Definitions which only apply to this section:

We, our, us DAS Legal Expenses Insurance Company Limited.

Representative The lawyer or other suitably-qualified person, who we have appointed to act for you in line with the conditions of this section.

Legal Costs All reasonable and necessary costs charged by the representative on a standard basis. It also includes the opponent’s costs in civil cases if you have to pay them, or pay them with our agreement.

Date of the incident The date the incident which may lead to a claim happened. If there is more than one incident arising at the same time or from the same cause, the date of the incident is the date of the first of these events.

Insured incident An event which causes the death of, or bodily injury to you.

WHAT YOU ARE COVERED FOR

Legal expenses; up to £25,000

Under this section, we will negotiate for your legal rights after an insured incident. We will also help in appealing or defending an appeal as long as you tell us within the time limits allowed that you want us to appeal.
Before we pay legal costs for appeals, we must agree that it is always more likely than not that the appeal will be successful.
If you use a representative, we will pay the legal costs for this. The most we will pay for all claims for an insured incident resulting from one or more event arising at the same time or from the same cause is £25,000.
We agree to provide legal expenses to cover, keeping to the conditions and exclusions, as long as:

1. any legal proceedings will be dealt with by a court or other body which we agree to;
2. in civil claims, it is always more likely than not that you will recover damages (or other legal remedy) or make a successful defence;
3. the insured incident happens during the period of insurance.

WHAT YOU ARE NOT COVERED FOR

As well as the general conditions, the following exclusions and conditions apply:

1. Any claim reported to us more than 180 days after the date you should have known about the insured incident.

2. Any legal costs incurred before we agree to pay them.

1. Any illness which develops gradually or is not caused by a specific or sudden accident.
2. You driving a motor vehicle for which you do not have valid motor insurance.
3. An application for Judicial Review.

4. Defending your legal rights (but defending a counter claim is covered.)

5. Any disagreement with us that is not in condition 18 of this section.

6. Any legal action you take which we or the representative have not agreed to or where you do anything that has a negative effect on us or the representative.

7. Any disagreement with Snowcard Insurance Services Ltd or any of the insurers.

8. Fines, damages or other penalties which you are ordered to pay.

9. Any legal costs that you have to pay under a contingency fee arrangement (a contingency fee arrangement is when the lawyer takes a percentage of the damages as the fee.)

10. Any insured incident intentionally brought about by you.

11. Any claim relating to your alleged dishonesty or alleged violent behaviour.

12. Any claim relating to written or spoken comments which damage your reputation.

CONDITIONS
You must do the following:
1. Send everything we ask for in writing and give us full details of any claim, and any information we need, as soon as possible.

2. We can take over in your name, any claim or legal proceedings at any time. We can negotiate any claim on your behalf.

3. You are free to choose a representative (by sending us a suitably qualified person’s name and address) if:

1. we agree to start court proceedings and it becomes necessary for a lawyer to represent your interests in those proceedings;
2. there is a conflict of interest.;

4. We may choose not to accept your choice, but only in exceptional circumstances. If there is a disagreement over the choice of representative in these circumstances, your may choose another suitably qualified person.

5. In all circumstances (except those in 3. above) we are free to choose a representative.

6. We will appoint a representative to represent you according to our standard conditions of appointment. The representative must fully co-operate with us at all times.

7. We will have direct contact with the representative.

8. You must co-operate fully with us and the representative and must keep us up-to-date with the progress of the claim.

9. You must give the representative any instructions that we ask for.

10. You must tell us if anyone offers to settle the claim.

11. If you do not accept a reasonable offer to settle a claim, we may refuse to pay further legal costs.

12. You must not negotiate or agree to settle a claim without our approval.

13. We may decide to pay you the amount of damages that you are claiming or is being claimed against you instead of starting or continuing legal proceedings.

14. If we ask, you must tell the representative to have legal costs taxed, assessed or audited.

15. You must take every step to recover any legal costs that we have to pay and must pay us any legal costs that you recover.

16. If your representative refuses to continue acting for you or if you dismiss your representative, the cover we provide will end immediately, unless we agree to appoint another representative.

17. If you stop a claim without our agreement, or do not give suitable instructions to your representative, the cover we provide will end immediately and we will be entitled to reclaim any legal costs we have paid.

18. If we and you disagree about the choice of representative or about how a claim is handled, we and you can choose another representative to decide the matter. We and you must both agree to this in writing.
If we cannot agree with you about the choice of second representative, we will ask the president of a relevant national law society to choose a representative. Whoever loses the disagreement will have to pay the costs of settling it.

19. We may ask you to get (at your own expense) an opinion from a barrister chosen by you and us about whether a claim or proceedings will be successful. If the barrister believes that it is more likely than not you will recover damages (or reach a solution that we have agreed to) or make a successful defence, we will pay the cost of getting the opinion.

20. We will not pay any claim covered under any other policy, or any claim that would have been covered by any other policy if this policy did not exist.