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An accident that causes serious injuries can change your life. You may not be able to continue working as you once did and may need to deal with bills from multiple medical procedures. You may need to plan for future procedures, physical therapy and may even need to restructure parts of your home for better access.
Those who are in this situation may believe that insurance will cover the cost of their injuries and help them get back on their feet. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. Even in clear cases when there is no question that the other party was at fault, insurance companies are notorious for trying to low-ball or even deny the claim and avoid paying the victim a reasonable recovery. Common tactics can include:
- Look for a loophole. The first step is often an attempt to deny the claim completely. This is often achieved by claiming the accident does not qualify for coverage. The insurance provider may state that the accident was not the result of their customer’s negligence, but instead was your or another party’s fault.
- Pressure to settle. The insurance contact may pressure you to take a settlement early on so you can move on and not worry about the claim, instead focusing on recovery. This is often a tactic used to pressure a victim into accepting a lower recovery rate than what they deserve.
- Question injuries. Insurance providers will also question the severity of the injuries and threaten to carefully review medical records of discrepancies. They may also argue that the injuries were not the result of the accident but preexisting to further lower the chance of your getting a reasonable recovery.
Unfortunately the insurance companies are not the only ones looking to reduce the recovery amount available for victims. A recent law under consideration would limit how much a victim can compensate their attorney. If passed the law would cap the victim’s ability to compensate their legal counsel at 20%. This would limit their ability to hire skilled counsel. To make matters even worse, the law does not put a similar cap on insurance companies — they are free to pay as much as they want. Such a law could result in uneven representation for these types of claims.
