Signs An Attorney Is Necessary
Usually, for an auto accident victim to make sure he recovers all his case is worth, it requires an auto accident lawyer. It’s possible, on occasion, for an accident victim to handle his claim alone without the help of an attorney. The following is a discussion of some of the circumstances in which the likelihood of you making a full recovery will only be possible by seeking the assistance of an auto accident lawyer.
You’ve Experienced Bodily Harm in the Accident:
If you experienced bodily injuries in your accident, having an attorney handle your claim is wise. If your injuries require more than one or more visits to a physician, you should call an attorney. When a client seeks damages for bodily injuries, insurance companies don’t have to follow predetermined guidelines when deciding how much to compensate you. Legally, they can decide to give you nothing by default, but having an attorney can change the way they perceive your claim. Call our Law Office for assistance if you’ve suffered broken bones, head injuries, back injuries, or any other type of injuries in your wreck.
The Other Driver is Difficult to Deal With:
If the other driver involved in your accident is difficult to deal with either at the scene of the accident or later, it is advisable to call a car accident attorney. If he doesn’t want to give you his contact or insurance information, that could be an early warning sign he wants to make it as hard as possible for you to recover what you deserve. If this occurs, you should seriously consider hiring an attorney.
The Insurance Company Harasses You or Pressures You to Settle:
If you don’t have a lawyer on your side, insurance companies can be very difficult to negotiate with. In essence, insurance companies are out to protect their own interests, and if you’ve been injured, their interests are diametrically opposed to yours. They will utilize adjusters to attempt to discover ways to deny your claims. The adjusters may also call you frequently, asking innocent-sounding questions about your wreck. Their questions may seem well-intentioned, but they are usually always calculated to pry you into saying something detrimental that could be used against you to deny your claim. They will record whatever you say to them, which could come back to haunt you in the future.
We’ve found, at our Law Office, the best avenue for our clients to deal with insurance adjusters is to not deal with them at all. We won’t permit adjusters to call our clients. Instead, we take those calls from the adjusters. If adjusters don’t have the opportunity to talk with our clients, they don’t have the chance to twist our clients’ words to use them against them.
In other situations, an insurance company may pressure you to settle your claim for less than your claim is actually worth. While accepting a fair settlement offer can be beneficial to an accident victim, accepting an unfair, inadequate settlement can be devastating for your legal rights. If you accept the insurance company’s settlement offer, you waive your right to sue the defendant in the future for more compensation for your injuries. Since the settlement is all you can collect from the defendant, it’s important not to accept an inferior offer, unless you are certain it is fair and complete.
Insurance companies realize accident victims are often struggling with cash flow issues, because of high medical bills, repair bills, and often being unable to work due to their injuries. So they hope if they dangle reduced amounts of quick cash in front of you, you will grasp it eagerly, and thereby relieve them of any future obligation for further liability. Settlements accepted from insurance companies before having an attorney on your side, are seldom fair, but they are in most cases, binding. Don’t allow the defendant to use this tactic to pay less than what your claim is worth. Call our auto accident lawyers to discover what your case is really worth so you will have a comparison to know if the defendant’s offer is fair.
You Can’t Afford a Physician or Pay Your Medical Expenses:
Many people don’t have health insurance and aren’t able to pay for the medical treatment needed after being in an accident. Even if an accident victim has health insurance, his benefits may not cover the medical treatment he requires. Regardless of having health insurance or not, many accident victims are hesitant to get treatment for their injuries because they are afraid they cannot afford to take time from work to see a physician.
Seeing a physician and receiving treatment for your injuries after an accident is critical to your health and your lawsuit. If you already have accumulated medical expenses you can’t pay, or you can’t afford the needed treatment, there’s a good chance our personal injury lawyers can help. We regularly work in collaboration with physicians and healthcare professionals and can put help you contact a physician who will consider your financial situation. We are also able to help many of our clients get medical care at no out-of-pocket expense to them. And we can explain to you how the time taken off from work for medical care may be compensated by your defendant.
You Have Bad Feeling About How Your Claim Is Being Handled:
Trust your instincts or gut reaction if you have a bad feeling about how the insurance company is handling your case. Insurance companies are not in business to help individuals. They’re in business to turn a profit. The more creative ways they can create to deny legitimate claims, the more money they’ll make, the better their bottom line looks. If you have a bad feeling, call an attorney, or if any of these circumstances apply:
The insurance company offers you less money than what’s due on your car loan.
The insurance company extends you a settlement offer before the full extent of medical treatment you’ll need is known.
The insurance company offers to pay your claim when you submit your bills but then refuses to do so.
The insurance company fails to offer you a rental car while your vehicle is being serviced by a mechanic.
The insurance company claims their settlement offer is “all you’re entitled to” or “the most you can hope to get”.
The insurance company takes extremely long to respond to your inquiries (usually this signifies they are investigating the claims behind your back).
If none of those circumstances apply, you possibly can handle your case on your own, without the assistance of an attorney. Sometimes, if a plaintiff has been involved in an accident which resulted in property damage only, they have succeeded in protecting their own rights. If your automobile was damaged, but you are fine, insurance companies are restricted by strict guidelines that delineate what they have to pay you to compensate for the damage to the automobile. Insurance companies have little opportunity to rip you off when they reimburse you for repair bills because these guidelines are so limiting.
If you were in an accident where the car alone has been damaged, take down the contact and insurance information of the other driver and then drive your car or have it towed to a repair shop. The mechanic will bill directly your insurance company and then the insurance company will reimburse or pay him. Then your insurance company will look to the other driver’s insurance company for reimbursement. Sometimes a conflict surfaces between the two insurance companies over which one should ultimately be responsible for the expenses. Often they settle their disagreements with no involvement from you through a process termed subrogation. However, if the damage to your vehicle exceeds $5,000, you may need an attorney to represent you if the insurance companies are indecisive about who is to pay.
