Video benefit for miners

Video-conferencing has saved huge costs for more than 2,000 terminally ill miners claiming compensation, a Welsh law firm claimed last week.Llanelli-based Randall Saunders Phillips...Video-conferencing has saved huge costs for more than 2,000 terminally ill miners claiming compensation, a Welsh law firm claimed last week.Llanelli-based Randall Saunders Phillips & LLoyd represents the miners who are suffering from chronic bronchitis, allegedly caused by exposure to coal dust.The claims are being brought against the Department of Trade and Industry, which has retained Sheffield-based claims management company Irisc to determine the claims.

To avoid the cost of travelling to Sheffield from Llanelli for every hearing, Randalls consulted a local IT company which advised the firm to use video-conferencing.

Annette Bell, Randalls head of industrial litigation, said: When you consider that many of our clients have critical illnesses, time is extremely valuable.

Using Motion Medias system, linked to a document camera, enables us to get through eight weeks of work in a four-hour conference.She added: Before we took on the video-communications technology, I used to have to make a 12-hour round-trip to Sheffield, and be out of the office for two days.

Her clients no longer get charged the cost of her travel, accommodation, and additional time out of the office.Motion Medias (www.motion-media.com) mm120 is a set-top box costing under 2,000.

It connects to a television for videoconferencing, and to a PC for data-sharing.Jeremy Fleming