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Far too often, injured people are mistreated by a negligent corporation and by the insurance industry.
The insurance companies step in after people are hurt and take advantage of them, giving them bad advice and cheap settlement and basically lying about the value of their cases.
Someone is injured through no fault of his own, or a family member or loved one is killed because of the recklessness of another person. It is clear that the other person is at fault. At first, it seems like the insurance company or negligent individual will not fight the case and will pay a quick settlement.
The insurance adjuster will ask the injured person to “Sign a few forms” or give a “recorded statement.” The insurance person acts nice and promises that the proper party will accept fault.
Then, after a while, the insurance company keeps asking for a bunch of information, forms, and paper. The adjuster stops calling back. The accident victim cant’ reach anyone or get any information from the company. Sometimes, they will try to make the injured person sign something before receiving medical attention.
Insurance companies do not treat injured victims fairly! That means that if you’ve been injured in an accident, you are in for a fight! That’s why it’s important to contact an experienced personal injury attorney at The Weinberger Law Firm to fight the greedy insurance companies for your fair compensation.
Insurance Myths After a Car Accident
Myth #1: You must sign every document the adjuster sends you – You are not required to sign a release of information for the other person’s insurance company. While an adjuster may want to look at your medical and employment records to assess your injuries, they do not have a right to the documents unless a lawsuit has been filed.
Myth #2: You have to give the adjuster a recorded statement – If a lawsuit hasn’t been filed, you do not have any obligation to give a statement to the other guy’s insurance company, recorded or otherwise. In fact, these often work against you because the adjuster can ask virtually question without objection and the claimant locks him or herself into answers early in the claim. It is important to speak to an attorney before agreeing to a recorded statement. Often an attorney will sit in on a recorded statement to protect your case.
Myth #3: Insurance adjusters are always honest with claimants – In the days after a claim is opened, the adjuster’s goal is to find out as much as possible about a claim to find any weakness to exploit. Adjusters can sometimes say something just to see if the claimant will give them what they want or to see how the individual reacts. There have been documented instances of insurance companies using fraudulent means to get a claimant to accept a low settlement offer.
Myth #4: The insurance companies will make a reasonable offer to settle your claim to avoid having to hire an attorney to defend the case – This is simply not true. The insurance companies see this as nothing more as a cost of doing business. Also, there is an increasing trend towards insurance companies using in-house counsel, meaning that they don’t have to pay attorneys by the hour to represent them. Therefore, these companies are not saving by avoiding a lawsuit.
Myth #5: There is a set of quotations to estimate the value of the claim – You might have heard that a claim should be worth three times the amount of a medical bill that you incurred from the accident. However, the reality is that this is not true because every case is different. For instance, if you were to break your ribs, there would be little a doctor could do to treat your injuries and your appointment would be sporadic over a number of months. However, your pain and suffering would be great. Every move you make would be agonizing and even breathing would be painful. That case would have relatively low medical bills. On the other hand, if your injury is to your muscles and soft tissue in your neck or back, you would need regular treatment, sometimes on a daily basis, while the injury healed. Your pain and suffering would probably be considerably less than the case of a broken rib, but the bills for treatment would probably be higher.
If You Are Injured, the Insurance Company Has All the Power
When you are injured due to someone else’s negligence or recklessness, you are in a position of weakness. You’ve got medical bills to pay. You’ve got to figure out what to do with your job, how to make ends meet, how to take care of your family. The negligent person doesn’t have those concerns. And the negligent person probably has an insurance company working for him or her to help defend against you.
The insurance company will see thousands of injury claims each year. The insurance company will have “adjusters” whose only job is to save the insurance company money and defeat claims by injured people. These adjusters are very good at what they do. Most experienced adjusters will have handled hundreds of thousands of claims. They will know how to trick the injured person into doing something that hurts his or her case. They will know how to make it seem like they are your best friends or have your best interest at heart.
The Adjusters Are Not Your Best Friend and Do Not Have Your Best Interest at Heart
So, if you are hurt by someone else’s negligence it is important to contact a Folsom accident attorney Joe Weinberger at the Weinberger Law Firm. Protect your legal rights and call (916) 357-6767 to schedule a free consultation with a Folsom accident attorney Joe Weinberger.
