainly come to the right place!

CHC Funding Advice – Get tailored guidance from Day One

The Nursing Care department at Hugh James is among the leading experts in the UK when it comes to recovering wrongly paid care home fees and offering tailored CHC funding advice. If this has happened to you, then you can make a retrospective claim for NHS Continuing Healthcare (CHC).

Our specialist nursing team has decades of experience and have recovered more than £200 million for clients since the department’s inception in 2006.

CHC Funding Help – Getting started on the right foot

The NHS’ CHC funding is accessible to all adults who have been assessed as having a primary health need. In such instances, the cost of health and social care is to be solely funded by the NHS, potentially saving you huge sums of money.

However, decisions around eligibility are often not as transparent as they ought to be, and so, many adults who should be receiving CHC funding often do not due to the arbitrary decision-making involved. Our specialist team are well-versed in retrospective NHS Continuing Healthcare claims and can support you in everything from retrospective Continuing Healthcare claims and appeals, to applications for ‘retrospective claim for NHS Continuing Healthcare’.

Get in touch now to get all the CHC finding help you need.

Retrospective CHC Claims made easy

Our friendly and expert CHC solicitors have extensive experience in helping people obtain non-means tested funding for both health and social care.

Whether you or a loved one requires primary healthcare, we will work with you to demonstrate your eligibility for CHC funding. This alone could save you and your family a significant amount of health and social care financing, which must be paid for solely by the NHS.

When it comes to any kind of help with CHC funding and retrospective CHC claims, our team’s in-depth knowledge and experience will guide you through every step of the process. We have supported many individuals like you when it comes to getting CHC funding help – from explaining how the initial referral and assessment pathways work to submitting a retrospective claim for NHS Continuing Healthcare, if you are assessed as ‘ineligible’.

What is a Nursing Care Claim?

A Nursing Care Claim in the UK is a claim for free NHS Continuing Healthcare funding.

If you believe that you or a friend or family member has not been paid fairly assessed, then you can contact our friendly Nursing Care Claim solicitors, who can advise you whether you have a case. If you do, then simply fill out the free initial questionnaire to get started where you are under no obligation to proceed with a claim, should you choose not to.

We are a leading expert in the recovery of wrongly paid home care fees. If, at any point, you believe that your ineligibility or pay out has been unfair, simply get in touch with our solicitor with for an initially free consultation, who would be happy to recommend the next steps.

Could you be eligible for NHS Continuing Healthcare?

Our Nursing Care department is one of the leading national experts in the recovery of wrongly paid care home fees; our specialist nursing care team have successfully recovered over £200 million for our clients since the department was set up in 2006.

If an individual is in a nursing or care home primarily because of physical or mental health needs, the cost of their care should be covered by the NHS Continuing Healthcare funding scheme, regardless of the individual’s wealth. However, with around 40% of Britain’s 440,000 care home residents self-funding their care, thousands of families in England and Wales could be wrongly paying care fees.

Therefore, if you or a relative are paying care home fees, you could be due a refund.

We are also able to support our clients access NHS Continuing Healthcare funding even if they have not started paying for nursing care fees.

Why should I choose Hugh James for my nursing care claim?

We believe we are one of the leading national experts in the recovery of wrongly paid care home fees. Here are just some of the reasons why our clients choose to work with us:

  • We have recovered over £200 million in wrongly paid nursing home fees since the department was set up in 2006.
  • Our success and client stories are regularly featured in the press as we are recognised as leading the way in reclaiming wrongly paid care home fees. This includes The One Show, Dispatches, ITV News, The Telegraph, The Sunday Times and The Mirror.
  • We work in partnership with many of the leading older peoples’ charities, helping us to ensure our service meets the needs of the people we, and the charities, represent.
  • Unlike many other companies who focus on reclaiming wrongly paid care fees, we are a firm of solicitors regulated by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority (SRA) and comply with the solicitors’ code of conduct.
  • The Hugh James Nursing Care team is the leading and most experienced team in the niche area of continuing healthcare, giving you complete peace of mind that your case is being dealt with by fully qualified lawyers who specialise in reclaiming nursing and care home fees.
  • The team is also one of the biggest teams focusing exclusively on this area in the UK with over 40 dedicated lawyers.
  • We promise to deal with your claim from start to finish and will not pass your claim on to a third party. We offer a complete service for you with dedicated team members to contact.
  • Head of the team, Lisa Morgan, won the highly acclaimed Law Society Junior Lawyer of the Year 2010 Excellence Award due to her work in this area. She was also recently awarded the Cardiff University Simon Mumford award. In 2017, the department was highly commended at the Age Cymru Awards in the large business category for its commitment to helping older people.
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Our services

Key contact

Lisa Morgan

Partner

Lisa Morgan is a Partner and Head of the Nursing Care department. She is regarded as an experienced and specialist solicitor leading in the niche area of continuing healthcare.

