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Part 4 of 7 · Damaged goods claimer series ~5 min read

Which claims are worth filing

The instinct is that every valid claim should be filed, and it is wrong in a way worth being precise about, because the effort that goes into unwinnable small claims is effort not spent on the ones that would have paid.

Key takeaways

  • A claim is roughly twenty minutes plus whatever the follow-up costs.
  • Liability caps are often per-kilo or per-consignment and can be well below the goods’ value.
  • Below a threshold, log the damage and do not file. Record that decision.
  • Some small claims are still worth filing as evidence of a pattern.
  • The system recommends; a person decides, in about ten seconds.

What a claim costs

StepTimeNotes
Assembling the pack2 minutesAutomated here; 20 minutes without a system
Checking and filing10 minutesPortal or form, per carrier
First chase5 minutesNeeded on most claims
Second chase or dispute20–60 minutesNeeded on maybe a third
Total, typical~20 minutesRising sharply if it is disputed

Twenty minutes of somebody’s attention is not free, and the fourth row is the one that makes small claims a bad trade: a disputed forty-pound claim can absorb an hour, and the dispute rate is higher on small claims because the carrier’s incentive to resolve quickly is lower.

Liability caps

Recoverable value against liability caps for three consignment typesA stacked bar chart with three bars in pounds. Two series: recoverable under the carrier's cap in green, and value above the cap in red. A four hundred kilogram pallet has a cap of five hundred and twenty pounds and nothing above it. A two kilogram small parcel has a cap of twenty-six pounds and two hundred and seventy-four pounds above it. A light, high value consignment has a cap of thirteen pounds and one thousand one hundred and eighty-seven pounds above it. A note says a weight-based cap is unrelated to what is in the box, and the third bar is common.£0£500£1000£1500£2000~£520Pallet, 400kg~£300Small parcel, 2kg~£1200Light, high valueRecoverable under the carrier's cap, £Value above the cap, £A weight-based cap is unrelated to what is in the box. The third bar is common.
Fig 1. Three consignments against a typical per-kilo liability cap. The third case — light, valuable goods — is where the standard cap recovers almost nothing.

Knowing the cap before filing changes the decision entirely, and it also changes an earlier decision: consignments where the cap is far below the value are the ones to insure separately or to declare, and the pattern report in the next post makes that visible.

The cap is per carrier and per service, configured alongside the deadline windows. It is twenty minutes of reading terms once and it prevents a recurring waste of effort.

The recommendation

How the system decides whether to recommend filing a claimA vertical chain of five steps entered by a box labelled A damage record with evidence captured. Step one computes the recoverable value after the cap. Step two asks whether it is under fifty pounds after the cap; if so it exits to Log, do not file, unless it is a pattern. Step three asks whether the damage was concealed, which is a weaker case; if so it exits to File if over two hundred pounds, a higher bar. Step four asks whether the evidence is complete, in particular whether the packaging was photographed; if not it exits to File anyway, note the gap, and fix the process. Step five files it, with the pack ready and the deadline set. A note says thresholds are configuration, and what matters is that a decision is made and recorded.AWS ACCOUNTA damage recordevidence capturedRecoverable valueafter the capUnder £50?after the capLog, do not fileunless it is a patternyesConcealed?weaker caseFile if over £200a higher baryesEvidence complete?packaging photographed?File anyway, note the gapand fix the processnoFile itpack ready, deadline setThresholds are configuration. What matters is that a decision is made and recorded.
Fig 2. How the recommendation is produced. It is four rules over two numbers, and its value is entirely in being applied consistently rather than by mood.
  • Database
  • App integration
  • Machine learning
  • Management
  • Front-end & mobile

Log, do not file

A damage record that is logged but not filed is not a failure. It is a recorded event that costs nothing, feeds the pattern analysis, and provides the count when somebody eventually needs to say “this carrier has damaged fourteen consignments this year”.

The decision is recorded with its reason, so that a year later nobody has to wonder whether the small claims were missed or declined. “Not filed: recoverable value £22 after cap” is an answer.

The exception for patterns

A small claim that would normally be logged should be filed when it is the third of its kind from the same carrier on the same route, because at that point the value of the claim is not the money. It is the record of having formally raised it, which is what makes a subsequent conversation about the route possible.

So the threshold rule has one override: if this is the third similar incident in a quarter, file it regardless of value and say so in the claim. That is a rule the system can apply and a person would not remember to.

Next: what the claims add up to.

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