Summary: If you were injured as a tourist in Ireland because of someone else's negligence, you can usually make a personal injury claim under Irish law. This is true even after you've flown home. A solicitor in Ireland can run most of the process for you remotely. You generally have two years from the date of the accident to start a claim, and that clock keeps running while you are back home. Most claims begin at the Injuries Resolution Board, and you don't need an Irish PPSN to apply.

Can a tourist claim compensation after an accident in Ireland?

Yes. A visitor injured in Ireland through someone else's fault has broadly the same right to claim compensation as an Irish resident. The basis of the claim is Irish negligence and liability law, not the law of your home country. Your nationality and your residence don't remove the right to claim.

This is the foundation of every tourist injury claim in Ireland. The accident happened on Irish soil, an Irish person or business owed you a duty of care, and that duty was breached. Whether you are from the United States, Australia, Germany or the United Kingdom, the route into the Irish system is the same. The differences appear later, in how cross-border evidence is gathered and, for some visitors, in how a judgment would be enforced.

For the foundational eligibility question on its own, our companion page on whether visitors can claim in Ireland answers it in plain terms.

Why your claim is dealt with under Irish law

A common worry is that a claim has to be handled in the injured person's own country. For an accident that happened in Ireland, that's not how it works. The applicable law is the law of the place the harm occurred. The Rome II Regulation sets this rule across the European Union, and the Irish courts apply Irish law to an injury that happened here.

Where you can sue, and where any award can be enforced, is a separate question from which law applies. Here the position splits by where you are from.

Visitors from the European Union and EEA. The Brussels I Recast Regulation still governs jurisdiction and enforcement between Ireland and other member states. An injured EU resident generally retains the option, in defined circumstances, to pursue the at-fault party's insurer through their home courts. In practice, most visitors still find the Irish route simpler, because the accident, the evidence and the witnesses are in Ireland.

Visitors from the United Kingdom. Since Brexit, the Brussels I Recast Regulation no longer applies to the United Kingdom. The direct-action route that once let an injured UK resident sue an Irish insurer in the courts of England, Scotland or Wales is no longer straightforward. For UK visitors, the practical position is to bring the claim in Ireland, through Irish solicitors and the Irish system. Enforcing an Irish judgment back in the UK is now more streamlined than in the immediate post-Brexit years: the 2019 Hague Judgments Convention came into force for the UK on 1 July 2025 and provides a treaty-based route for recognising and enforcing judgments in proceedings begun on or after that date. Even so, early advice matters, because the Convention has conditions and exclusions and does not cover every situation.

The jurisdiction question deserves more room than a hub page can give it. Our detailed guide on how tourist claims work under Irish law covers the applicable-law and forum points in full, including the post-Brexit detail for UK visitors.

Three ways to find your path

Tourist injury claims in Ireland cover a wide range of situations. The fastest way to the right guidance is to start from where you are. We call this the Visitor Claim Map, three routes into the same Irish system. Choose the route that matches your position, then follow the link to the detail.

The Visitor Claim Map is the overview. Each link leads to a focused guide for that situation, so you only read what applies to you.

Making your Irish claim after you have gone home

The biggest unmet worry for injured visitors is logistics. You're home, the accident is in another country, and the system is unfamiliar. The reassuring reality is that an Irish solicitor can run most of a tourist injury claim remotely. We map this as the Non-Resident Claim Pathway, five stages your solicitor runs for you, most of them without you leaving home. Documents move by email and post, and calls and video handle the rest.

The Non-Resident Claim Pathway sits behind every route on the Visitor Claim Map. In the visitor claims we run, the stage that surprises people most is how much moves by email and video rather than in person. Here is what each stage involves.

The five stages of the Non-Resident Claim Pathway:

1. Instruct an Irish solicitor and open the file, usually from your home country.
2. Gather the accident evidence in Ireland, including Garda records, CCTV requests, incident reports and witness details.
3. Obtain the medical report the Injuries Resolution Board requires, with the examination sometimes arranged near you.
4. Prepare and submit the Injuries Resolution Board application on your behalf.
5. Correspond with the insurer and negotiate, then move to assessment or, if it does not settle, court.

A return visit can arise in two situations. The first is an independent medical examination, where the other side or your own solicitor wants a doctor in Ireland to assess your injuries. Some examinations can be arranged in your home country, although not always. The second is a court hearing, if the claim does not settle and goes to trial. Most claims resolve before that stage.

The practical mechanics, including gathering evidence once you are no longer in the country, run through this same pathway. Our page on tourist accident claims sets out the early evidence steps in detail.

Time limits: the two-year clock keeps running

The general time limit for a personal injury claim in Ireland is two years. The two-year period was set by section 7 of the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004, which amended the earlier limitation legislation and reduced the period from three years to two. For visitors, two points matter more than the headline number.

