The first thing is to decide if making a claim is the right thing for you to do.

By using the website, or calling one of our legally trained advisors, we can talk you through what you might need to think about and answer any questions you may have. Our advisors will not try to pressure you into making a claim - you're under no obligation to do so. And, just in case you were worried, our service is completely free.

At National Accident Helpline, we believe that everyone should have access to justice. We can help you find out if you have a claim and put you in touch with one of our expert solicitors, who will then sort everything out for you.

You can call us, email us, chat to us online or leave your details and we will call you back - whatever works for you. You will be put through to one of our legally trained advisors, who will be able to answer any questions you have and assess your claim. If you are eligible to no win no fee claim and want to go ahead, you could be speaking to a specialist personal injury solicitor within minutes. If it turns out that you don't actually have a valid claim, we will try to help you in any way we can.

When we have spoken to people who have claimed with us, one of the first things they consider is what impact the injury is going to have on their life.

But not just the immediate issues, like if it is going to stop them working, cause them to lose money, or how it will affect their day-to-day life. People are also concerned about the long-term effects their injury could have, like whether it might stop them doing things in the future or how it might affect their family.

Another important consideration is the impact making a claim might have on your life. We often get cases where the party being claimed against is someone they know, sometimes even a friend.

Many people worry that this person is the one who has to pay any compensation directly. But this shouldn't be the case; anyone you may be claiming against should have insurance to cover personal injury claims. It will therefore be their insurance company which pays the compensation.

In the next section we have some more specific advice about accidents that happen at work and making a claim against your employer.

When an accident has happened at work, many people worry that making a claim against their employer could cause them to lose their job.

Fortunately, it's against the law for an employer to dismiss someone for making a compensation claim against them - this would be unfair dismissal. Your employer has a duty of care to ensure all employees are given a safe environment to work in. If an accident has occurred, making a claim will often lead to an improvement in the working environment as a whole.

'Compensation culture' is the misconception that there are increasing numbers of unnecessary claims being made. While we're aware that we can't stop people trying to make false claims, we pride ourselves on only helping people who genuinely have a claim. Our focus is always to give a clear path of justice to people who need it, not to those who are taking advantage of the system.

At National Accident Helpline, we strongly believe that you shouldn't feel ashamed about making a compensation claim.

To put your accident into context, roughly two million accidents which are eligible for a claim happen each year. Most of these accidents will have an impact on the accident sufferer's ability to work, while nearly half will prevent them from working altogether. Roughly half of the injuries will need at least a month to recover from.

Thousands of claims are made in the UK each year, so it's quite likely that you already know someone who's made a claim - it's more common than you think. And, not only could you get compensation, you could also be preventing the same injury from happening to somebody else.

All claims with us are confidential, so there is no need to worry about your information being shared with others without your permission.