With regards to your car insurance, two types exist – liability coverage and property damage. If the other party sustains injury in an accident that was your fault, then that coverage applies to the liability coverage. Most of these accidents should definitely be reported to your carrier, even if the damage was only minimal.

How can you know if the accident should be reported or not? If there is only property damage and no body injury, then it may be ok to withold it from the insurance carrier. You could simply pay for the damages yourself to avoid a claim on your insurance policy record.

If there is any potential for an injury however, the claim should at least be reported. For instance if you rear end another auto going only five miles an hour, you may not need to report a claim after speaking with the other driver. However, what is necessary is to at least tell your insurance company about the crash.

You should explain the details of the incident, provide them the location of the accident, the other vehicle information,the other driver’s info along with that of the passengers. It may be that you pay for some minor property damage and then nothing else comes of it. However if a few months later the driver or the other vehicle’s passenger(s) does have some pain in the back, and you have notified your insurance company about the accident, you will be covered under your policy. If you have not notified them prior, the insurance company may say they are not obligated to cover you.

Definitely report any claims involving incidents with minors, pedestrians, or cyclists. Say for instance you are backing out of the driveway and you almost hit a child on a bike. The kid is not actually injured, but his bike is hit and ruined. There is not even a scratch on the kid. Even if the parents and the child apologize big time for the incident, it should still be reported to your insurance company.

This could resolve any legal problem in the future if documented so that you are protected from any potential legal issues. You may want to still buy the child a new bicycle, but you should also notify your insurance company. They wouldn’t be obligated to defend you if you didn’t and a claim for injury ever resulted.

The bottom line is you should have a low threshhold for reporting to your carrier. When it comes to liability, you can never be too careful and discussing with your carrier and notifying them of the accident can help with their need to defend you later.

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After being in a car accident that was not your fault, you may unfortunately need to deal with the at fault driver’s insurance carrier. If you then become upset with the insurance companies you will want to know if there is anything that can be done about it?

The answer is yes, you may have a claim against the insurance company for bad faith. Bad faith is when the insurance company is treating you unreasonably or outrageously. Besides the money that the insurance company already owes you, they may have to pay you more money as punitive damages as punishment for this unreasonable or outrageous behavior.

Insurance carriers tend to fight very hard against it when individuals file bad faith claims. Trying to take care of getting compensated by yourself for a bad faith claim is very difficult without a personal injury attorney. This attorney should let the insurance company know that there is a responsibility to their clients.

The primary reason insurance companies are in business is to make a profit, so they have an conflict of interest when it comes to paying out settlements. The veteran PI lawyer will contact the insurance company to put them on notice of their duty to protect client rights and obey state law.

It’s not a surprise that insurance companies will try to blame you for the accident if they can find any way to do so in order that they do not have to pay you. Here’s an example. You have an accident where the other driver turns right in front of you and the police issues a ticket to the other driver. The insurance company will frequently try to blame you for 50% of the responsibility of the accident. When you question this they may say that you failed to keep a proper lookout. After you finish laughing hysterically trying to figure out what they meant by proper lookout since there was no possible way to avoid the accident, you realize that the person on the other end of the phone is serious and then arguing with that person is not going to get you anywhere.

The issue here is that if the at fault driver’s insurance company can get you to admit some fault whether it adds to 25 or 50% they will avoid paying you. What makes it worse is that if any substantial percentage is found, your own carrier may elevate your rates. This is why in this instance a veteran personal injury lawyer can make sure this doesn’t happen to you.

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A lot of people don’t understand “no-fault” insurance. There are 2 requirements involved:

*It mandates that drivers maintain insurance for their own protection

*Limitations are placed on the lawsuit ability versus opposing drivers for sustained damages

With a no-fault policy,you would be reimbursed for damages incurred up to the limits of your policy. This monetary figure occurs regardless of whether or not you were at fault in the accident. If other drivers were involved, they would have coverage with their own policies.

In a system that is a true no-fault one, the driver or the vehicle would receive complete coverage with the insurance policy. In addition, the driver would not have the right to sue another vehicle’s driver for damages.

There are currently 12 states utilizing a no-fault system, and interestingly, none have a pure no-fault model. States institute a hybrid model of no-fault mixed with the standard liability model. Lawsuits are permitted in certain instances, and it’s a good idea to read about your individual state’s model.

No-fault insurance benefits? No-fault insurance guarantees drivers medical care access right after an accident. One of the main intents with the system was to reduce the legal and administrative fees associated with insurance claims. In theory, the insurance premiums should go down in this situation.

Due to remaining liability issues as no state has in place a true no-fault mode, one’s insurance premiums do tend to go up however. Personal injury protection is one term that is used to refer to no-fault. Numerous states include varying coverages with this, but most involve injury expenses such as medical costs, funeral expenses, wages, and death benefits.

