Usdaw Legal Plus more services for more people

Usdaw's legal service has long been recognised as an important factor when it comes to the recruitment and retention of members.

Members find it reassuring to have the resources of Usdaw's Legal Department and our nationwide panel of solicitors behind them, as well as a team of skilled and experienced Usdaw officials to provide advice and representation where necessary.

Now the legal service which Usdaw offers has been improved even more, with the expansion in 2001 of our LEGAL PLUS service.

If a member has a legal problem, they have enough worries without the additional problem of having to find the money to pay for legal advice and representation. The Usdaw Legal Plus service is available as part of our attractive membership package at no extra cost from the first day they join.

The Legal Plus service is not just a benefit to tuck away in your back pocket. More than 11,000 members called upon it in the year 2000. The Legal Plus service is now reaching about one in 27 members, about twice as many as in 1992 when the figure was one in 53. This means that Legal Plus is not just a remote possibility but an immediate reality for members.

The year 2000 was a record year and £13.5 million was recovered for members through the Union's Legal Department. We are expecting even more for 2001.

Expanding the Service

Usdaw is looking all the time to bringing better and better benefits to members. Changes in Government legislation give us an opportunity to improve and develop the Legal Plus service even further. In order to maximise the advantage under the new legislation the Executive Council will be making Rule Change Proposals to the ADM which we trust the membership will unanimously endorse.

New Benefits

1) In addition to accidents at work and on the way to and from work, members may now be granted full legal assistance for road traffic accidents and any other kind of accident – even those which have nothing to do with work.

2) Full legal assistance may now be granted to the member's immediate family who share the same household and who have been injured in a road traffic accident.

3) A medical negligence panel of solicitors has been set up and although not covered by the full legal assistance, special arrangements have been put in place to help Usdaw members with claims against hospitals and doctors.

Legal Plus Services for Members

• Claims for accidents at work.
• Claims for accidents on the way to or from work.
• Claims for road traffic accidents.
• Claims for any other accidents even outside work.
• Industrial disease cases.
• Criminal Injury Compensation claims.
• Employment law problems (eg dismissal, redundancy, contract claims, equal pay, discrimination, pension rights).
• Claims for work-related State Benefits
• Work-related criminal prosecutions.
• Free will-writing and assistance on probate matters at special rates.
• Conveyancing at special rates.
• A free initial interview on any other non-work-related legal problem with special rates for follow-up work (eg family law, consumer problems, neighbour disputes, debt advice, crime outside work, criminal negligence).

A brand new member can take up the free will offer the day they join the Union and immediately get a service for which they would otherwise pay anything up to £100.

Usdaw's Legal Plus service extends to members of the immediate family (that is, those living in the same household) for the following:

• Road traffic accident claims. (This is the same full accident service as a member injured at work would receive.)
• Other accidents – free initial interview with follow-up work at special rates.
• Free initial interview on any other legal problem with special rates for follow-up work.
• Free will-writing for members' partners and assistance on probate matters at special rates.

The Legal Plus service will not be granted to members' families if they have work-related accidents or other work-related problems and they should have been in Usdaw.

Form BL1 (yellow) - For accidents and injuries; criminalprosecutions; victims of violent crime; social security and unemployment benefits.

Form BL2 (blue) - For employment problems, such as contract terms, employment protection, dismissal, redundancy, racial discrimination, sexualdiscrimination, disability discrimination,sexual harassment, equal pay and maternity rights.

Form BL3 (pink) - For legal problems unconnected with work.

Form BL4 - For free will-writing for you and your partner.

Form BL5 (green) - For road traffic accidents befalling a family member.

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