The date of knowledge. The two years does not always start on the day of the accident. It starts on the date you knew, or ought to have known, four things. These are that you were injured, that the injury was significant, that another person's act caused it, and who that person is. For an injury that appears later, this can move the start date. This date of knowledge test comes from the Statute of Limitations (Amendment) Act 1991.

Sourcing evidence from abroad takes time. Translated medical records, reports from a doctor at home and documents from Ireland all add weeks. In our experience the records that take longest are foreign medical notes, so we ask for them early. Because the two-year period is suspended only once a complete Injuries Resolution Board application is acknowledged, delay in assembling that application can put the deadline at risk. Early contact with a solicitor protects the timeline.

Symptoms that emerge after a trip can start the clock late, which is why early advice matters even months later.

One early step is easy to miss. You, or your solicitor, should put the wrongdoer on notice in writing within one month of the accident, a requirement of the Civil Liability and Courts Act 2004 as amended in 2019. Missing it does not end your claim. A court can, though, reduce or refuse your legal costs, so contacting a solicitor quickly helps even when you are already home.

The Injuries Resolution Board for non-residents

Most visitor claims start at the Injuries Resolution Board, and you can apply without an Irish PPSN. The Board, formerly the Personal Injuries Assessment Board, assesses the value of a claim where liability is not seriously in dispute, without the cost of a full court case. The statutory basis is the PIAB Act 2003, and the process is described by the Injuries Resolution Board in our dedicated guide.

For a visitor, several points are worth knowing up front.

You don't need a PPSN. The Board accepts a passport, a national identity card or a driving licence as proof of identity from a claimant who has no Irish Personal Public Service Number. This removes one of the first hurdles visitors expect to face. The current forms and guidance are on the injuries.ie forms page.

Form B is required. A medical report on the Board's Form B must accompany the application. Without a complete application, including that report, the application is not treated as made and the two-year clock is not suspended. Coordinating this report is one of the things a solicitor handles for an overseas client.

The Board does not assess everything. Some matters fall outside the Injuries Resolution Board and go a different way. The Board does not assess claims arising from assault or medical negligence. If you were assaulted, or if a hospital treated you negligently, the route is different, as the next section explains.

What can you claim for, and how is the amount decided?

Compensation has two parts: general damages for the injury itself, and special damages for financial losses you can prove. General damages cover the pain, the suffering and the effect on your life. Special damages cover costs you can vouch, such as medical bills, the price of getting home, and lost earnings.

The value of general damages is guided by the Personal Injuries Guidelines, which came into effect on 24 April 2021 and replaced the older Book of Quantum. They set out ranges by injury type and severity and apply to assessments by the Injuries Resolution Board and to awards by the courts. A review proposed an across-the-board increase, but those amendments have not been approved by the Oireachtas, so the 2021 Guidelines remain the ones in force.

Two features of the Guidelines matter for visitors. The first is the use of severity bands. Injuries are grouped from minor through to severe and permanent, with a range for each, and where a case sits depends on the medical evidence. The second is the multiple injuries rule. Where you suffer several injuries, the values are not simply added together. The most serious injury is assessed first, then the figure is adjusted upward to reflect the others, which avoids both under-compensation and double-counting.

Awards vary case by case, and no solicitor can promise a figure. For how injury values and damages are calculated in practice, see our detailed damages guide.

Your healthcare as a visitor, and the costs you can recover

What your treatment costs depends on where you are from, and the bills you pay can become part of your claim. Access to Irish public health services for visitors is decided mainly by residency status, not by tax paid. This matters twice over, because the medical costs you pay become part of the special damages you can seek to recover.

For official detail on entitlement, see Citizens Information on health services for visitors. Keep all receipts and discharge letters. Whatever you pay for treatment, repatriation and follow-up care at home can form part of your claim, subject to evidence.

Travel insurance and your injury claim work together

Travel insurance and a personal injury claim are not alternatives. They do different jobs and often run side by side. Your policy is there for the urgent things, such as emergency treatment, hospital costs and repatriation. A personal injury claim addresses the harm caused by another party's fault, which a travel policy does not pay for.

Where an insurer has paid your medical costs, it may later seek to recover that money from any compensation you receive, through a process called subrogation. This is normal, and a solicitor will account for it so you are not left worse off. The two routes are explained in full in our guide to travel insurance and Irish injury claims.

The sections above explain how a visitor's claim works in general. The rest of this guide covers specific accident types and special situations, and points you to the focused page for each.

Common visitor accidents, and where to get the detail

Tourists are injured in Ireland in a recognisable set of situations. Each has its own guidance, and most also connect to the law that governs the underlying accident. Use this section to jump to the detail for your situation.