No state uses a pure no-fault model, and drivers can still be held responsible financially in some instances. Certain states allow lawsuits when the case reaches a certain dollar amount, while other states allow lawsuits based on severity standards.

Critics of the system argue that reckless or negligent drivers are not punished sufficiently. Also it is routinely seen that insurance premiums in no-fault states are the highest in the US. Proponents of no-fault insurance state that in areas with a high number of uninsured drivers, parties at fault are often unable to pay liability damages anyway. Also, those in favor say accidents are inevitable, so why punish those at-fault necessarily?

Three of the no-fault states allow drivers to decide between this system and a traditional tort system. Kentucky and New Jersey allows this decision, and if the driver does not decide he or she is assigned the no-fault option by default. The opposite is true in Pennsylvania, where the full tort option is the default.

Several states have taken away their no-fault laws. In the 1970′s 2 dozen states put laws into effect, and at this point only half have kept them.

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Personal injury protection, also termed PIP, represents insurance coverage that people obtain to assist with covering medical bills and other expenses after a motorcycle, truck, or car accident. If one has it, the insurance covers expenses regardless of whether or not the individual was at fault.

In some states, personal injury protection is mandatory, while in most it is optional. Usually PIP will not maintain coverage for farm equipment injuries, off road or recreational vehicle injuries, or mopeds. Often racing activities are excluded, and if the person was committing a felony while in the crash, that would probably be excluded too.

PIP is often called “no-fault” coverage, as it is designed to be paid out regardless of fault or legal responsibility. An insured’s premium is not supposed to increase when a PIP claim takes place. Personal injury protection covers anyone named on the policy along with anyone who is blood related in the house (or a legal guardian situation). If the accident involves non-family passengers, they are covered as well. Covered expenses may include medical expenses of any sort to funeral expenses.

At times a personal injury protection policy may include uninsured motorist coverage, or that may need to be obtained separately in some states. If the person at fault has no insurance, he or she will most likely not be able to pay for the damages and medical expenses, so the uninsured coverage may be just as important as the PIP policy itself.

If you are a younger driver your PIP policy in a state where it’s not mandatory may be more expensive than average. This is a statistical calculation based on younger drivers more often being involved in car accidents more frequently. Regulations for Personal Injury Protection vary depending on the state in which one lives. PIP is mandatory in the following states: Utah, Oregon, North Dakota, New York, New Jersey, Minnesota, Michigan, Massachusetts, Maryland, Kentucky, Kansas, Hawaii, Florida, Delaware, Colorado and Pennsylvania. In two states, Texas and Washington, it is mandatory unless a waiver is signed at the initial policy purchase.

The exact insurance will vary between states. Some insurance may cover massage and acupuncture, while others may not. In certain states, it is ok to have a worker’s comp claim along with a PIP one. Personal injury protection limits have a broad range of coverage among states, varying from $1500 up to around $250,000. Individuals should submit their own health insurance info when seeking treatment, as this will allow a larger settlement for the person at the case end.

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If you are hit by another vehicle in an auto accident and you sustain personal injuries with the fault being another person’s, you may be eligible to get money damages from that invididual. If the person’s auto insurance carrier agrees to fund the cost of your injuries and accept responsibility for your property that was damaged, it may not be needed to hire a personal injury attorney.

However, if the person responsible is not cooperating or you find that the insurance company will not pay you fairly, it may be in your best interest to hire a personal injury attorney experienced in leveling the playing field for you and getting you the money you deserve.

Becoming a lawyer involves learning a different mindset of thinking. Similar to a chess player who learns how to think multiple moves ahead, PI lawyers with lots of experience anticipate the insurance company moves, putting your interests at play. The leverage the auto insurance companies have by dealing with you directly can be negated by your own “chess player” attorney.

Veteran PI lawyers usually know what your case is worth by weighing all of the direct and indirect injuries and having the experience to know the potential worth. Knowing these factors may maximize your settlement, making sure money is not left behind. Most PI lawyers work on a contingency fee, which means they do not get upfront money and have a stake in the result. If the case fails, the victim will not have to pay anything.

Have you heard of cases where insurance companies use pressure or delay tactics to force a bad settlement? Do not bend to these tactics. Your case just may be more complicated than you know.

For instance, the insurance company at fault may offer to pay for your vehicle’s damages completely and then reimburse dollar for dollar medical expenses? Isn’t that sufficient? The answer is no, it’s not.

Once your car is fixed completely, it will not be worth what it was before the accident. This is termed diminished value and should be negotiated into a settlement. When you eventually go to sell your vehicle, the damage history will become evident and will factor into the auto’s value. Having received money from the diminished value calculation will help ease the pain of that calculation.

People should do what they do best, and not become attorneys when it comes to their own personal injury cases after a car accident. Only in simple circumstances should you deal with the opposing insurance company by yourself.

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