Accept or reject the Board's assessment: the 28 days and what each choice means

The Notice of Assessment is the letter the whole Board process has been leading to. It gives the Board's figure and starts a 28-day period in which you decide. This guide explains the two periods, what silence does, what follows each choice, and section 51A, which is the rule that makes rejecting an assessment a decision with consequences. It sets out the law; it does not tell you what to do, because it cannot.

Whether to accept depends on facts a tool cannot see. The Board's figure is binding on nobody until both sides accept it.

The two periods

Section 30 of the 2003 Act gives you 28 days from the date the Notice of Assessment is served to state in writing whether you accept. A rule under section 46 can allow longer, but the notice will say 28 days and that is the period to work to. If you do not accept in writing within it, section 31(1) deems you not to have accepted. Silence is a rejection, and an accidental one counts the same as a deliberate one.

The respondent's period runs the other way. Section 31(2) deems a respondent who does not state in writing within the period that they reject the assessment to have accepted it. The Board's practice gives 21 days.

Where the claimant is a child or lacks capacity, acceptance needs court approval under section 35; the guide on children, capacity and late claims covers that.

If both accept: the Order to Pay

Where both sides accept, the Board issues an Order to Pay under section 38. The Act gives it the same standing as a court order, so the respondent or its insurer must pay the figure, including the special damages, the fee and the reasonable cost of your medical report, with the recoverable welfare benefits going to the Department of Social Protection. The claim is then over. There is no appeal and no further claim for the same injury.

If either rejects: the Authorisation

Where you reject, or stay silent, or the respondent rejects, the Board issues an Authorisation. That is the document section 12 requires before a personal injury claim can be brought to court. The Board's part is over, and the claim either settles between you and the insurer or goes to court.

Two things then follow. The two-year clock, paused since your application under section 50, starts again 6 months after the Authorisation issues; the time-limit checker will give the date. And if it was you who rejected, section 51A may apply.

Section 51A in plain words

Section 51A was inserted by the 2022 Act and applies to assessments rejected from 13 February 2023. It only bites in one situation: the respondent accepted the assessment (or was deemed to), you rejected it, and the court later awards you no more than the Board did.

In that situation:

1. No costs in your favour. The court cannot make an order for costs in your favour. Your own solicitor's and barrister's costs, which would usually be paid by the losing side, are yours.
2. The deemed tender. The respondent is treated as having tendered the Board's figure on the date it accepted. In costs terms, a tender or lodgment that a plaintiff fails to beat usually makes the plaintiff liable for the defendant's costs from the date of the tender. So you may be ordered to pay the respondent's costs from the day it accepted the assessment onward.
3. The exceptions. The court can disapply the deemed tender for special cause. A later offer under section 17 of the 2004 Act, or an actual lodgment in court, displaces the deemed tender and the usual rules apply to that offer instead.

If the court awards more than the Board did, section 51A does not apply and the ordinary rules on costs do. If the respondent rejected the assessment, section 51A does not apply at all. The accept or reject explainer sets the section out against your own figure, with the court it would fall in: the District Court up to €15,000, the Circuit Court up to €60,000, the High Court above.

Section 51A is why the decision needs a solicitor's eye. The question is not "is the figure fair" but "would a court award more, after liability and contributory negligence are argued, by enough to cover the risk on costs". Nobody can answer that from the notice alone.

What the figures say about the decision, and what they do not

The Board's Annual Report 2025 release says 47% of assessments were accepted during 2025, down from 50% in 2024 and 48% in 2023. In September 2026 the Board commissioned an Ipsos B&A survey of claimants and respondents into why assessments are accepted or rejected; the results have not been published, and the updates log will carry them when they are. All of the figures are dated on the figures register.

The Central Bank's National Claims Information Database gives the other side of the picture for motor injury claims. In the first half of 2025, a claim settled through the Board cost €22,658 on average and a litigated claim €66,100, of which €26,752 was legal costs, taking 4.7 years. In 2024, 16% of motor injury claims settled through the Board, in 2.7 years on average, and 36% through litigation, in 5 years. The litigated figure is higher partly because the claims that go to court are different claims: more serious, or with liability in dispute. The figures describe channels, not the choice in front of one person. The guide on the Central Bank's channel figures explains how to read them.

The reasons people reject, and the reasons they accept

From the Board's own FAQ and the cases that reach the courts, the reasons fall into a few groups, and none of them is a recommendation.

People reject because the medical picture has changed since the report; because the Board, assuming full liability, could not reflect a point on liability they believe the evidence settles in their favour; because a head of special damages was not vouched in time; or because a solicitor's view is that the Guidelines' bracket was applied at the wrong point. The guide on rejecting an assessment and going to court follows that route through the summons, the court and the costs.

People accept because the figure sits where the Guidelines put an injury described like theirs; because liability or contributory negligence would be contested in court; because the Order to Pay ends the claim in weeks rather than years; or because section 51A makes the downside of a court award no higher than the Board's figure a real one. The injury checker shows the Guidelines' bracket for an injury described like yours, drawn to scale, so you can see where the Board's general damages sit within it.

Practical points about the 28 days

• The period runs from service of the notice, not from the date you read it. Note the date on the envelope and the letter.
• Acceptance must be in writing, in the form the notice asks for. A phone call is not acceptance.
• If the respondent's 21 days end before your 28, you may know their position before you decide; if not, you decide without it.
• A direct offer from the insurer during the 28 days is a separate thing. Accepting it settles the claim outside the Board; the guide on an insurer's direct offer explains what signing does.
• For a child, nothing is final until a court approves it.

The step in the sequence

The lead guide on how the Board works places this step in the whole process, and the Board page is the site's own page on the Board.

Where this leaves you

Rejecting an assessment the respondent has accepted puts section 51A in play, and that is a decision on which a solicitor is plainly the right step: they can read the medical evidence, the liability position and the costs risk together, which no page can. The accept or reject explainer sets section 51A out in plain words against your figure and the court it falls in, so you go into that conversation knowing the rule.