The accident-type guides own the visitor angle. The linked mechanism pages explain how the underlying claim works, so you do not read the same thing twice.

Hit by an uninsured or hit-and-run driver? You can still claim. The Motor Insurers' Bureau of Ireland compensates people hurt by uninsured or untraced drivers, and visitors are covered. Report the crash to the Gardai quickly and keep the incident reference number. Your claim then goes through the Injuries Resolution Board naming the Bureau, and the same Personal Injuries Guidelines apply to the value.

Occupiers' liability and the 2023 changes that affect visitors

The duty owed to you depends on how the law classifies your visit, and these rules changed in 2023. Many tourist injuries happen on someone's premises, from a hotel floor to a historic site. The detail lives on our page about the Occupiers' Liability Act 1995. The overview matters here because the classification affects whether a claim is realistic.

Under the Occupiers' Liability Act 1995, people on a premises fall into categories with different levels of protection.

The Courts and Civil Law (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2023 amended the 1995 Act, with the changes commencing on 31 July 2023. Three points affect visitors directly.

• A statutory balancing test. The court must now weigh defined factors, including the likelihood of an accident, the severity of possible injury, the cost and practicality of removing the danger, and the social value of the activity.
• Reckless disregard for recreational users. For recreational users and trespassers, an occupier is liable only where it acted with reckless disregard. Ordinary carelessness isn't enough. The threshold for a claim after a fall on a free mountain trail is higher than for a slip in a hotel lobby.
• Accepting a risk without signing anything. A court can now find that you accepted a risk based on your words or conduct alone. A signed waiver is no longer needed for an occupier to rely on voluntary assumption of risk.

Accidents on public footpaths and roads. A separate rule applies to local authorities. Where a council simply failed to repair a footpath or road, that failure to act is generally not enough to ground a claim. Where the council carried out a repair negligently and created a hazard, a claim can follow. This distinction often decides whether a trip on a public path is actionable.

Two cases that show how courts treat visitor accidents

Two appeal decisions show how Irish courts apply these rules to the kind of accidents visitors actually have.

If a crime caused your injury, or you were treated negligently

Two situations sit outside the Injuries Resolution Board: a violent crime, and negligent medical treatment. Visitors are sometimes caught out by both.

You were the victim of a crime. If your injury came from a violent crime, such as an assault, the claim does not go to the Injuries Resolution Board. Compensation may instead be available through the State's Scheme of Compensation for Personal Injuries Criminally Inflicted. Visitors can apply. The scheme has covered out-of-pocket costs and loss of earnings rather than general damages, though the Court of Justice of the EU ruled that exclusion incompatible with EU law in 2025 and reform is expected. Report the incident to the Gardai as soon as you can, because a report is usually required.

If you live in another European Union country, you do not have to come back to apply. Under the EU cross-border rules you can lodge the application through an assisting authority in your home country, which passes it to the Irish deciding authority. This route exists precisely for visitors who were harmed while abroad.

You were treated negligently. If a hospital or clinician in Ireland treated you negligently while caring for your original injury, that is a medical negligence claim. It bypasses the Injuries Resolution Board and proceeds through the courts. These claims are more complex and need specialist advice early.

Children injured on holiday, and visitors who booked a package

A child's claim is run by an adult acting as next friend, and any settlement is held by the court until the child turns 18.

Children. A child under 18 can't bring a personal injury claim alone in Ireland. An adult, usually a parent, acts as the child's "next friend" to start the claim. Where a settlement is reached for a child, an Irish judge must approve it, and the money is generally held by the court until the child turns 18. A child also has a window of two years from their 18th birthday to bring a claim themselves. Families expecting an immediate payout to cover holiday medical bills should plan around this. The court rules set out the next friend role.

Package bookings. If you booked your trip to Ireland as a package, you may have a separate contractual route against the organiser, alongside the injury claim against the party at fault. This is a specialised area, and it sits apart from the core visitor claim covered on this page. Raise it with your solicitor so the best route is chosen.

What to do next

If you were injured as a visitor to Ireland, the useful next steps are simple. Keep your medical records and receipts. Note the names and contact details of anyone who saw what happened. If you can, photograph the place where you were hurt. Then take advice while the two-year period is comfortably ahead of you.

Gary Matthews Solicitors acts for injured visitors from across the world and runs the Non-Resident Claim Pathway for clients who are already back home. Most visitors we speak to are surprised they can begin without returning to Ireland. You can talk through your situation in a no obligation consultation.

Common questions from injured visitors

Related guides for visitors: Can tourists claim • How claims work • Claiming from abroad • Time limits • Personal injury claims