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Dintilhac schedule of heads of damage

The French classification of heads of bodily injury damage, never made binding by any statute yet applied by every court.

Definition

Article 25 of the French social security funding act for 2007: recovery by social security bodies against the liable party and its insurer now runs head by head, no longer against the overall award. That called for a list of heads; a Justice Ministry circular of February 22, 2007 recommended Dintilhac's. The Dintilhac schedule divides bodily injury into some twenty distinct heads along two crossing axes: the nature of the harm, economic or non-economic, and its timing, before or after medical consolidation. It covers medical expenses, present and then future loss of earnings, third party care and effect on career. It also covers temporary and then permanent functional deficit, pain endured, and the aesthetic, amenity, sexual and family-founding heads. Its practical value is twofold. It makes awards comparable from one court to another. It also prevents one head being compensated twice under two names, which was common before. It drives the mechanics of social security recovery as well, which has proceeded head by head only since the 2006 reform. What stands out is where its authority comes from: no statute ever imposed it, and it spread on the sole strength of how well it was built.

Its 19 cross-references, woven across the glossary's 18 categories
Dintilhac schedule of heads of damage: Claims & settlement glossary illustration, AlgoPolis
Example

The working group chaired by Judge Jean-Pierre Dintilhac delivered its report in July 2005. The French social security funding act for 2007, passed on December 21, 2006, drew the consequence: third party payer recovery must now proceed head by head. That mechanically raised the share going to the victim on the personal heads.

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