She has been instrumental in developing a niche legal department in Hugh James, which comprises of 25 fee earners who solely act for the elderly and families in recovering wrongly paid nursing fees.

Trustpilot

How Patrick reclaimed wrongly paid care home fees

Discover how Patrick and his family successfully reclaimed wrongly paid care home fees in this in-depth case study. Patrick talks about the difficult time when his mother needed to go into care, challenges faced, and the steps taken to recover care home fees that should have been covered by the NHS. If you or a loved one have overpaid for care home fees, this real-life example could provide the guidance and inspiration you need. Watch now to learn more.

View more stories

Free no obligation assessment

We offer a free assessment to help you decide whether you’d like to proceed with a case to reclaim wrongly paid care fees or not.

Please contact us to receive a copy of our questionnaire through the post. Once you have completed and returned this to us, a member of our specialist Nursing Care legal team will assess your case and will discuss whether they believe you should be eligible for funding with you. There is no obligation on you to proceed with a legal case after this point.

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How can we help?

We are the UK’s the leading law firm in the recovery of wrongly paid care costs. We have a 60% success rate and have recovered over £200m in wrongly paid care fees for patients and their families. Our biggest single recovery so far is £450,000, with an average settlement value of £30,000.

Our fees

We understand that instructing a solicitor may be daunting, but unlike advocacy firms, as solicitors we must be open and transparent about our costs. There cannot be any hidden charges.

Following a free initial assessment of your case, we offer a number of funding.

In most cases our clients are offered the choice of a ‘no win no fee’ Contingency Fee Agreement and an hourly rate basis. The Contingency Fee Agreement is popular with our clients as it provides certainty; they know exactly what we will charge if we win the case and it makes no difference how much time we spend pursuing the claim to a successful conclusion. In addition, there is peace of mind that if we pursue the claim and we lose, you do not pay us anything.

Retrospective cases

This is where money paid for care home fees is recovered.

If we succeed with a retrospective claim (monies are recovered), we take 25% plus VAT of the monies recovered.

It is common, as NHS Continuing Healthcare is based on the type and amount of care needs, that eligibility is only awarded for part of the period in care. Our average amount to recover is £30,000 and our average fee is £7,500 plus VAT.

Current assessments

Where someone is awarded free NHS funding.

If a current assessment awards full NHS funding, our fee is 25% plus VAT of the monies we preserve for you for the first four months, or until eligibility for NHS CHC is lost, whichever is first.

If, for example, the date of a current assessment is 1 June and eligibility is found and you were paying £800 per week, and over four months £12,800. You will pay us £3,200 plus VAT.

Hourly rate charging basis

All our clients are also offered an hourly rate option. Our current hourly rate is £200 plus VAT.

We will provide you with an estimate of costs. Giving an estimate at the outset of a case is difficult and is dependent on the circumstance of each case. Many of the factors which will influence the eventual amount of costs are unknown. Whilst it is difficult for us to say how long the claim may take and how much work we will need to do (since often this will depend on the way that the health authority deals with the claim) our estimate of our costs will be provided to cover the work for assessing all the medical records, advising on merit, requesting an assessment and appeals.

It is difficult to estimate how much time is spent on a case, but we suggest a typical case from start to finish will be 40-60 hours.

We regularly update you on the costs incurred. Our costs are payable win or lose on an hourly rate basis.

Will there be any surprise costs at any time

No. At the outset of the claim, we will write to you to explain the funding options. As a firm of solicitors, we must be clear and transparent about our costs.

Whilst we do not envisage you will be unhappy with the cost or service we provide, it is good for you to know that if you were unhappy, unlike unregulated advocacy companies, you can make a complaint through our internal complaints procedure. If you are not satisfied once you have been through our complaints procedure, you can contact the Legal Ombudsman.

