How much compensation can I get for a fall in the street?

Question

José Manuel Alburquerque · Accepted Answer

There is no separate table for falls. Injuries are valued by reference to the statutory compensation scale for road traffic accidents (the “baremo”), the legal tables that set how much is paid for each day of recovery and for each after-effect. Added to that are medical expenses, the earnings you have lost and damage to your belongings, if you can prove them. The amount depends on how serious the injuries are and on what you can prove with documents. In a case on which an advisory opinion was issued in 2023, fractured vertebrae were valued at 57.227,02 euros, but the opinion proposed paying half because the injured person was partly to blame. What is added together The law allows the traffic scale to be used as a reference. Judges and the “Comissió Jurídica Assessora”, the Catalan government's legal advisory body, which gives opinions on claims of 50.000 euros or more, apply it as a guide. The amounts in the scale change every year and those for the year of the fall are used. These are the usual items: The days it takes you to recover. They are paid at a higher or lower rate depending on how much they prevent you from leading your normal life. Operations, which have their own set amount. After-effects, which are valued in points according to how serious they are and the age of the person who suffers them. Scars and other aesthetic harm (disfigurement) are valued separately. Medical, pharmacy, physiotherapy and travel expenses, backed by the invoices. Help from another person, if you need it. Loss of earnings (“lucro cesante”), which is the income you lose while you are unable to work. Damage to your belongings, such as your glasses, mobile phone or clothes. A real example In a case on which an advisory opinion was issued in 2023, a cyclist fell when his wheel went into an open gap between the planks of a wooden footbridge on a municipal path. He fractured several vertebrae, took almost a year to recover and was left with after-effects. Using the scale as a reference, the Comissió Jurídica Assessora valued his damages at 57.227,02 euros. Of that amount, 20.059,78 euros corresponded to the days of recovery and an operation, 36.512,16 to the after-effects and 655,08 to medical expenses. It was daytime, visibility was good and the defect could be seen perfectly well. The Comissió considered that the cyclist was half to blame, because of the speed he was going at and because he lifted his front wheel. It proposed compensation of 28.613,51 euros, plus whatever indexation and interest were due. He had asked for 87.113,15 euros. He was awarded nothing for material damage, which he did not back up with invoices, or for his lost earnings, because his payslips from before the accident were missing. What you should know If the defect was clearly visible or you were distracted, the compensation is reduced in proportion to your share of the blame, as in the example. If you were entirely to blame, you get nothing. Anything not backed up by medical reports, invoices or payslips is not paid. If you claim 50.000 euros or more, the file needs an opinion from the Comissió Jurídica Assessora, which makes it take longer. The amount is calculated as at the date of the fall and updated to the date of the decision using the “Índice de Garantía de la Competitividad”, an official index published by the “Instituto Nacional de Estadística”, Spain's national statistics office. If the public authority is then slow to pay, it also owes late-payment interest.