The Supreme Court of Appeal has found that new RAF rules relating to lodging a claim, stood in road accident victims' way of legally obtaining compensation.
Image: Facebook/RAF
The Road Accident Fund will in the next few weeks implement a comprehensive communication campaign to inform claimants whose claims were rejected due to outstanding documents on how to resubmit them by the end of September.
This follows the recent Supreme Court of Appeal judgment, which found that stricter RAF claim rules made it more difficult for road accident victims to submit their claims.
The Pretoria High Court earlier slammed the directives contained in what was called the new RAF1 claim form published by the minister of transport in July 2022, as well as a similar board notice published in the Government Gazette. This followed an application by several legal bodies, which said the directives made it near impossible for road accident victims to lodge their claims. The RAF, however, appealed the earlier ruling.
The new claim requirements replaced the old claim forms, where claimants did not need to submit all the required details at the stage of lodging a claim. The new requirements resulted in thousands of claims not being accepted as they did not adhere to the requirements.
The SCA, however, found that the new requirements unfairly raised the bar for making valid claims. It subsequently ruled that the RAF must allow claimants whose submissions were rejected under the unlawful “stricter requirements” to re-lodge their claims by the end of September.
Acting Chief Executive Officer of the RAF, Radikwena Phora, said the fund welcomes the judgment since it provides clarity on the matter of the RAF 1 Form. He said the fund is currently studying the judgment in detail together with its legal advisors to understand its full extent and its impact on operational, legal, and claims administration.
Phora added that the RAF has taken into consideration all concerns raised in this judgment and is committed to its full implementation. The fund will engage with the minister of transport to adopt and publish a revised RAF 1 Form within six months.
RAF law expert and attorney, Gert Nel, meanwhile, advised claimants whose claims were rejected to issue proof that their original claim was submitted within three years of the accident and to issue as many relevant documents relating to the accident as required when re-submitting their claims. The rest can follow later.
According to Nel, indications are that around 600,000 claims were rejected under the new claim form, which will now have to be re-lodged and registered. “However, the fund’s bigger issue is “phantom” claims that have secured default judgments that are now immediately payable and estimated at R 4.8 billion,” he said. Phantom claims are claims that were lodged fully in compliance with the Act, but they failed to be acknowledged by the fund as they did not adhere to the now-overturned RAF1 form.
Nel said summons was served on the RAF, resulting in thousands of default judgments that now become payable. “Our office has court orders against the RAF for payment of these claims in excess of R100 million. There are hundreds more practitioners facing the same challenge".
Nel explained that the RAF Act does not make provision for claims to lodged again in matters that has already been fully ventilated in court and secured an order for payment. “The RAF needs to start paying - some of these victims had already died in the process of waiting,” he said.
zelda.venter@inl.co.za