You are involved in a car accident and don't know what to do next. You sustain serious bodily injuries, and your hospital bills are increasing every sunrise. After the accident, you want to receive compensation from your insurer or the at-fault motorist. Negotiating a settlement alone is not advisable, especially if you aren’t a law expert.
While you could chase the compensation alone, it makes sense to engage a personal injury lawyer when you must negotiate with your insurer, when another motorist has blamed you for the accident, or even after sustaining serious injuries. In this article, you learn the circumstances where you need to hire a car accident lawyer, including:
When Your Insurance Adjuster Gives You an Offer
Many victims settle for the initial settlement their insurance companies offer. That’s a blunder. Your insurer is always looking to take advantage of you, especially if you are shying away from wading through murky waters of chasing compensation. While it is human nature to avoid dealing with the red tape, you want to hire a lawyer who has experience with car accidents and personal injury cases. You want to respect your health enough to reject the first offer, as it is never sufficient. Your attorney could hold out for the compensation you deserve.
When You Are Blamed For Causing The Car Accident
After a car crash, no driver wants to be held liable. All motorists involved, together with their insurers, will blame other parties or even you. Therefore, you should be ready to be blamed for causing your injuries too. If you do not challenge these accusations, they could affect your compensation claiming process or the final amount you receive.
Florida is a comparative fault state; hence, you receive compensation proportional to your degree of fault. Your percentage of fault cuts your damages, and if other motorists prove you caused the accident, you cannot collect damages.
Engaging a personal injury attorney could help protect your rights and ensure other parties and insurance do not blame you for the crash. Your attorney could engage an accident reconstruction expert to investigate your accident and determine the accident cause. Not only does the expert unearth the accident cause but also the at-fault party. Your lawyer could then use the findings to chase your rightful compensation.
When Your Insurance Provider Refuses to Pay a Fair Amount
Chasing compensation alone is hectic. The odds are that you could omit vital information or miss deadlines. Since the insurer is looking for loopholes in your claim, they could refuse to compensate you. You cannot understand how your most trusted insurer turns their back against you when you make claims. They deny your claim and delay paying out only to compensate a fraction of the amount you deserve.
If you realize that you cannot receive fair compensation from your insurer or are difficult, you want to talk to a lawyer. Only an experienced personal injury attorney understands the claim process and what you cannot afford not to include in the compensation claim. Never let your insurance firm take advantage of your personal injury case.
When Your Insurer Dispute Liability or It’s Not Clear
More often than not, insurance firms question clients' liability. You cannot tell why they question your liability and the ideal solution. Accepting the insurer’s initial settlement dwindles the hopes of receiving the compensation you deserve. Simply put, your insurer doesn't want to pay out the compensation you deserve.
Proving another at-fault party’s responsibility for your car accident is part of maximizing your compensation. You must prove beyond a reasonable doubt certain elements, including:
- Another motorist owed you a duty of care. The law expects all motorists to drive in a reasonably safe manner. Therefore, you bear the burden of proving that the other party breached the duty by driving in an unsafe manner.
- Another motorist’s breach caused the road crash. While the other driver could be reckless, they could not cause a car accident. After proving that breach, you must show the court that the act caused your car accident.
- Owing to the at-fault party’s breach, you sustained significant injuries.
If you are unsure of who the at-fault party is, you want to consult with a personal injury attorney. The chances are high that another motorist’s insurer will try to blame you for causing the accident. Your lawyer could engage the insurer and protect your rights.
Your attorney could help you maneuver complex liability issues, including:
- Road hazards. Particular authorities are tasked to repair and maintain potholes for safe driving. If a dangerous road caused your accident, you could recover compensation by filing a claim against the liable government entity.
- Vehicle defects. If the road accident happened because of a car defect, you could file a product liability claim against the manufacturer.
- Commercial vehicle accidents. Many car types only compensate for commercial use like delivery vans, rideshare cars, taxis, and semi-trucks. If a commercial accident causes an accident where you sustain injuries, you could sue the driver or employer.
When You Suffered Permanent/ Long-Term Injuries
Your insurer determines the extent of your injuries using various factors, including the injury type you sustained, the projected recovery timeline, and current/ future hospital bills. As an average person, you could be overwhelmed by the volleying that goes back and forth concerning your compensation.
Avoid a war of wits trying to prove that another party caused the car accident that made you sustain permanent injuries through seeking a personal injury attorney’s help. A qualified attorney understands the ins and outs of Florida accident laws and has a strong network of professionals like doctors and other experts who could help prove your disability.
You Need Time to Recover
You could sustain injuries after a car accident, including neck injuries, broken limbs, or traumatic brain injury. If so, you need time to heal as each injury takes its toll. Imagine chasing compensation while in pain. That could be hard and uncomfortable. Recuperate stress-free by hiring a personal injury lawyer to file the claim on your behalf. A trustworthy lawyer will help with all legal paperwork too.
