If you’re a student or recent graduate in the UK, you’ve almost certainly seen either targeted adverts to join the Student Group Claim (SGC) across social media, student newspapers sharing the story, or links to sign up to the claim repeatedly shared in group chats.
Yesterday the SGC had its first hearing in the High Court in its case against University College London, where it will decide how the claim should proceed.
The case was first launched in 2020 as a compensation claim for UCL students seeking compensation for online studies during the pandemic. But after the government rejected a petition related to tuition fees in 2021, the claim expanded to 83 universities, with 18 letters before claim already sent to some of the country’s largest universities.
The speed at which the claim has gathered pace has been monumental and media coverage across student and more mainstream media has been the key catalyst for driving students to sign up to the claim.
The Boar and Felix, the student papers for the University of Warwick and Imperial College respectively, were among the first to report these claims back in November 2022. Student magazines are regularly shared across student group pages, with the appeal factor being simple; these are by students featuring the testimony of their friends and peers. This provided the perfect springboard for the story to then be shared by ITV and The Times – encouraging further publications to pick it up as well.
Evening Standard reported in November 2022, 20,000 students and graduates had joined the claim, by February it had reached 80,000 and the claim hit six figures a couple of weeks ago. It only goes to show you can’t disregard the power of word of mouth among disgruntled students – uniting almost 5% of the student population in a matter of months.
Harcus Parker and Asserson Law are leading the claim, and they’ve captured their audience well. Undeniably the claim is a straightforward sell too, ‘no win, no fee’ is a no hassle option for potentially significant gain. Student complaints hit a record high for a fourth consecutive year and, politics aside, the famously cash-strapped student population isn’t going to turn down the opportunity to claim free money.
SGC now faces its next challenge in securing continued engagement from its claimants and maintaining the momentum. Their Instagram and Twitter pages have limited engagement and we know these court proceedings are more than likely to drag on. The first hearing, taking place this week has already been delayed twice.
It’s not just a problem for SGC but all group claims, they target the general public with messages of easy wins, but when that drags, the claimants will naturally forget and move on. The UK legal system is sometimes considered as a Blackbox to those outside it, and converting legalese to meaningful, digestible content is a challenge – if anything the rise of group claims may hopefully increase engagement with the Justice system and the MoJ’s ‘open justice’ consultation may also help.
Regular engagement from the claim organisers is vital; make the claimants feel like part of the case. Not everyone will know about the process and it’s the role of the organisers to demystify the system.
Client communication is part of Lawyer 101, but naturally much harder when your client is thousands of individuals rather than one or two corporate parties. Whether the update is positive or negative it’s important for the client to know. Managing expectations then also becomes an important part of this. Posts have claimed the possibility of securing “up to £5000” in compensation, but of course, there is no guarantee. As news of the claim circulated largely by word of mouth, and likely spread around student friendship groups, there will be a lot of expectations and room for misunderstandings. In a growing area of law such as class actions, building trust is key. A large fall from grace risks upsetting a large group of future clients for other group claims.
Continued engagement is two-way; however, the claimants are clearly interested and leveraging this to use their testimony and experience keeps them invested and gives the group claim a natural voice. This is one thing the SGC has done well. Alongside inviting signatories to the claim to assemble outside the High Court before the hearing, the organisers have personal case studies and names plastered across their website, socials and in national newspapers including The Times and Telegraph and broadcasts. The effect of this is also then two-fold: like any other high-profile case, winning over wider public opinion can only positively spread your message further.
All in all, the SGC campaign appears to be going from strength to strength by understanding its audience, having clear and engaging messaging and raising awareness of the claim with effective media coverage across key publications over a sustained period of time. It will now be up to the courts to decide how the claim progresses.
