When choosing your car insurance policy, you’ll likely be able to add ‘legal expenses cover’ as an optional extra. Although you might write this off as an extra you can do without, it’s worth considering the benefits it can add to your policy as a safety net in case you end up in court after a car accident.

What is legal cover?

Legal cover, or motor legal protection, helps you to recover legal costs if you have to go to court after an accident. While a car insurance policy will help you to pay for repairs to vehicles involved in the accident, if things go to court to decide who was responsible for the accident then you could be left out of pocket due to a lawyer’s fees. Legal expenses cover exists to help take some of the burden away and absorb some of the costs from a few different areas.

What can I use legal cover for?

Legal expenses cover as part of a car insurance policy can be used in a number of ways, helping you to recover uninsured losses due to an accident. This can include:

• Any excess you paid from a crash which wasn’t your fault
• Cost of hiring a car
• Damage to your vehicle if you don’t have a comprehensive policy
• Legal fees involved from going to court or paying a solicitor to go after a third party
• Money lost due to personal injury (missing work)
• Travel expenses

Depending on which provider you choose, your policy may also include access to a legal advice helpline which you can use to talk to a legal expert if you do get into an accident.

What isn’t included in legal expenses cover?

Although you can recover legal fees using legal expenses cover, there isn’t a guarantee that your provider would take on your case. This is because they won’t act unless there’s a decent chance that the case will go in your favour or if it isn’t clear who was at fault for the accident.

Other things you may be unable to claim for include:

• Any costs associated with intentional damage caused
• Any legal expenses from before your policy was approved
• Costs from parking offenses, drunk driving or violent behaviour
• Fines or compensation which you’re ordered to pay by the courts

Also, legal cover linked to a car insurance policy can’t be used for legal fees in other, non-motor incident related cases unless specifically mentioned in the policy.

Do I need motor legal protection?

When it comes to optional extras, legal cover may seem like something which is very specific and doesn’t offer as much practicality as something like breakdown cover or windscreen cover.

However, legal costs can run very high if you do get into an accident, with a lot of policies covering around £100,000 which can give you an idea of how costly things can get. Depending on the situation, motor legal protection can provide a good amount of support in an area which can become very expensive if the worst is to happen.