Your Personal Injury Insurance Coverage Is Minimal – What Do You Do?
Victims of auto accidents face many issues, most notably when they are injured by someone whose insurance coverage is poor, or even nonexistent. Depending on your state of residence, you are required to maintain a certain amount of coverage for property damage and bodily injury. Even if you are covered by the minimum amount of insurance, those with injuries have expenses that are greater than the amount of the insurance.
Set aside the fact that this injury is a life-changing event. Now if the insurance coverage to help pay for the financial aspects of this is inadequate, that only compounds this negative situation. That is where a professional and experienced attorney will help their injured clients.
What coverage do we have to start with? That is one of the first things to try and determine. What do we know exists right now? Sometimes, insurance companies for the defendant don’t like to disclose the amount of coverage they have. However, they can be compelled to provide that information to a qualified attorney. After that, we assess the amount of coverage the defendant has so we can help pay bills right away. But what other coverage is there? What are other possibilities? If we are representing an auto accident victim, if the driver is driving a car of someone else, then the owner of the car has coverage on that car. Is the car a vehicle owned by a company? If so, then there could be a primary policy and also some kind of umbrella policy to pursue.
Were there other parties present for this accident? It’s crucial to explore all of the options that you can take advantage of. There are situations in which an additional driver can be held partially responsible, therefor involving their insurance company also. This might not be simple to determine, but if you want all of your medical bills to be covered by insurance, it’s valuable to explore all of these avenues.
Does the defendant have any other assets? Just because the defendant has low insurance coverage, doesn’t mean they’re off the hook. By using their non-insurance related assets, they can be forced to pay for damages. However, suing for personal assets can be very difficult unless the individual is wealthy.
Now that we know what the maximum coverage amount we can access is, and what other assets the defendant has, now comes the negotiation of how those monies become dispersed. Often times, these negotiations take place between many injured parties to determine who gets paid what from the insurance company, and who gets paid what from the defendant.
The insurance companies can stake a claim too. They can also attempt to recover damages if they feel it is in their best interests to do so. Having a skilled negotiator and lawyer is important during this process. If you are the injured party and trying to deal with all these issues yourself is not the easiest thing to do. Try doing all this while you are trying to recover from your injuries. An experienced injury lawyer will help fight for you, and one that understands the system is a true asset to you.
Finding a good california dog bite attorney Larry Parker specializes in dog bite lawyer california. You the law offices of Larry H. Parker Today
Filed under Legal by .