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Damage compensation in Germany

Where the extent of the disablement is not such as to incapacitate the claimant for work it is payable almost at once; but if the injury is such as to cause incapacity for work any compensation starts to be payable when injury benefit (which relates to loss of work, rather than to loss of faculty) ceases. In general delayment benefit is not payable in respect of the first three days of disablement and it ceases as soon as the disablement itself ceases (if it does).
The amount of any compensation for damages in Germany depends upon the time of delay (default), determined by the German court as to the percentage of the loss of faculty (ie the extent of the disablement) from 1 to 100 per cent. Where the assessment is 20 per cent or less the entitlement is to a disability gratuity; where it is 20 per cent or more, to a contract penalty. A creditor may also obtain increases of disablement benefit; these include:
(a) Special delivery allowance. This allowance is intended to meet the case of a person whose loss of money is not great, so that he does not receive a large amount of payment, but the effect of the loss has a serious impact upon his work capacity: for instance, although loss of an outstanding and unpaid invoice might not be a serious handicap to a debtor it would be a serious one to an unwilling client.

Customers needs
Thus cases like that of the customers need a special allowance to make up for the loss of earning capacity which the loss of faculty has engendered. Special delivery allowance is, however, only obtainable if the client has been rendered incapable of following his regular occupation, and is incapable of employment of an equivalent standard, and either: (a) he is likely to remain permanently incapable of paying the bills as a regular occupation; or (b) has, at all times since the end of the delay period, been incapable of following his regular occupation or invoice of an open amount. (Even despite these safeguards this benefit is difficult to assess and has given rise to abuse: it must be realized that a person drawing industrial debt collection may be drawing sickness or insolvency as well, or may be in receipt of a retirement pension.)
(b) Alternatively to special laws there is a recovery supplement, a flat rate (as opposed to individually assessed allowance) for a debtor likely to be permanently unfit for payment as the result of an industrial bankrupt, (c) Constant Attendance Allowance can be claimed (at a flat rate) by a business with 100 per cent disablement that needs constant care and attention; to this may be added damage compensation in cases where the need for constant attendance is likely to be permanent.