HBA Legal continues to strengthen its Queensland workers’ compensation, insurance litigation and public liability expertise, appointing highly regarded solicitor Robert Parcell as Special Counsel.
With 30 years’ experience, Parcell is the fifth significant lateral hire for the Crawford-owned law firm, following its acquisition in November 2020.
HBA Legal Managing Director, Brett Ablong, said Parcell had spent the past three and a half years with DWF and was well known and respected within the insurance sector in Queensland.
“Robert is an Accredited Personal Injury Specialist, a notation he obtained back in 1998 – this is considered formal recognition of a practitioner’s high level of competency and knowledge and a mark of a true leader in their area of expertise.”
“HBA has always been a firm seen as a refreshing alternative to a traditional law firm in terms of client service and employee experience. But now, as part of Crawford we can elevate that proposition to offer unique services, bold pricing models and create legal solutions at the forefront of technology. I think all this combined is playing a very significant part in the talent we are attracting into this business,” Ablong said.
Parcell said he was looking forward to being part of the only provider in Australia to offer a single supplier integrated claims solution including legal.
“Workers’ compensation is where my primary focus has been for the past 20 years. In this space, the end-to-end claims solution with TPA claims managers and lawyers working side by side collaboratively has enormous benefits to clients in terms of helping to drive down both claim costs and duration.”
“For me, when you make a career move it has to be somewhere where there’s high quality work and great opportunity to take client service to the next level. I’m looking forward to the next chapter with Crawford and HBA,”
Parcell said.
Crawford Australia President Tim Jarman said the addition of legal services was proving attractive to Crawford’s existing client base.
“Clients are genuinely telling us that our offering is game changing because we can handle the entire claim lifecycle under one roof. This provides us with a real differentiator in the Australian market. We are seeing clients drawn to this One Crawford model because, put simply, it takes the hassle out of their claims management by only having to deal with one company for the life of the claim,” Jarman said.
Robert joined HBA on Monday 16 August. HBA has also recently welcomed Mariella Leeman, Solicitor, also formerly of DWF.
