Insurance claims · evidence work, Reading
It's not your honesty that an adjuster is evaluating. The question is whether your file is actually what it claims to be, and what settles it is the export the recorder made and the hash values taken from it, along with a written description of the route it took off the disk. Claims are civil matters. The Regulator's statutory Code governs criminal proceedings in England and Wales, so it does not govern this, and nothing here calls for accreditation. We do not hold accreditation in any form in any case, and the report states as much at the top. If something cannot be read, that is documented in writing too. From £800 + VAT, agreed in writing before anything starts.
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| The kind of claim | What reaches our bench | What it can prove |
|---|---|---|
| A break-in, or a theft | The recorder, or the disk taken from a recorder which has stopped working | The period around the incident, exported in the format written by the box |
| A unit lost to water, smoke or heat | The drive out of the damaged machine | Invoices, schedules and photographs still held on the machine |
| A vehicle claim | The dashcam card itself, not a clip somebody sent on | The camera's full data file (GPS, speed and sensor channels, which any forwarded MP4 would lose), with a note of what the forwarded version lost |
| A company documenting its loss | The drive that held those records | A hashed list of everything that can still be read from the disk, plus a plain account of what cannot be told from the disk at all |
| A liability dispute | A recorder that each party thinks backs their own account | One set of exports, sent identically to each, with a method either of the two can run again |
The first scoping call costs nothing. There will be no chargeable work on your case until you have a price in writing. The purpose of this call is to define the scope of the work. Specifically, we identify all relevant events, the accounts and machines involved and, most importantly, what the evidence needs to prove. Forensic instructions begin at £800 + VAT, and the scope decides where yours lands.
As long as the recorder remains powered on, it will continue to write, the oldest material being replaced by the newest. Claims move far more slowly than that loop. A manual cannot tell you how much time is left before the material is gone; that depends on capacity, number of channels, resolution, and how the unit was set up. Turn the power off first. Then ring.
Examining a machine without authority is illegal under section 1 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990, so each job records who authorised the work and on what basis. The landlord stands in one position, the employer in a second, and the owner of the van in a third.
You receive two files. The first is the native export, with whatever player will open it; the second plays anywhere. What was required to convert the first into the second is documented, not hidden in a viewing application. Both carry MD5 and SHA-256, and the report records the offset between the box's clock and real time.
Give the other side a finding they cannot check or test, and you are giving them an argument. So it all goes in the bundle: exhibit numbers, the image each conclusion came from, dated handovers, the hashes, and the working notes typed while the job was running. The examiners on the other side will be able to re-run everything and come to the same answer.
Worth knowing before you instruct anybody: since 2 October 2025, version 2 of the Regulator's statutory Code has been in force. It requires compliance with ISO/IEC 17025 for two things that matter here, namely extracting data from digital storage and recovering CCTV footage. However, this applies only to work done for a criminal prosecution, in England and Wales. A claim under your insurance policy is not a criminal prosecution. No accreditation of any type is held here, and that is clearly stated first in every report we produce.
A haulier and a food producer had a disagreement over the day a pallet had been damaged, and the only record of it sat on the yard gate recorder. Its clock had not been set for British Summer Time. The offset was measured, the recorder's own export was taken, and both times appeared in the report. It settled after exchange.
No. ISO/IEC 17025 is required under the Regulator's Code for work done for a criminal prosecution in England and Wales. A claim on a policy is civil, so this requirement never reaches it. Accreditation is not held here, whatever the matter, and the opening page of each report says so. If a claim later becomes criminal, we will tell you in writing.
The footage has been round a monitor, through a phone's camera lens and out through a re-encode. So what the recorder originally wrote, timing included, does not come out at the other end of that process. Insurers want exactly what the box produced, with a hash on it.
We can list whatever still reads, and report what the disk records about the rest. Overwritten material is reported as overwritten. Guesswork is not on the menu.
Somebody with the legal right to give it. Unauthorised access to a computer is an offence (section 1 of the Computer Misuse Act 1990), so each case file records the basis for the work. A landlord stands in one position, an employer in another, the owner of a van in a third, and a driver in a fourth.
When asking about the loss, the insurer will want to know what happened to the disk between the loss and the report. The proper answer is nothing. Do not power up the disk. Get a quote first, by phone or with the form, then post it to the Oxford intake lab or drop it off there, Monday to Friday, 9am to 5:30pm, no appointment needed. The first look is free, our fees are set out in writing, and what we find goes to the party who instructed us.