When You Must Negotiate with an Insurance Company
Florida has a ‘no-fault” auto insurance rule where all motorists are required to have personal injury protection (PIP) coverage of $10,000. If you are involved in a car accident, you must engage your insurance provider irrespective of the at-fault party. Your insurer should compensate you after sustaining injuries in the accident.
Even if insurance companies claim to always be on your side, it is not always the case. Insurance firms are looking to increase profit margins by luring you to acquire their insurance policies. Compensating clients when they submit claims cannot allow insurers to achieve high margins. Therefore, your insurer could do anything in their power to ensure they pay you the least compensation possible or zero compensation.
Since insurance companies designed compensation processes, they know how to ensure personal injury claims from clients work in their favor. To fight these firms, you want to hire an experienced lawyer. Your injury attorney can detect the insurer’s tactics and ensure you receive the compensation you deserve. Insurance firms pay out reasonable and fair benefits when a reputable lawyer represents you.
When You are a Novice
The aftermath of a road crash, especially a car accident that causes severe injuries, involves an unending blam game of she-said, he-said. To navigate the complicated process, you must follow particular steps to file a compensation claim against the insurer for your damages. If you are unaware of the exact steps to take after being involved in a car accident, seek a personal injury attorney’s help.
If you attempt to handle your accident case alone, you could trip up on one of the many hurdles, missing the deadline per limitation of statutes laws, having the claim rejected, or even missing out on collecting the damages. Because of the many bottlenecks to receiving the compensation you deserve in a personal injury case, an experienced lawyer is an ideal person to engage. Your attorney knows what to do and when to do it.
If the Car Accident Involved Multiple Parties
Many motorists or parties could be liable for a car accident or damages and injuries caused to you. Filing a claim with your insurer when multiple parties are responsible for an accident could be difficult. Several people are injured, meaning lower compensation for you as the amount is split among many victims. Also, the insurer could lower your compensation if you had a proportional fault in the car crash.
With this type of case, many processes are involved, which could be hard for you to maneuver, especially if you sustained injuries. You want to engage a competent lawyer to help you with the case as you recuperate. Personal accident lawyers have the needed experience to make sure that you are awarded the damages you deserve. Your lawyer could also help with building a strong case to protect you from cross- and counter-claims.
If You Sustained Serious Injuries
The severity of your injuries is a primary determinant of the compensation amounts you could receive after you are involved in a car accident. Insurance firms use various measures to determine the injuries’ severity, including:
- The length of your recovery time.
- The amount of medical and hospital bills incurred.
- Your injury types.
While automobile safety has improved in the past decades, a car accident could cause various catastrophic or serious injuries. These include:
- Internal organs injuries
- Internal bleeding
- Loss of limbs
- Severe burns
- Spinal cord and back injuries
- Neck injuries
- Traumatic brain injury
- Bone fractures
The injuries mentioned above could result in permanent disability and affect your life in different ways. You should be compensated for economic and non-economic damages. Still, the at-fault party's insurer could refuse to pay you what you deserve or try to pay just a part of your rightful compensation.
Therefore, engaging a personal injury lawyer who has worked with insurers could help you obtain the compensation amounts you deserve. The attorney will review your doctor’s reports and find experts to testify about the problems you experience because of the car accident.
If Your Accident Caused You Emotional Distress
After a car accident, Florida law allows you to seek compensatory damage types like economic and non-economic damages. While economic damages compensate for injuries that have a particular value, non-economic ones compensate for subjective injuries. Subjective injuries do not have specific costs, including emotional distress or loss of consortium.
You want to work with an aggressive attorney as non-economic damages are very difficult to determine their monetary value when negotiating a settlement. Negligent/ at-fault parties and insurers alike will attempt to downplay the injuries’ effects on your life. They will try as much as possible to reduce your non-economic damages’ worth.
With the help of a competent lawyer, you could fight the allegations and ensure your damages are valued properly. The risk of losing compensation money is higher if you simply accept a case valuation that the defendant’s lawyer or insurer has done.
Speak With a Jacksonville Personal Injury Attorney Near Me
If the situations mentioned above resemble yours, it’s time to engage a personal injury attorney. Finding an ideal lawyer is hard, but you want a competent one to help you navigate your injury case. Also, the lawyer must be trustworthy and have experience fighting for car accident victims’ rights.
At Jacksonville Personal Injury Attorney, we will investigate the accident cause and build a solid argument to support your claim. We have the resources and expertise to find out the accident facts, including interviewing you, reviewing official reports, and investigating witnesses. By contacting us soon after the accident, we will ensure that you are a step ahead of your insurer.
You have everything to gain and nothing to lose by ensuring that the at-fault party or your insurer does not take advantage of your situation. If you are involved in a car accident in Jacksonville, FL, call us at 904-800-7557 for a free case review. There is zero obligation, and we will answer all questions you might have.
