QuestionGood Afternoon,
In a nutshell, I was in an accident approximately 2 years ago where someone turned in front of me. I impacted their vehicle at approximately 45mph resulting in a total loss of my vehicle. I felt OK (shock) after the accident and ultimately waited until the next day to go to the ER. I was worried about reinjury to an ankle reconstruction as well as neck and back were very sore. Ultimately diagnosed with ankle sprain and soft tissue strain in the neck and back, instructed to follow up with orthopaedic doc. Between ER and followup, shoulder started really hurting where the seatbelt came across. Doc ordered MRI and started me on therapy and referred me to shoulder doc. Ended up having surgery to debride torn labrum and torn subscapularis. Went through more therapy and ultimately had another MRI about 1 year ago due to continued pain. Have had three cortizone injections in the mean time. Biceps tendon remained injured and wouldn't heal resulting in biceps tenodesis. Subscapularis had also ruptured at the site where it was previously debrided. I now have a life long anatomical change and daily pain. Settled with his company for policy limits of $25,000. With stacked coverage, my insurance bills are $70,000 billed, $16,500 subrogation (actually paid#. We started negotiating at $300,000 #policy limits) they are offering just over $100,000. We have been back and forth for weeks and are only at about $275 - $125. Am I out of the ballpark or are they just being difficult. I have told them they need to get upwards of $200,000 for us to talk. I am now dealing with stress induced illness over all of this and wonder if I should just walk away and hire an attorney or if I am on the right path. At what point do I declare bad faith and walk away?
Answer Hello Chris,
First my sympathies.
I strongly, actually very strongly urge you to obtain a personal injury attorney. Make certain the attorney has plenty of experience, most of all to include trial experience. There are untold numbers of personal injuries that have no courtroom experience, instead they spend literally all of their time settling. While a settlement might well be the solution, you want to make certain that your attorney is qualified to go to trial if necessary.
Based on my experience, I can tell you with relative certainty that you are very unlikely to achieve a fair settlement on your own. It doesn't matter that this is your insurance company, UM claims are every bit as difficult to negotiate - if not harder to negotiate - than BI liability claims are.
Why is this? Because the carrier does not feel "threatened" by you. Presumably you don't completely understand all of the ramifications, and you can be lowballed.
Your injuries are clearly profound and permanent. You are entitled to your special damages which are measured by hospital bills and lost wages - those things that are easily measured. But I'm not seeing any consideration of your general damages. Those are more difficult to value monetarily and include such things as pain and suffering, loss of consortium, or emotional trauma. You are absolutely entitled to both special and general damages.
Combining the two, you might well be entitled to your policy limits. But you'll have great difficulty establishing that without the assistance of a skilled attorney.
Now, of course, the attorney will get his percentage - usually 30% pre-trial and 40% after suit. But my guess is that even after the attorney gets his cut, you will still be ahead of what you could negotiate on your own.
If I were in your position, I wouldn't even consider negotiating this claim without hiring a skilled PI attorney.
Bad faith? Well, of course I don't have access to what is going on with the claim investigation - or lack thereof. As the name implies, fairly negotiated settlements would probably not be bad faith. But if it could be established that the insurance company was exclusively acting in its own interests rather than yours and that they were actively not considering your losses, that might be stepping into bad faith. Generally speaking bad faith is defined in most all states by the NAIC (National Assoc of Insurance Commissioners) "Unfair Claims Settlement Practices Act".
For more information on that, you can visit my website, this particular page: http://solutionsforyourinsuranceclaim.com/Bad-Faith-Claims-Settlement-Regulation
Also look at the page concerning Bad Faith claims.
In any event, if there is an indication of bad faith, your attorney should be able to identify it. However, bad faith is often a specialty that goes beyond the practice of personal injury.
For now, get yourself a reputable PI attorney. Do some online research, check histories and backgrounds online. As well, many state bars will also provide referrals.
I wish you well.
Jane Pytel
http://SolutionsForYourInsuranceClaim.com
http://FloridaAutoInsuranceCentral.com