Your questions answered

The process will depend on a number of factors, such as whether you are starting your claim from scratch or if you are coming to us to appeal a negative decision; whether you are claiming on behalf of a loved one who has since passed away or has just moved into long-term care.

If you believe that you or a family member has wrongly paid care fees, then the first step is to complete our questionnaire. This will be assessed by our Nursing Care legal team who will be able to advise on whether or not you have a case, and if so, what the process will be. This initial questionnaire is free to complete and there is no obligation on you to proceed with a claim should you decide not to.

We believe we are one of the leading national experts in the recovery of wrongly paid care home fees. Here are just some of the reasons why our clients choose to work with us:

  • We have recovered over £200 million in wrongly paid nursing home fees since the department was set up in 2006.
  • Our success and client stories are regularly featured in the press as we are recognised as leading the way in reclaiming wrongly paid care home fees. This includes The One Show, Dispatches, ITV News, The Telegraph, The Sunday Times and The Mirror.
  • We work in partnership with many of the leading older peoples’ charities, helping us to ensure our service meets the needs of the people we, and the charities, represent.
  • Unlike many other companies who focus on reclaiming wrongly paid care fees, we are a firm of solicitors regulated by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority (SRA) and comply with the solicitors’ code of conduct.
  • The Hugh James Nursing Care team is the leading and most experienced team in the niche area of continuing healthcare, giving you complete peace of mind that your case is being dealt with by fully qualified lawyers who specialise in reclaiming nursing and care home fees.
  • The team is also one of the biggest teams focusing exclusively on this area in the UK with over 40 dedicated lawyers.
  • We promise to deal with your claim from start to finish and will not pass your claim on to a third party. We offer a complete service for you with dedicated team members to contact.
  • Head of the team, Lisa Morgan, won the highly acclaimed Law Society Junior Lawyer of the Year 2010 Excellence Award due to her work in this area. She was also recently awarded the Cardiff University Simon Mumford award. In 2017, the department was highly commended at the Age Cymru Awards in the large business category for its commitment to helping older people.

We deal with a wide range of clients across England and Wales.

In theory, yes. However, you cannot simply appeal because you disagree with the outcome of the decision. You can ask for a review of the decision to refuse funding if the correct procedures have not been followed or the application of the eligibility criteria have been incorrectly applied. You may also only be given a limited time to appeal a decision so it’s important you read any letters you receive carefully.

In the first instance you should direct your appeal to the Clinical Commissioning Group in England or Health Board in Wales. The review systems in England and Wales are different and can be complicated.

If you are a client of ours, we will conduct the appeal on your behalf with your authorisation.

Yes, it is possible to retrospectively claim back money paid on care home fees even if the individual who received the care has now passed away. We have successfully done this for many clients.

It is the local authority (social services), rather than the NHS who are responsible for care if you are found not eligible for NHS Continuing Healthcare. Unlike the NHS, social services are able to assess the individual’s ability to pay. This will mean that they will conduct a financial assessment.

There is an upper and lower capital limit. This means that if a person has savings which amount to more than the upper capital limit, they will have to pay the full cost of their care home placement until their savings reduce to that limit. If an individual has savings which are worth less than the lower capital limit, then a local authority social services department will fund the cost of care. A person who is in between the capital limits will have to make a contribution to their care costs on a tariff rate depending on how much they exceed the minimum.

Your savings include any money in bank and building society accounts, stocks and shares, and property (land and buildings). Any joint ownership is counted according to that person’s share.

The capital limits are different in England and Wales. Please check the Government website to find the capital limits where you live.

The application process for NHS Continuing Healthcare is very complex. Although you don’t need to work with a solicitor to get the funding, working with an expert in the field will significantly increase your chances of getting NHS Continuing Healthcare eligibility.

Clinical Commissioning Groups  in England and Health Boards in Wales can often make arbitrary NHS care funding decisions based on the ability to pay rather than health needs. As a result you may not receive NHS care funding, even if you are eligible.

Many of our clients start working with us after starting to work through the process themselves, but struggle with the complicated system. Working with our team will give you the best chance of securing the correct decision.

There are a number of companies offering this service who do not have our experience and in some cases are not solicitors. A Legal Ombudsman report released in July 2011 revealed that thousands of people may be receiving sub-standard services from unregulated companies offering consumer financial products. Hugh James is regulated by the Solicitors Regulatory Authority (SRA) and complies with the solicitor’s code of conduct.

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